We will reduce South Korea to debris, says North

“We clarify our stand that should the South Korean puppet authorities continue scattering leaflets and conducting a smear campaign with sheer fabrications, our army will take a resolute practical action as we have already warned,” the official KCNA news agency quoted the military spokesman as saying.

At a rare round of military talks on Monday, North Korea complained about the leaflets while South Korean activists sent a new batch of 1,00,000, despite warnings from Seoul not to do so.

“The puppet authorities had better bear in mind that the advanced pre-emptive strike of our own style will reduce everything opposed to the nation and reunification to debris, not just setting them on fire,” the spokesman said.

South Korean groups have been sending the leaflets into the North for years. Analysts said the recent wave appeared to have touched a nerve because they mentioned a taboo subject in the North — the health of leader Kim Jong-il.

US and South Korean officials have said Kim may have suffered a stroke in August, raising questions about who was running Asia’s only communist dynasty and making decisions concerning its nuclear arms programme.

North Korea mostly refrained from threatening the South when it was receiving a steady stream of unconditional aide under liberal presidents who ruled for 10 years before President Lee Myung-bak.

But it has unleashed a torrent of insults at Lee, who wants to tie handouts to progress the North makes in nuclear disarmament, calling him a traitor to the nation. About six months ago, it threatened to reduce the South to ashes.