North Korea’s Kim blasts South media over flood damage ‘rumours’

SEOUL – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un accused South Korean media outlets of spreading rumours about flood damage and casualties in his country, state media said on Aug 3, days after Seoul reached out to offer humanitarian aid.

North Korea said earlier this week that there had been unspecified casualties resulting from the flooding in its northern regions, in addition to damage to thousands of homes.

Seoul on Aug 1 said it was

willing to “urgently provide” humanitarian assistance

to “North Korean disaster victims” following a South Korean news report that the toll of dead and missing could be as high as 1,500.

The report by TV Chosun, which was later picked up by other outlets, also referred to the possible deaths of rescue workers in helicopter crashes.

But Mr Kim slammed the reports for “spreading the false rumour that the human loss... is expected to be over 1,000 or 1,500”, according to Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency.

The North’s leader “bitterly censured the inveterate habits and despicable nature of the ROK scum”, KCNA said on Aug 3, referring to the South by the initials of its formal name, the Republic of Korea.

The flooding reports constituted a South Korean “smear campaign to bring disgrace upon us and tarnish” the North’s image, Mr Kim added.

Pyongyang said on July 31 that officials who neglected their disaster prevention duties had caused unspecified casualties, without specifying the location.

But it said on Aug 3 that there were no casualties at all in the Sinuiju area, the region Pyongyang said suffered the “greatest flood damage”.

It claimed North Korea’s air force rescued more than 5,000 people, with about 4,200 of them saved by helicopter “within a few hours”.

Relations between the two Koreas are at one of their lowest points in years, but South Korea’s unification and foreign ministries this week expressed condolences for the North’s flood victims.

Seoul said on Aug 2 it had received no response after trying to offer humanitarian aid via the Koreas’ liaison office communication channel.

North Korea declared the South its principal enemy earlier in 2024, and Pyongyang has not responded to inter-Korea liaison hotline calls since April 2023. AFP