Seoul, South Korea CNN –
North Korea’s military said it would take a “major military step” to completely isolate its territory from South Korea on Wednesday, after months of heavily armed fortification of its border.
The announcement comes after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un scrapped a long-standing policy seeking peaceful reunification with South Korea earlier this year and announced that remaining roads and railways linked to the South would be completely cut off, blocking access along the border.
“The acute military situation prevailing on the Korean Peninsula requires the Armed Forces of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to take more resolute and stronger measures in order to more credibly defend national security,” the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army said. to a notice on the state-run Korean Central News Agency that referred to North Korea by the initials of its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
Since January, Pyongyang has strengthened its border defenses, planted land mines, set up anti-tank traps, and removed railway infrastructure, according to the South Korean military.
Kim has also stepped up his fiery rhetoric against the South, referring to it as North Korea’s “main enemy and main consistent enemy,” a description echoed in the KPA’s latest notice.
The General Staff said that these measures came in response to recent “war exercises” conducted in South Korea and visits to what it claims are American strategic nuclear assets in the region. Over the past year, a US aircraft carrier, amphibious assault ships, long-range bombers and submarines have visited South Korea, drawing angry criticism from Pyongyang.
In a response on Wednesday, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said North Korea’s announcement was a “desperate measure stemming from the insecurity of Kim Jong Un’s failed regime” and would only lead to… [its] “Harder isolation.”
Hong Min, a senior research fellow at the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul, said North Korea’s latest move formalizes work already being done along its military border and suggests that Pyongyang may aim to constitutionalize it in the future.
“If North Korea were to establish a new territorial provision through a constitutional amendment and sever its relationship with the South, the internal and external repercussions would be very large,” Hong told CNN, noting that Pyongyang is taking small steps in this direction.
Hostilities between the two Koreas have intensified this year as North Korea appears to have stepped up its nuclear production efforts and strengthened its ties with Russia, deepening widespread concerns in the West about the direction the isolated state is taking.
Last week, Kim threatened to use nuclear weapons to destroy South Korea if it was attacked, after South Korea’s president warned that if North Korea used nuclear weapons it would “face the end of its regime.”
Kim’s statements appear to be a direct response to South Korean President Yoon Suk-yul, who showed off Seoul’s most powerful ballistic missile and other weapons designed to deter North Korean threats during a parade marking Armed Forces Day on October 1.
Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha Women’s University in Seoul, said the Korean military’s announcement may be an attempt by Pyongyang to “shift blame for its economic failures and legitimize its costly buildup of missiles and nuclear weapons” by exaggerating external threats.
“Kim Jong Un wants the domestic and international public to believe he is acting out of military strength, but he may actually be motivated by political weakness,” Easley said. “North Korea’s threats, real and rhetorical, reflect the survival strategy of a hereditary dictatorial regime.”
North and South Korea have been separated since the Korean War ended in 1953 with an armistice agreement. The two sides are still technically at war, but both governments have long sought the goal of one day reunification.
In January, Kim said North Korea would no longer seek reconciliation and reunification with South Korea, and described inter-Korean relations as “a relationship between two hostile countries and two warring countries at war,” KCNA reported at the time.
The North Korean military said in its statement that it informed US forces on Wednesday morning “to prevent any miscalculation and accidental conflict” regarding the “fortification project.”
The United Nations Command – a multinational military force tasked with securing the heavily fortified demilitarized zone between the two Koreas – confirmed that the North Korean military had contacted it but said it would not discuss the specific content of the messages “out of consideration for the safety of the region.” Hotline.”
