North Korea launches over 300 trash-carrying balloons toward South Korea since Saturday

SEOUL: North Korea has launched hundreds more balloons carrying trash toward South Korea over the past two days, Seoul's military said Sunday, amid heightened tensions over Pyongyang's continued balloon campaign, Yonhap news agency reported

As of 10 am local time, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it had detected some 330 waste-carrying balloons launched by the North since Saturday, with more than 80 of them landing inside South Korea and the rest apparently failing to reach the country.

The latest balloons appeared to be carrying trash, such as scraps of paper and plastic, the JCS said, noting that it was preparing for the possibility of the North launching additional balloons.

The latest balloon campaign came after South Korean civic groups' launch of large balloons carrying anti-Pyongyang propaganda to the North between Friday and Saturday, according to Yonhap.

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Since May 28, the North has staged the balloon campaign, which it described as a "tit-for-tat" response to anti-Pyongyang leafleting by activists in South Korea. It launched nearly 1,000 trash-carrying balloons into the South late last month and early last week.

Last Sunday, the North announced it would temporarily suspend the balloon campaign after Seoul warned of "unendurable" countermeasures, but threatened to send "a hundred times the amount of toilet paper and filth" in response to any further leafleting from the South.

South Korea’s defense ministry said it is taking North Korea’s additional launches of waste balloons very seriously and remain in a heightened state of vigilance and operational discipline to respond immediately to North Korea's sending of trash balloons and additional provocations.

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