Less than a week after North Korea announced it would stop sending balloons carrying trash to South Korea, the authoritarian state has resumed this unorthodox campaign.
In response to the ongoing balloon conflict, South Korea has suspended a 2018 military pact with the North and resumed loudspeaker broadcasts, playing hit singles by K-pop band BTS and foreign news across the border.
Since late May, North Korea has launched over 1,000 balloons filled with trash and manure into South Korea. North Korea’s vice defense minister stated that this was a "tit-for-tat" response to South Korean activists sending balloons with leaflets criticizing North Korea’s human rights abuses.
North Korea is highly sensitive to these leaflets because most of its 26 million people lack official access to foreign TV and radio.
After launching over 700 balloons, North Korean vice defense minister Kim Kang Il announced on June 2 that the balloon activities would cease, claiming North Korea had made its point. However, he warned the campaign would resume if South Korean activists continued to send leaflets.
“We made [South Korea] experience how unpleasant it feels and how much effort is needed to remove the scattered wastepaper,” Kim said.
Undeterred, a South Korean activist group led by North Korean defector Park Sang-hak launched 10 balloons carrying 200,000 anti-North Korean leaflets, U.S. dollar bills, and USB sticks with K-pop songs and K-drama TV shows on Thursday. Another activist group also sent balloons with 200,000 propaganda leaflets on Friday.
In retaliation, North Korea resumed sending trash-filled balloons to South Korea.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff reported detecting around 330 balloons launched by the North since Saturday night, with about 80 found in South Korean territory by Sunday morning. The balloons dropped trash, including plastic and paper waste, but no hazardous substances. Previous waves also included animal feces and manure.
Kim Yo-jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, stated on Sunday that the trash balloons would continue as long as South Korea wages “psychological warfare” against the North.
“This is a prelude to a very dangerous situation,” Kim Yo-jong said. “[South Korea] will suffer the embarrassment of picking up waste paper daily.”
The South Korean military has mobilized chemical response and explosive clearance units to retrieve the balloons and alerted the public to report suspicious balloons.
Following the initial wave of balloons, South Korea suspended the 2018 military agreement with the North, which had ended military training and inflammatory broadcasts near the border. Last year, North Korea declared it was no longer bound by the agreement and began redeploying troops and weapons at border posts.
With the 2018 pact effectively dead, South Korea redeployed its loudspeakers along the border and resumed anti-Pyongyang broadcasts on Sunday. These broadcasts included BTS hits, weather forecasts, news about Samsung, and criticism of the North’s missile program and crackdown on foreign media.
While North Korea has reinstalled its own loudspeakers near the border, they had not been turned on as of Tuesday morning. North Korean broadcasts have typically praised their system and censured South Korea.
In 2015, similar loudspeaker broadcasts led to an exchange of artillery fire across the border, though no casualties were reported.
There are concerns that this psychological warfare could escalate into direct military clashes. “Both Koreas are trying to pressure and deter each other with symbolic actions,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. “The problem is that neither side wants to back down, increasing the risk of unintended conflict.”
— With files from The Associated Press
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