South Korea Suspends Military Deal With North Over Garbage Balloons

(PatriotPostNews.com) – South Korea has paused a military deal with North Korea amid new tension surrounding balloons carrying garbage across the border.

The agreement, first signed in 2018, is geared towards reducing tensions between the North and South. But after the North began sending balloons filled with trash into the South, the latter warned that there could be intense repercussions.

In recent days, the North has floated hundreds of garbage balloons across the border in an act that Kim Kang Il, the communist nation’s vice minister of defense, has described as “strictly a responsive act” to anti-North messages floated over the border by the South. On Sunday June 2, an official from South Korea indicated that “unendurable measures” would be taken in response to the actions.

The South Korean security council announced on Monday, June 3, that it would suspend the agreement until trust between the two countries is obtained. It was set to appear for approval by the cabinet during a meeting on Tuesday, June 4.

According to the presidential security council, the suspension of the military peace agreement would permit the South to go back to conducting military practices near the border and “sufficient[ly] and immediate[ly]” respond to actions from the North that provoke its southern neighbor.

The military deal was the most critical accomplishment of the 2018 summit between the North and South. In 2023, the North pushed towards its nullification by saying it did not have to abide by its terms. The North has since sent both weapons and troops to guard posts located along the border.

The garbage-filled balloons were allegedly sent purely as a response to efforts from activists and defectors to undermine the North’s restrictive government policies. South Korea has routinely launched balloons with anti-North messaging as well as money, food, medicine, and digital entertainment across the border.

On Sunday, North Korea stated it would refrain from sending trash to the South only as long as the anti-North packages were no longer sent from the South.