North Korea leader denies removing propaganda loudspeakers at border

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister has rebutted South Korea’s claims that Pyongyang removed some of its propaganda-blasting loudspeakers along the border.

North Korea has “never removed” the speakers and “are not willing to remove them”, Kim Yo Jong said in a statement published by state media KCNA on Thursday.

“We have clarified on several occasions that we have no will to improve relations with [South Korea],” she said, adding that this stance “will be fixed in our constitution in the future”.

South Korea’s military said earlier this week that North Korea had removed some of its loudspeakers along the border – days after South Korea dismantled some of its own.

Kim, the deputy director of North Korea’s propaganda department, said Seoul’s claim was an “unfounded unilateral supposition and a red herring”.

Besides propaganda messages, South Korea’s broadcasts often blasted K-pop songs across the border. while North Korea played unsettling noises such as howling animals.

South Korean residents living near the border had complained that their lives were being disrupted been by the noise from both sides, sometimes in the middle of the night.

Pyongyang considers Seoul’s propaganda broadcasts an act of war and has threatened to blow up the speakers in the past.

South Korea’s speaker broadcasts resumed in June 2024 after a six year pause under impeached president Yoon Suk Yeol who took a more hardline stance against the North.

They were restarted after Pyongyang began sending rubbish-filled balloons to the South in response to increased tensions.

The relationship appeared to have thawed under new President Lee Jae Myung, who campaigned on improving inter-Korean ties.

South Korea halted its broadcasts along the demilitarised zone shortly after Lee took office in June, in what the country’s military described as a bid to “restore trust” and “achieve peace on the Korean Peninsula”.

Still, ties between the two neighbours remain uneasy. Earlier this week, North Korea warned of “resolute counteraction” to provocations ahead of joint military drills between South Korea and the US.