North Korea threatens to again suspend ties with South over joint military drills with US

Last week brought a diplomatic breakthrough but Kim Jong-un’s sister on the weekend said Pyongyang would watch ‘whether the South Korean side stages hostile war exercises’

North Korea has sought for decades to leverage the prospect of talks to scale back US-South Korea military drills, which former president Donald Trump controversially agreed

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Kim Yo-jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. Photo: Reuters

Published: 12:25pm, 2 Aug 2021Updated: 11:18pm, 2 Aug 2021

Kim Jong-un’s sister warned that upcoming US-South Korea military drills could jeopardise talks with Seoul, raising doubts about a diplomatic breakthrough less than a week after both sides announced a resumption of communications.

Kim Yo-jong on Sunday said the plan to hold annual allied exercises this month “seriously undermines” efforts to restore ties, according to the official Korean Central News Agency. The statement by Kim Jong-un’s sister, one of the prominent faces of Pyongyang’s pressure campaign against Seoul and Washington, reinforces worries North Korea would use South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s desire for talks to try to force him to break with the US.

“Our government and army will closely follow whether the South Korean side stages hostile war exercises in August or makes other bold decisions,” said the younger Kim, who is a senior official with the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea. “Hope or despair? Choice is not made by us.”

The US and South Korea still planned to start the exercises on August 10, despite the warning, the Dong-A Ilbo newspaper reported on Monday.

South Korea’s defence ministry on Monday repeated their earlier statement that the timing and scale of summertime military exercises had yet to be finalised.

“South Korea and the US are having close consultations taking into account related situations,” spokesman Boo Seung-chan said.