Pyongyang rejects Seoul's request to send special envoys to ease tensions

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea on Wednesday flatly rejected a plea from South Korea to send special envoys to Pyongyang for talks to ease the current tensions on the peninsula, the official Korean Central News Agency reported.

The South Korean authorities "staged the petty farce of asking us to accept special envoys on June 15," but the "tactless and sinister proposal" was flatly rejected by Kim Yo Jong, first vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, said the KCNA.

"We take seriously the south side's disrespectful attitude of wishing to send special envoys out of a lingering attachment even though they are well aware of the fact that unprecedented state emergency anti-epidemic measures are in force and no entry or exit are allowed from and to the territory of the DPRK," it said.

"We can guess how much the south side reacts to the present situation and what its anticipation of the consequences could be, but we are extremely displeased to get such an absurd judgment and reckless proposal," it added.

It is impossible, said the report, to solve the present crisis between the North and the South, which is "caused by the incompetence and irresponsibility of the South Korean authorities" and the crisis "can be terminated only when proper price is paid" by the South.

The DPRK on Tuesday demolished an inter-Korean liaison office in the border city of Kaesong in retaliation for the South's failure to stop activists sending anti-DPRK leaflets into the North. Pyongyang has also cut off all communication lines with Seoul.

The army of the DPRK announced on Wednesday it would redeploy soldiers to the previously demilitarized Kaesong Industrial Zone and the Mount Kumgang areas soon.

The army was making a clearer stand on more detailed military action plans outlined on Tuesday so as to provide military guarantee for the measures taken by the party and the government, an unnamed spokesman for General Staff of the Korean People's Army was quoted by the Korean Central News Agency as saying in a statement.

Under the detailed military action plans, to be approved by the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party of Korea, units of the regiment level and necessary firepower sub-units will be deployed in the Mount Kumgang tourist area and the Kaesong Industrial Zone, both are located at the areas bordering South Korea.

According to the military spokesman, civil police posts that had been withdrawn from the demilitarized zone under the inter-Korea agreement in the military field, signed in 2018, will be set up again to strengthen the guard over the front line.

Moreover, the artillery units deployed on the whole front line will reinforce those on combat duty and will resume all kinds of regular military exercises in the areas close to the boundary.

The spokesman also said the areas favorable for scattering leaflets against South Korea will open and the people's drive for scattering leaflets will be guaranteed militarily.