South Korea removes anti-North Korean loudspeakers on border

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00:00These speakers used to blare world news and popular K-pop music across the border into

00:06North Korea.

00:07A provocative move by Seoul to promote democracy and propaganda to its neighbor.

00:13Now the newly elected government is having them dismantled in attempt to restore trust

00:18between the two countries.

00:20Our military began removing loudspeakers towards North Korea starting today.

00:25It's a practical measure to help ease tensions between the South and the North without affecting

00:29the military's readiness posture.

00:33When he was elected, the left-leaning Democratic President Lee Jae-myung pledged to restore

00:38communications between Seoul and Pyongyang.

00:41As an act of goodwill, he first had the speakers switched off in June, shortly after he took

00:46office.

00:48It marked a U-turn from his conservative predecessor, Yoon Seok-yul, who had restarted the dormant

00:54speakers a year earlier, in retaliation to North Korea after it launched thousands of

00:59balloons filled with trash and manure to the South.

01:04Pyongyang views the speakers as an act of psychological warfare, but Seoul's recent overtures appear

01:10to have made little difference.

01:13If Seoul expected that it could reverse all the results it had made with a few sentimental

01:18words, nothing is more serious miscalculation than it.

01:23Since the armistice of 1953, North Korea and South Korea have remained technically at war.

01:29In recent years, relations between the two countries have been increasingly strained.

01:35But instead of seeking reparations with Seoul, Pyongyang has cosied up to Russia, supplying

01:41troops and ammunition to its war in Ukraine.

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