Kim Jong Un’s Sister Rejects South Korea’s Disarmament Offer, Blasts Yoon Suk-yeol

Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said her country will never do the “foolish” offer made by South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol for the return of nuclear disarmament. The South’s offer would in turn provide economic benefits to the North in exchange for its complete denuclearization. The leader’s powerful sister on Friday told Yoon to “shut his mouth” calling his recycled plan “audacious” and had been previously rejected by Pyongyang.

According to NBC News, Yo Jong's comment with the state media had her strongly emphasizing her country’s refusal to cut off its nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles program saying “no one barters its destiny for corn cake.” She also expressed her doubts about the sincerity of South Korea’s requests for improved bilateral relations while it continues to conduct combined military exercises with the United States and its negligence in stopping civilian activists from tossing anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets and other “dirty waste” across their border. The North Korean official then criticized South Korea’s military incompetence.

Yo Jong said that the South supposedly misread the launch site of the North’s latest missile test, hours before South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s press conference on Wednesday.

South Korea’s Unification Ministry expressed grief over Kim Yo Jong’s statements. The South Korean Presidential Office called for Pyongyang to show “self-restraint” and reconsider Seoul’s offer. Last week, Kim Yo Jong threatened “deadly” retaliation against the South, claiming the Covid-19 outbreak in the North was caused by propaganda leaflets and other objects dropped from balloons launched by civilian activists from the South.

On Monday, the South Korean leader proposed an economic assistance package to the North that reportedly consists of large-scale food aid, appropriate healthcare, and modernization of the country’s electricity production system that also covers its seaport and airports. This proposal was not any different from previous offers rejected by the North Korean government. Kim’s sister did not mince her words as she described the South’s actions will only “incite hatred and wrath” from the North, citing the worsening inter-Korean ties. Yoon on the other hand has expressed hope for further meaningful talks with the North over his aid-for-disarmament deal.