North’s new propaganda to attack South Korea hits new low

When South Korea attacked the North with loudspeaker broadcasts of K-Pop music, North Korea apparently took a smelly, dirty approach.

The country has resorted to bombarding South Korea with used toilet paper, tissues and cigarette butts.

Helium balloons loaded with anti-South leaflets are now being mixed with human waste and sent over the border, where each one is fitted with a timer and a small explosive charge which pops the balloons over enemy territory.

Dozens of these ‘stink bombs’ have not exploded and instead landed in fields, reportedly sparking fears of containing biological and chemical weapons.

One military official told The JoongAng Daily: 'When we opened up a bundle that had dropped on the ground, we found plastic bags filled with leaflets and mixed with trash.

A police officer said: 'In some of the bundles, there were cigarette butts, tissues and daily waste'.

He added that it also contained used toilet paper.

Some leaflets have also reportedly attacked South Korean president Park Geun-hye, calling her 'political filth'.

Pyongyang has scattered more than one million propaganda messages in an escalating propaganda battle triggered by the North's latest nuclear test last month.

The tit-for-tat exchanges are reportedly the result of the North's fourth nuclear test carried out – to near universal condemnation – on January 6.

The defence ministry said the North's leaflets were being air-dropped on a near daily basis and estimated the number that had been scattered at close to one million.

Most have been recovered near the border in Gyeonggi province, though some have made it as far as Seoul.

A ministry official said the North was using helium balloons with timers that cause them to explode and scatter the leaflet packages.

Last month, an unopened package of nearly 10,000 leaflets slammed into a car, imploding the roof.

Yang Moo-Jin, a professor at the Seoul-based University for North Korean Studies, said the leafleting was largely a reactive gesture.

'They couldn't just sit idle while South Korea launches a psychological warfare front,' Yang said.

Seoul is reportedly planning to retaliate by installing giant electronic screen on the border to display messages and videos.

Though South Korea halted official leaflet drops following an inter-Korean agreement reached in 2004, civic groups have kept up balloon launches into the North – much to Pyongyang's annoyance.