More info needed on link between loudspeaker broadcasts, N. Korean’s defection: military

South Korea’s military said Friday that further analysis is necessary to determine whether South Korea’s propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts affected the recent defection of a North Korean amid speculation the anti-Pyongyang campaign may have prompted the person to flee the North.

On Thursday, a North Korean individual crossed the neutral zone of the Han River estuary located west of the inter-Korean land border and arrived at South Korea’s Gyodong Island off the west coast in what marked the first known defection of a North Korean in the border area since October last year.

The latest defection came as South Korea’s military continues to blare news, K-pop music and other broadcasts through loudspeakers near the border in a new propaganda campaign, in response to the North’s repeated launches of trash-carrying balloons.

“An investigation is needed,” an official at the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said, noting that relevant authorities are conducting a joint probe into the North Korean individual.

“At least three months of monitoring are needed to see whether the loudspeaker broadcasts have had an effect,” the official said, without confirming whether news of Thursday’s defection will be included in the propaganda broadcasts as it is part of operations.

The military’s loudspeaker broadcasts have reportedly included news on the defection of a former North Korean diplomat at Pyongyang’s embassy in Cuba, as well as a message urging North Korean soldiers to escape from their “slave-like lives.”

The JCS official, meanwhile, said no signs of the North deploying hundreds of new tactical missile launchers at its front-line units have yet been detected and said it would likely take “considerable” time for the North to manufacture missiles for such weapons.

On Monday, the North’s state media reported that leader Kim Jong-un attended the ceremony for the transfer of the launchers, which it described as “new pivotal attack” weapons.