South Korea stops loudspeaker broadcasts to North Korea as new administration aims to relieve tensions

South Korean military suspended its loudspeaker broadcasts to North Korea, the new administration said Wednesday as part of its efforts to alleviate tensions with the North.

According to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) and the Ministry of National Defense, the military stopped operating fixed loudspeakers along the western, central and eastern front lines on June 11 afternoon. President Lee Jae-myung gave orders to stop the speakers at around 2 p.m. on Wednesday, according to the presidential office.

“We have received orders to stop the loudspeaker broadcasts from higher in the command chain,” said a military official on June 11.

The broadcasts, which resumed across all border regions in June last year, came to a halt after one year. The move is seen as the first step in President Lee’s push to reverse the full suspension of the Sept. 19 inter-Korean military agreement — a key campaign pledge.

The Sept. 19 agreement refers to the military agreement made between then-President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang in 2018, where the two sides agreed on easing military tensions between the two Koreas.

Approximately 20 fixed loudspeakers and 10 mobile units had been deployed in front-line areas, though mobile units had effectively ceased operations since the end of last year.

“The suspension was made to fulfill a campaign pledge aimed at restoring trust in inter-Korean relations and promoting peace on the Korean Peninsula,” said a Defense Ministry official. Another military source said the measure should be interpreted as a full suspension, not a conditional or temporary halt.

The previous Yoon Suk Yeol administration suspended the Sept. 19 agreement entirely in response to a series of provocations from the North, including ballistic missile launches and the first wave of balloon-borne trash attacks that began on May 28 last year.

On June 4, 2024, the Cabinet passed the suspension, and on June 9, 2024, the National Security Council decided to reinstall loudspeakers and resume limited broadcasts. This marked the return of loudspeaker operations six years after they were dismantled in 2018 to foster inter-Korean dialogue.

At the time, however, the actual broadcasting was limited to a single day, a decision interpreted as an attempt to avoid escalating tensions and provoking further North Korean actions under the so-called tit-for-tat standoff.

Despite this, the North continued its balloon campaigns. In response, the South Korean military resumed partial broadcasts on July 19, alternating broadcasts along different front-line sectors. Then, after the North’s ninth trash-balloon launch, the military fully resumed broadcasts across all sectors at 1 p.m. on July 21 using both fixed and mobile systems. The strategy was grounded in the belief that “psychological warfare must be repeated to bring about behavioral change from the North.”
The JCS also resumed front-line training exercises for immediate broadcast deployment — the first in six years. Known as the “Echoes of Freedom” drill, the training familiarized troops with the procedures for moving, installing and operating loudspeakers.

From the end of last year, when North Korea’s balloon launches ceased, only fixed speakers remained in use while mobile ones were effectively shelved.

The broadcasts primarily targeted the North Korean regime and were designed to criticize the regime and enlighten the North Korean residents. For instance, when North Korea attempted to conceal its deployment of troops to Russia to the people, the South relayed that information through the loudspeakers. However, the broadcasts were met with retaliatory anti-South broadcasts from the North, prompting complaints from residents in border areas.

The Lee administration appears to have halted the broadcasts to ease the anxiety of those residents and to signal goodwill to Pyongyang. The move is also interpreted as the first step toward reviving the Sept. 19 military agreement, which calls for a full suspension of all hostile activities on land, at sea and in the air.

While some speculate the halt could be temporary depending on the North’s actions, the prevailing view is that the Lee government’s preemptive and unconditional decision makes a resumption unlikely.

Nevertheless, concerns remain that halting the broadcasts without a corresponding change in North Korean behavior could send the wrong signal.

Loudspeaker broadcasts are considered one of the few effective tools for countering Pyongyang’s “bad behavior,” particularly given the regime’s extreme sensitivity to criticism of its leadership and political system. Meanwhile, the North continues to blast anti-South broadcasts along the border, with no clear way for the South to compel them to stop.

Since the first balloon launch on May 28 last year, North Korea has sent over 10,000 trash-laden balloons — containing manure, feces, garbage and paper — across 33 separate instances. The most recent occurred on Nov. 28 and 29, after which the launches ceased.

BY YOON SO-YEON, LEE YU-JUNG, LEE KEUN-PYUNG [yoon.soyeon@joongang.co.kr]