The undated photo shows a member of Fighters for Free North Korea, a civic group, holding balloons that carry anti-Pyongyang leaflets before letting them go near the North Korean border. Courtesy of Fighters for Free North Korea

South Korea's unification ministry on Thursday warned Pyongyang to refrain from "acting rashly" after the recalcitrant regime threatened to "pour a shower of shells" into the South over propaganda leaflets criticizing it.

The warning came a day after the North's Korean Central News Agency carried a commentary claiming that psychological warfare, including the anti-Pyongyang leafleting campaign, will act as a "detonator" for the end of South Korea.

In September, South Korea's Constitutional Court struck down a law banning the cross-border leaflet campaign, saying it excessively restricts the right to freedom of expression.

The ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, has launched a procedure to repeal the guidelines banning floating balloons carrying propaganda leaflets in all areas of South Korea.

"The distribution of leaflets into the North is a voluntary activity carried out by civic groups in accordance with the freedom of expression guaranteed in our Constitution," the ministry said in a statement.

"We sternly warn North Korea against acting rashly and using the Constitutional Court's decision striking down the cross-border leaflet campaign ban as a pretext," it added.

For years, North Korean defectors in the South and conservative activists have sent leaflets to the North via balloon to help encourage North Koreans to eventually rise up against the Pyongyang regime.

North Korea has bristled at the propaganda campaign amid concern that an influx of outside information could pose a threat to its leader Kim Jong-un.

In 2014, the two Koreas exchanged machine gun fire across the border after the North apparently tried to shoot down balloons carrying propaganda leaflets critical of North Korea.

North Korea blew up the inter-Korean liaison office in the North's border town of Kaesong in 2020 in anger over anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets sent via balloon by North Korean defectors in Seoul.

In the runup to the destruction of the office, Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim, threatened to scrap the 2018 no-hostility military pact with South Korea and demanded South Korea's legislation banning the sending of leaflets.

In December 2020, South Korea's parliament passed the so-called anti-leaflet act, which stipulates violators can face a maximum prison term of three years or a fine of up to 30 million won ($22,857).

Noting that Pyongyang's latest criticism of the leaflet campaign was issued by an individual commentator rather than an official, a ministry official said the reclusive regime appears to be trying to distance itself from the South. (Yonhap)