The North Korean leader’s powerful sister yesterday said that the country has never taken down propaganda loudspeakers and would not do so, calling South Korea’s belief that Pyongyang was responding to its peace overtures a “pipedream.”
Kim Yo-jong, who is a senior official in North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party, also said that adjustments made to the plan for annual joint military drills by South Korea and the US were a “futile” move that did not change the allies’ hostile intent.
Kim, who officials and analysts believe speaks for her brother, has in the past few weeks rebuffed moves taken by South Korea’s new liberal government aimed at easing tension between the two sides.
Photo: Sputnik / Vladimir Smirnov / Reuters
“I am confident that Seoul’s policy towards the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] remains unchanged and can never change,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency quoted Kim as saying.
South Korea’s military last week said it detected moves by North Korea’s military to dismantle some propaganda loudspeakers directed at the South, following similar moves by Seoul.
The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff yesterday said it stood by its assessment of activities it had observed at some parts of the border, adding it was continuing to monitor the situation.
South Korea Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesman Lee Sung-jun said he believed caution was needed when interpreting statements made by North Korea to avoid being misled and that Pyongyang had often made “claims that are untrue.”
Lee did not directly address a question about a news report that North Korea had taken down only one loudspeaker out of the dozens it had positioned along the border.
There has been cautious optimism in the South that the North might be responding positively to a policy by South Korean President Lee Jae-myung to engage Pyongyang after a period of cross-border tension and even show willingness to return to dialogue.
However, Kim said that North Korea would not be sitting down with the US for dialogue, saying reports raising the possibilities of such a development were “false suppositions.”
Hong Min, a senior analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification, said that Pyongyang likely anticipated further conciliatory gestures by Seoul and might be trying to pace the development, while driving home leader Kim Jong-un’s earlier vow to permanently break off ties with South Korea.
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