After North Korea’s nuclear test last week and the planting of land mines the demilitarised zone, South Korea resumed the loudspeaker broadcast of propaganda messages.
The messages are broadcasted by 11 sites across the heavily militarised boarder between North and South Korea. Its messages are audible within a 10km range into North Korea.
The messages include a mix of different information ranging from lifestyle and political news to K-pop music and critical messages of the North Korean regime. It is made with a North Korean accent. The content of the broadcasts can be divided in the following categories:
- The superiority of liberal democracy
- Promote the high level of development in South Korea
- Build up on the ethnic homogeneity of North and South Korea
- Facts about North Korea
- Korean pop music
- Weather forecast
General lifestyle information and information on current events are intended to make North Korean citizens get used to the broadcasts and build trust. Moreover, some messages are included about the reality of North Korea to generate questions within the North Korean civil society against their government.
You can hear to an example in the recording below:
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This announcement translates into:
“North Korea’s Kim Jong-un has not become the ruler through a democratic process . Through three generations they have brainwashed North Koreans. Just because he was the son of the previous leader, he came into power and he is a parasitic hereditary dictator, which is unprecedented. He is an enemy of the people’s party.
Therefore, we do not recognise the Kim Jong Un regime. Today the international community is concerned North Korea’s missile, nuclear development, human rights abuses , kidnappings , terrorism , drugs, and all the problems faced by slave labor as well as North Korea, of counterfeiting dollars , foreign workers are associated with hereditary dictatorship because Kim Jong Un.”
Further, cultural information and music is used to promote South Korean capitalistic lifestyle and generate a positive attitude towards South Korea in a country were state media is claiming that South Koreans are occupied and repressed by the US. However, the songs do not have a direct political message but rather try to appeal to the wish for freedom and an excessive capitalistic lifestyle. Lastly, the announcements take a call for action to spread the word from the boarder region to other parts of the country within the civil population.
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North Korea responded by stating that broadcasts could provoke a war and demanded for them to be stopped within 48 hours. Otherwise, retaliatory actions would be taken. Moreover, North Korea started their own broadcasts to disturb the South Korean messages.
