Authorities say they have found remains of a drone in a neighborhood of Pyongyang that corresponds to a model used by the South Korean army, at a time marked by border tensions.
The “drone” was found tied to a tree in the Hyongjesan area, northeast of Pyongyang, on October 13, according to a statement from the North Korean Ministry of National Defense, published by the state news agency KCNA.
Following the investigation, “it was scientifically proven that the ‘drone’ originated in the Republic of Korea,” the official name of South Korea, the government department said in the statement.
In addition, the note continues, it is a long-range reconnaissance model used by the Drone Operations Command of the South Korean army and which was recently on display in Seoul and at an air base during the Day of the Day parades. Armed Forces, October 1. .
The photographs released by KCNA show a ‘drone’ “very similar” to a model presented in these parades, called S-Bat or SD-Bat and manufactured by Sunwoo Engineering, wrote the Spanish news agency EFE.
The model was selected by South Korea’s Defense Development Agency (ADD) as part of a recent program to acquire one hundred small, low-cost drones: the model measures 287 centimeters wide and 173 centimeters long.
KCNA said that after investigation, the drone may have been used in the last five to seven days before the date it was found.
“Taking into account the shape of the ‘drone’, the alleged flight period, the container for launching the leaflets fixed at the bottom of the fuselage, etc., it is very likely that it is the ‘drone’ that disseminated the leaflets throughout central Pyongyang, although a conclusion has not yet been reached,” he adds.
North Korea claimed, on October 11, that it detected ‘drones’ with propaganda pamphlets flying over the North Korean capital and accused the neighboring country’s army of being responsible for the operation.
The South Korean military denied this, although ambiguously, and pointed out the possibility that the unmanned aerial vehicles were the responsibility of activists who periodically send balloons with this type of propaganda from the South to the North.
“If the drone’s involvement in the recent leaflet distribution episode is denied, this will be evidence of another deliberate violation of our country’s airspace by ROK military means,” the North’s Ministry of National Defense said. . Korean, which considers “objective evidence and scientific analysis” as “clear evidence” that Seoul is responsible for the operation.
The text recalls that, after Pyongyang detected the ‘drones’, border artillery units received orders to open fire if new devices were seen coming from the neighboring country.
The episode occurs shortly after North Korea modified the Constitution to declare the South a “hostile state”, which represents a radical change by Pyongyang in its diplomatic strategy, currently marked by the refusal to resume dialogue with Seoul or Washington and a strong proximity to Moscow.
Source: Observadora
