SOUTH Korea will remove propaganda-broadcasting loudspeakers from the border with North Korea this week as the rivals move to follow through with their leaders’ summit declaration that produced reconciliation steps but failed to make a breakthrough in the nuclear stand-off.
During their historic meeting on Friday at a Korean border village, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in agreed to end hostile acts against each other along their tense border, establish a liaison office and resume reunions of separated families.
They also agreed to achieve a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula, but failed to produce specific time frames and disarmament steps.
Seoul’s defence ministry said it would pull back dozens of its front-line loudspeakers today. Ministry spokeswoman Choi Hyunsoo Seoul expects Pyongyang to do the same.
South Korea had already turned off its loudspeakers ahead of Friday’s summit talks, and North Korea responded by halting its own broadcasts.
The two Koreas had been engaged in Cold War-era psychological warfare since the North’s fourth nuclear test in early 2016. Seoul began blaring anti-Pyongyang broadcasts and K-Pop songs via border loudspeakers, and Pyongyang quickly matched the South’s action with its own border broadcasts.
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