S. Korea continues cross-border broadcasts

South Korea's military said Saturday it will continue loudspeaker broadcasts to North Korea, adding that the North has not yet shown any special moves of a possible provocation.

On Friday, South Korea re-started its cross-border loudspeaker broadcasts carrying anti-North Korea messages after stopping them for about four months in retaliation against North Korea's claimed hydrogen bomb test earlier this week.

"We are continuing the broadcast at 10 spots on the border Saturday," a military official said. "We have not yet identified special moves by the North Korean army."

South Korea said it will make broadcasts irregularly around the clock.

Pyongyang has bolstered its monitoring at the border and also started its own broadcasts to disturb Seoul's loudspeakers, but has not made other significant moves, military sources said.

Seoul believes that North Korea violated the two Koreas' rare Aug. 25 deal to defuse military tension. Landmine attacks maimed two South Korean soldiers in early August, sharply escalating ilitary tensions between the two Koreas.

In the wake of the landmine incident and subsequent exchanges of fire, the two Koreas reached a set of agreements in August to ease tensions and make efforts to improve their ties.

North Korea made its first official reaction against the broadcasts on Friday, saying that South Korea's move could provoke a war. Pyongyang added the hydrogen bomb test has "displayed the dignity" of the country.

Despite tensions, the operations of the two countries' joint industrial park in North Korea remain intact, sources said.

"Overnight, there were 512 South Koreans at the Kaesong Industrial Complex. On Saturday, 269 will visit the North, and 479 will return, although the numbers may change," an official from South Korea's unification ministry said.

A total of 124 South Korean firms are running factories with about 54,000 North Koreans working at the factory zone, the last remaining symbol of inter-Korean reconciliation that opened in 2004.

(Yonhap)