(ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead with more details; ADDS more info throughout)
SEOUL, Oct. 22 (Yonhap) -- Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, warned Thursday of "new counter means" along the inter-Korean border, adding propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts against South Korea will be ready within days.
Kim's warning came a day after she visited key locations along the southern border and threatened to take military action against what the North called South Korean troops' provocations against its border fortification work.
"Our new counter means will get into the alert for duty at all the southern border line and the loudspeakers against the ROK will be on standby in a matter of days," Kim said in a statement carried by the North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). ROK is the acronym for South Korea's official name, the Republic of Korea.
Kim warned Wednesday that Pyongyang would resume propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts toward South Korea later this month, as South Korea has vowed to respond sternly to North Korean troops crossing the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) during border fortification work.
"Within the territory where our sovereignty is exercised, the permanent project for the southern border will be surely and successfully continued according to our purposes," she said.
Kim claimed that completing the fortifications would "considerably" lower the risk of military conflict between the two Koreas and resolve "complicated problems."
But she warned that South Korea would "face the most horrible and distressing situation" if it made a "mistake," whether intentional or not.
Pak Jong-chon (C), vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea and an adviser to the North Korean defense ministry, Kim Yo-jong (in front of Pak), the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, and others inspect fortification work on the border with South Korea at an unspecified location on Oct. 20, 2026, in this photo released by the North's official Korean Central News Agency the next day. (For Use Only in the Republic of Korea. No Redistribution) (Yonhap)
Pyongyang has pressed ahead with the fortifications since April 2024 by laying land mines, installing barbed-wire fences and erecting anti-tank barriers along the MDL, after leader Kim's declaration in late 2023 that inter-Korean relations were those between "two states hostile to each other."
The construction has repeatedly brought North Korean troops close to or across the MDL, prompting South Korean forces to issue warning broadcasts and fire warning shots to make them withdraw.
Tensions have flared up further following a Sept. 21 land mine explosion inside the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that injured three South Korean soldiers, two of them seriously.
The South Korean military and the U.N. Command concluded that the blast was caused by North Korean antipersonnel mines planted south of the MDL in violation of the Armistice Agreement that ended the 1950-53 Korean War. Pyongyang has flatly denied responsibility.
On Tuesday, South Korea's defense ministry vowed to respond decisively to any further provocations, while Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Jin Yong-sung ordered troops to respond sternly to enemy provocations and carry out operations to reinforce the military's initiative in the DMZ.
Kim's latest statement also targeted Kim Byung-joo, a special presidential adviser for defense policy, who had criticized Pyongyang's threat to resume loudspeaker broadcasts and called on the North to apologize for its provocations.
"The special assistant to the defense policy of Chongwadae should not talk incoherently but shut his mouth at once," Kim said.
colin@yna.co.kr
graceoh@yna.co.kr
(END)