N.K. to redeploy troops to Kaesong, Mount Kumgang areas, rejects Seoul's offer for envoys

SEOUL, June 17 (Yonhap) -- North Korea said Wednesday it has rejected South Korea's offer to send special envoys and will redeploy troops to two inter-Korean business zones near the border, unrelentingly ratcheting up tensions a day after blowing up a joint liaison office.

The North's disclosure of its rejection of the special envoy proposal shows the regime has no intention to defuse tensions through dialogue and will carry out a series of measures it has threatened to take in anger over propaganda leaflets criticizing its leader.

The sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un also issued a harshly worded statement lambasting South Korean President Moon Jae-in for failing to apologize for such leafleting and accusing him of "pro-U.S. flunkeyism."

South Korea reacted angrily to the North's moves, with the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae slamming the North Korean leader's sister, Kim Yo-jong, for her "rude" and "senseless" criticism and warning it will no longer tolerate such "indiscreet" words and acts.

It also denounced the North's disclosure of its special envoy offer as an "unprecedentedly senseless act."

The defense ministry warned that the North will pay the price if it actually takes military action, and the unification ministry expressed "strong regret" over the North's plan to send troops to the joint economic zones.

The exchange of threats and warnings marked a new high in tensions, aggravated dramatically by the North's blowing up of an inter-Korean liaison office building Tuesday, and deepened fears that the situation could spiral out of control into accidental clashes.

Earlier, the General Staff of the North's Korean People's Army said it will send troops to the now-shuttered inter-Korean industrial complex in its border city of Kaesong and the Mount Kumgang tourist zone on the east coast -- two key symbols of inter-Korean reconciliation.

The North also said it will restore guard posts removed from the Demilitarized Zone separating the two sides and resume "all kinds of regular military exercises" near the inter-Korean border in an apparent move to abolish a military tension-reduction deal signed in 2018.

"Units of the regiment level and necessary firepower sub-units with defense mission will be deployed in the Mount Kumgang tourist area and the Kaesong Industrial Zone," a spokesperson of the General Staff said in a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

"Civil police posts that had been withdrawn from the Demilitarized Zone under the north-south agreement in the military field will be set up again to strengthen the guard over the front line," it said.