North Korea launches garbage and manure balloons over the South

seoul, South Korea — North Korea flew hundreds of balloons carrying trash and manure toward South Korea in one of its most bizarre provocations against its rival in years, prompting the South’s military to mobilize chemical and explosive response teams to recover objects and debris in different parts of the country.

The balloon campaign came as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un urged his military scientists to overcome a failed satellite launch and continue to develop space-based reconnaissance capabilities, which he described as crucial to countering US and South Korean military activities, state media reported on Wednesday.

In his first public comments on the failed launch, Kim also warned of unspecified “overwhelming actions” against South Korea during an exercise involving 20 fighter jets near the inter-Korean border, hours before North Korea’s failed launch on Monday. In a speech on Tuesday, Kim described the South Korean response as a “hysterical strike formation flight and attack exercise” and a “direct military challenge” against North Korea, the Central Intelligence Agency said on Wednesday. Official North Korean News.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said North Korea has also flown large numbers of garbage-carrying balloons toward the South since Tuesday night in retaliation against South Korean activists for flying anti-North Korean propaganda leaflets Across the border.

The South’s military said about 260 North Korean balloons were found in various parts of the country on Wednesday afternoon and were being recovered by military rapid response and explosives clearance teams. The military said the balloons brought back various types of trash and manure, but so far they have not found any human excrement. He advised civilians not to touch North Korean objects and to report them to the military or police after discovering them.

In a statement released over the weekend, North Korean Vice Defense Minister Kim Kang Il said the North was planning to spread “heaps of trash and filth” over border areas and other parts of South Korea, which he described the action against leafleting by South Korean activists as an “eye-door-tat”.

Later on Wednesday, Kim Yo Jong, the North Korean leader’s powerful sister, took to state media to ridicule a South Korean military statement that demanded the North stop its “inhumane and vulgar activity.” She said the North was merely exercising its freedom of expression, which the Seoul government stated as a reason for its inability to stop anti-North Korean activists from spreading leaflets across the border.

“Once you experience how unpleasant and tiring it is to walk around picking up dirt, you will realize that you shouldn’t talk about freedom of speech so easily when it comes to leaflets in border areas,” she said. “We will make it clear that we will respond with dozens of times the amount of dirt that the (South Koreans) will spray on us in the future.”

Photos released by the South Korean military showed trash strewn across highways and roads in different parts of the country. In the capital, Seoul, military officers found what appeared to be a timer that was likely designed to burst trash bags into the air. In the southern central province of Chungcheong, two huge balloons carrying a plastic bag filled with dirt-like substances were spotted on a road.

There were no immediate reports of damage from the balloons. Similar North Korean balloon activity damaged cars and other property in 2016.

Kim Jong Un’s comments about the satellite came from a speech at the Northern Defense Science Academy, which he visited a day after a rocket carrying what would have been his country’s second military reconnaissance satellite exploded shortly after takeoff. North Korea’s Aerospace Technology Administration said the explosion was possibly related to the reliability of a newly developed rocket engine that is fueled by petroleum and uses liquid oxygen as an oxidizer.

Animosities between the Koreas are at their worst level in years as the pace of Kim’s weapons demonstrations and South Korea’s combined military exercises with the US and Japan have intensified since 2022.

The satellite’s failed launch was a setback for Kim’s plan to launch three more military spy satellites in 2024, after North Korea first military reconnaissance satellite was launched into orbit last November. The November launch followed two failed attempts.

Monday’s launch drew criticism from South Korea, Japan and the United States because the United Nations prohibits North Korea from carrying out such rocket launches, considering them a cover for testing long-range missile technology.

North Korea has firmly asserted that it has the right to launch satellites and test missiles in the face of what it considers to be US-led military threats. Kim described the spy satellites as crucial to monitoring US and South Korean military activities and increasing the threat posed by their nuclear-capable missiles.

“Although we did not achieve the results we hoped to achieve in the recent reconnaissance satellite launch, we should never feel scared or discouraged, but rather make even greater efforts,” Kim said. experiencing failure.”

North Korea has not commented on when it will be ready to attempt a satellite launch again, which some experts say could take months.

State media’s mention of a petroleum-liquid oxygen rocket engine suggests the North is trying to develop a more powerful space launch vehicle that can handle larger payloads, according to some South Korean experts.

North Korea’s previous space rockets are believed to have used asymmetric dimethylhydrazine as a fuel and dinitrogen tetroxide as an oxidant. The country’s rapid transition into space rocket projects possibly indicates foreign technological help, which would likely come from Russia, said Chang Young-keun, a missile expert at South Korea’s Research Institute for National Strategy.

Kim has increased the visibility of his ties with Russia in recent months, highlighted by a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in September as they fall into line over their separate confrontations with Washington. Kim’s meeting with Putin was held at a spaceport in the Russian Far East and came after North Korea’s consecutive failures in its attempts to launch its first spy satellite. Putin then told Russian reporters that Moscow was willing to help the North build satellites.

The US and South Korea have also accused North Korea of ​​supplying Russia with artillery shells, missiles and other military equipment to help prolong its fighting in Ukraine.