Seeing that the balloon drops in the past have been effective, a South Korean civic group has sent another 10 giant balloons containing anti-North Korea leaflets into North Korea on Wednesday. Yesterday, the North said it will re-start its nuclear-arms plant and would never return to the six-way nuclear talks.
The balloons also contained North Korean cash for starving residents in the communist state.
Protesters say they selected this day to deliver their message to North Koreans, as they are resting on a holiday that marks North Korea's founder Kim Il-sung's 97th birthday. Late Kim is the father of current North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.
About a dozen civilians gathered at Imjingak in Paju near the border to prepare and send 100,000 leaflets with about $2,000 U.S. dollars-worth of North Korean currency.
[Park Sang-hak, Protest Leader]:
"We urge the party officials not to be Kim Jong-il's hands and feet, suppressing their people and starving them, but to work for opening and reforming the society for the people and to be a member of the international community.
The waterproof messages on the leaflets, which are critical of the North's leadership, have angered Pyongyang and caused it to lash out on the South's government.
Hundreds of thousands of leaflets have been sent across the heavily armed border, many containing U.S. dollars or Chinese yuan and North Korean cash.
The conservative government of President Lee Myung-bak, which has called on the North to return to dialogue, has said there is no legal basis to outlaw the leaflet drops themselves. The government has asked the civic groups not to send the leaflets to the North.
