“Publishing and printing institutions at all levels in the capital city have turned out 12 million leaflets of all kinds reflective of the wrath and hatred of the people from all walks of life,” it said.

More than “3,000 balloons of various types capable of scattering leaflets deep inside South Korea, have been prepared”, along with other means of distribution, KCNA added.

“South Korea has to face the music. Only when it experiences how painful and how irritating it is to dispose of leaflets and waste, it will shake off its bad habit,” KCNA said.

“The time for retaliatory punishment is drawing near.”

Citing military sources, South Korean news agency Yonhap said the North’s military was bringing its propaganda loudspeakers – that had been were removed in 2018 – back out of storage. A defence military spokesman declined to comment on the report.

As part of what analysts saw as staged provocations, the North last Tuesday blew up an inter-Korean liaison office on its side of the border, triggering broad international condemnation.

It has also threatened to bolster its military presence in and around the demilitarised zone.

Moon’s vision of peace with North Korea goes up in smoke

The North’s actions appear to be carefully calibrated, with Pyongyang drawing out the process by issuing multiple incremental warnings from different official sources – leadership, government departments and the military – ahead of each step it takes.

The North’s two consecutive days of comment about its leaflet campaign came after Kim Yeon-chul, South Korea’s point man for relations with the North, resigned over the heightened tensions. He expressed hope that his departure “will be a chance to pause for a bit”.

Photos carried by the official Rodong Sinmun newspaper on Saturday showed North Koreans preparing the leaflets.

Seoul’s unification ministry urged Pyongyang to withdraw the plan “immediately”, calling it “very regrettable”.

South Korea has also warned of a “thorough crackdown” against activists sending anti-North leaflets. It filed a police complaint against two defector groups over the messages that have offended Pyongyang.

“We have been preparing to launch a million leaflets since March and we will do so around June 25,” he said.

Park’s brother Jeong-o, who leads a similar exercise with plastic bottles containing leaflets and rice released into the sea near the border, said he had stopped his campaign at the request of the South Korean government.

Another activist, Lee Min-bok, who has been sending balloons across the border since 2003, said he was being followed and authorities had impounded his equipment, including gas tanks to fill the balloons.

“I’ve nine detectives around me who take turns in watching me round the clock,” Lee said.

The defectors whose airborne propaganda enraged North Korea

The leaflet campaign has reportedly led to anxiety among defectors of possible retaliation against their relatives in the North.

Hong Gang-cheol, a defector who operates a YouTube channel on North Korea-related news, said he had two teenage daughters in the North, and managed to speak to them in May.

“Differently from what has been reported here, North Korea mostly allows defectors’ relatives go on with their life as there are simply too many of defectors and their relatives to deal with”, Hong said.

“But I am afraid my daughters can’t hold up their heads due to the rising resentment against defectors over the leaflet launches,” he said.