Seoul to ban on anti-Pyongyang leaflet campaign after threats

TOKYO, June 4 (KUNA) -- Seoul is working on a plan to legislate a ban on sending anti-Pyongyang leaflets into the North, the Unification Ministry said Thursday following threats by the North, Yonhap News Agency reported.
The envisioned legislation is aimed at preventing chilly inter-Korean relations from deteriorating further, but enacting a law banning leaflet-sending could spark an outcry over the possible infringement of the right to freedom of expression, according to the report. The announcement came hours after Kim Yo-jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, issued a statement denouncing the flying-in of such propaganda leaflets as a hostile act that runs counter to peace agreements the two sides signed during summit talks of their leaders in 2018. "The South Korean authorities will be forced to pay a dear price if they let this situation go on while making sort of excuses," Kim said in the statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency.
Unless the South stops such leaflets from flying across the border, the North could scrap a military tension-reduction agreement banning hostilities against each other, dismantle a shuttered joint industrial complex in the border city of Kaesong and shut down a joint liaison office, she said. North Korean defectors and anti-Pyongyang activists have occasionally sent a large number of leaflets via giant balloons sharply criticizing the North and its leader.
"Taking into consideration relevant circumstances comprehensively, the government has already been mulling effective regulatory-improvement measures to fundamentally prevent such tension-causing acts near the border," a ministry spokesman told reporters in Seoul. In the military deal reached in September 2018, the two Koreas agreed to stop all kinds of tension-causing activities against each other.
The latest strongly worded statement came as inter-Korean relations have been stalled amid a stalemate in denuclearization talks between Pyongyang and Washington since the no-deal summit in February last year between the North's leader and US President Donald Trump. (end) mk.rk