Launched after midnight from Pocheon, a metropolis about 30 miles northeast of Seoul, the balloons additionally carried 200,000 leaflets criticizing North Korean chief Kim Jong Un, in addition to 2,000 U.S. $1 payments, in line with a press release from the Fighters for Free North Korea (FFNK) group, which is led by North Korean defector Park Sang-hak.
In a press release, FFNK accused North Korea of “indiscriminately dropping” 15 tons of waste on the South by way of balloons, calling it “a show of insult and embarrassment for our 50 million residents.” The South Korean army mentioned that the balloons had been “clear violations of worldwide regulation and severely threaten the security of our residents.”
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Activists from the South have for years despatched balloons over the border and floated bottles up the river in an try to achieve the individuals in North Korea with leaflets, media and even Choco Pies — whereas Pyongyang has responded not less than twice with airborne trash. The South briefly banned sending propaganda leaflets to the North, however the regulation was struck down final 12 months.
“We despatched them reality and truth, love and medication — and greenback payments, dramas and trot songs,” FFNK mentioned Thursday of their assertion, including that Kim “has not mentioned a single phrase of apology” and accusing him of “unprecedented evils.”
FFNK despatched 20 balloons with related contents on Could 10, in line with a press launch on its web site, sparking the newest tit-for-tat balloon launches.
Activists admit it’s not clear what number of — if any — of the balloons and bottles truly attain their vacation spot, not to mention affect the pondering of odd North Koreans.
John Lie, a sociologist at College of California at Berkeley, who has written in regards to the historical past of Okay-pop, attributed the group’s latest actions partly to the idea that earlier balloons had been profitable, “not less than gauged by the truth that North Korean authorities are responding to what they think about to be ‘trash’ with their trash,” he wrote in an e mail.
Lately, South Korean tradition has flourished globally, with Okay-pop teams promoting out stadiums, Okay-dramas dominating streaming platforms, and Okay-beauty and Okay-fashion industries booming. However consuming overseas media is an offense in North Korea, and in 2020, Pyongyang adopted a regulation particularly cracking down on Okay-pop and different South Korean cultural content material, media within the South reported.
Freedom Home, a Washington-based pro-democracy assume tank and watchdog, offers North Korea a 3 out of 100 ranking for civil liberties and political rights.
Relations between the 2 international locations — which by no means formally signed a peace treaty after a 1953 armistice ended hostilities within the Korean Struggle — have been particularly turbulent in latest months, with Kim earlier this 12 months formally abandoning the concept of peaceable reunification with the South, The Washington Publish reported.
And balloons stuffed with South Korean tradition may solely serve to spotlight that division.
“Okay-dramas have hooked some North Korean viewers and venture the picture of rich, profitable South Korea” in contrast with the North, Lie mentioned, whereas “popular culture can have a subversive impact on authoritarian” regimes, sparking crackdowns, corresponding to with jazz within the Soviet Union, he added.
For many South Koreans, Okay-culture “just isn’t solely nice in and of itself,” Lie mentioned, “however can be a world model: probably the most potent expression of South Korean coolness and greatness.”