North Korea Says It’s Cutting Communications With South Korea
North Korea to sever official communication because South Korea had “connived” to carry out “hostile acts” against the country.
(Bloomberg) -- North Korea said it was shutting a liaison office it shares with South Korea from Tuesday and severing communication over a leaders’ hot line, putting pressure on Seoul to break with Washington’s effort to isolate the country.
North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency said the state was taking the move because South Korean authorities had “connived” to carry out “hostile acts” against the country. The statement appeared to be referring to leaflets critical of leader Kim Jong Un being floated by balloons across the border by anti-Pyongyang activists in South Korea.
“This measure is the first step of the determination to completely shut down all contact means with South Korea and get rid of unnecessary things,” KCNA said, adding that North Korean officials Kim Yong Chol and Kim Jong Un’s sister Kim Yo Jong gave the instruction to “completely cut off all the communication and liaison lines” with the South.
The move could end up stoking tensions between South Korea and the Trump administration, which have long differed over how to engage with the Kim regime. North Korea has for months shunned President Moon Jae-in’s offers for talks and slammed him for standing by U.S. sanctions, which are part of Donald Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign to force Kim to give up his nuclear weapons.
The regime has so far ignored Moon’s limited proposals for restoring some of the economic and trade ties that once represented for as much as about 10% of North Korea’s economy. That money has dwindled to virtually nothing since global sanctions were imposed on Kim’s regime for 2017 tests of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles in defiance of United Nations resolutions.
The two nations are about to mark the 20th anniversary of the first summit between their leaders -- an event that opened hopes of reconciliation between the neighbors. After Moon’s progressive ruling party scored a landslide victory in parliamentary elections in April, his government made a fresh push to restart some exchanges that could allow a trickle of foreign currency to flow to the cash-starved neighbor.
Actually implementing such steps would likely require sanctions waivers from the U.S. -- something Trump has shown no sign of providing.
“South Korea has continually given the indication that the North’s complaints, threats, and provocations will be tolerated,” said Soo Kim, a Rand Corp. policy analyst who specializes in Korean Peninsula issues. “Seoul’s pliancy only encourages Pyongyang’s provocations.”
No Answer
North Korea didn’t answer South Korea’s calls made on the military line Tuesday for the first time since the inter-Korean communication link was restored in 2018, defense ministry spokeswoman Choi Hyun-soo told a briefing in Seoul.
“Inter-Korean communication lines are a basic means for communication and should be kept in line with inter-Korean agreements,” South Korea’s Unification Ministry said in a text message sent to reporters.
North Korea tested the patience of South Korea on Monday by delaying a regularly scheduled phone conversation at the inter-Korean liaison office, located in the border city of Kaesong, after saying it was abolishing the project that once allowed the rivals to communicate around the clock.
The liaison facility was opened in the spirit of rapprochement advocated by Moon and was part of moves to reduce threats along the border, where the two countries have stationed about 1 million troops. It allowed for constant communication between the two sides for the first time since the start of the 1950-53 Korean War.
The channels were established in 2018 after Kim and Moon held summits over the course of five months between April and September. North Korea accused South Korea of violating the agreement by allowing the balloon launches.
“We have reached a conclusion that there is no need to sit face to face with the South Korean authorities and there is no issue to discuss with them, as they have only aroused our dismay,” KCNA said.
South Korea said last week it would look to ban anti-North Korea leaflets after a rebuke from Kim Yo Jong. The younger Kim accused South Korea of tolerating a “sordid and wicked act of hostility.”
Millions of leaflets sent by South Korean activists and defectors from North Korea have flown across the border for more than a decade bearing messages critical of North Korea’s leaders, fueling friction between the rivals.
Leaflets that raise questions about the leader’s grip on power have tended to draw some of the sharpest rebukes from Pyongyang over the years. The latest leaflets came after Kim Jong Un has made fewer public appearances over the past several weeks than normal, leading to global speculation about his health.
Since the start of last year, North Korea has also increased the threat it poses to South Korea and the some 28,500 U.S. military personnel in the country by rolling out new lines of short-range, nuclear-capable ballistic missiles that can hit all of the country and are designed to evade U.S. interceptors.
“The well-organized, quick manner in which they have been issuing statements and carrying out media propaganda indicates to me that they already have a plan laid out and that they will probably want to stick to it,” said Rachel Minyoung Lee, a former analyst for the U.S. government specializing in North Korea. “If so, there is probably not much that Moon can do dissuade North Korea.”
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