Pyongyang says is completely cutting off communication with South Korea, including their military hotlines. And earlier our correspondent Joseph Kim gave us the details from Seoul.
Yes, South Korea said the DPRK is already not answering any phone calls from Seoul on Tuesday morning after Pyongyang had vowed through its state media to sever hotlines with the ROK, as a first step to cutting all communications with South Korea. Now for the past several days the DPRK has lashed out at Seoul threatening to close joint inter-korean projects, if the government does not stop defectors from sending leaflets across the border, which Pyongyang suggests criticizes the DPRK leadership. Now though Seoul has announced last week that it would push new laws to ban activists from flying anti-pyongyang leaflets into the DPRK, which has been heavily scrutinized here with critics saying that in pedes free speech.
South Korea's unification and defense ministry says that Pyongyang is now not answering any of the hotlines ahead of the time that they said they would cut contact. Now inter-korean relations have been chilly since talks broke down between the United States and the DPRK last February, with Pyongyang staying silent on all of Seoul's offers for cooperation and through this KCNA. The DPRK said that it will now treat Seoul as an enemy and this marks another setback for relations to try to persuade the DPRK to give up its nuclear weapons program.