North Korea jams GPS signals, affecting planes and ships in South Korea

North Korea has been conducting a campaign of jamming GPS signals since Friday, which have affected ; several ships and dozens of civilian aircraft in South Korea, the South Korean military said Saturday.

The accusations come at a time of tension over North Korea, which fired a missile just over a week ago that it said was the most advanced in its arsenal and is accused of sending thousands of troops to help Russia in its war against Ukraine, all in the context of the US election won by Donald Trump.

The South Korean military has urged caution for South Korean civilian ships and aircraft operating on and above the Yellow Sea, between China and the Korean Peninsula, indicating that ships and dozens of aircraft were experiencing “some operational disruptions”.

“We strongly urge North Korea to immediately cease its GPS provocations and warn it that it will be held responsible for any problems that arise from them,” the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Republic of Korea continued in a statement. Seoul.

GPS jamming involves emitting unknown signals that overload GPS receivers and render them unusable for navigation. South Korea has repeatedly accused North Korea of ​​carrying out such interference from its territory in recent years.

In May, the South Korean military reported a similar attack by Pyongyang, saying it had not interfered with any military operations in the South.

“GPS jamming attacks pose a real risk of serious incidents, including potential plane crashes in the worst case scenario,” Yang Moo-jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, told AFP, noting that the aim of the campaign was “unclear.”

It could be an “intention to divert the world's attention from (North Korean) troop deployments in Russia, to instill psychological anxiety among the inhabitants of the South or to respond to (South Korean military) maneuvers on Friday,” the specialist explains.

For defector Ahn Chan-il, director of the World Institute for North Korean Studies, the jamming could allow the North to “protect its own communications and intelligence exchanges during crucial military operations” on its territory and abroad.

– Garbage Balloons –

These announcements come a little over a week after Pyongyang tested an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) presented by the regime as the most advanced in its arsenal.

The launch, days before the U.S. presidential election on Tuesday, was North Korea's first weapons test since it was accused of sending troops to Russia to support its war effort in Ukraine.

South Korea responded Friday by firing one of its own ballistic missiles into the Yellow Sea in a bid to show its “strong determination to respond firmly” to “any North Korean provocation.”

The Hyunmoo missile, a short-range surface-to-surface projectile, is part of South Korea's preemptive strike system called “Kill Chain,” which aims to take the lead in an imminent North Korean offensive.

During his term, Donald Trump met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un three times, starting with a historic summit in Singapore in June 2018, but the two men have failed to make much progress in efforts to denuclearize North Korea.

Since the failure of a second summit in Hanoi in 2019, Pyongyang has abandoned diplomacy, doubling down on its military buildup while rejecting Washington's offers of dialogue.

Since last May, Pyongyang has also sent thousands of balloons carrying garbage toward South Korea. Some of these balloons disrupted traffic at Incheon International Airport, located northwest of Seoul, about forty kilometers from North Korea.

“Planes take off and land every two to three minutes” in Incheon, “so it is crucial to exercise caution,” notes Yang Moo-jin.

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