South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said on 9 Aug. that it observed North Korean troops removing several of the propaganda loudspeakers the North had positioned along the inter-Korean demilitarized zone. The assessment came less than a week after Seoul finished dismantling its own bank of speakers, which had broadcast K-pop music and messages critical of Pyongyang, in what President Lee Jae Myung described as an early step toward reducing military tensions. Border loudspeakers have long been a flashpoint on the peninsula, with North Korean units retaliating by blasting disruptive noises toward the South after Seoul resumed its broadcasts last year. Lee, who took office in June, halted the South’s transmissions on 4 Aug. and ordered the equipment removed, hoping the gesture would prompt reciprocal measures and reopen channels for dialogue. Pyongyang publicly rejected that interpretation on 14 Aug. when Kim Yo Jong, sister of leader Kim Jong Un, declared through state media that North Korea had “never removed” any speakers and had “no intention” of doing so. She dismissed Seoul’s belief in a thaw as a “pipedream” and criticised upcoming expanded U.S.–South Korean military exercises scheduled to begin on 18 Aug. In response to the denial, Seoul’s military spokesman said the South stands by its observation of dismantling activity but will continue to monitor the border. The conflicting accounts underline the fragility of President Lee’s overture and leave uncertainty over whether the apparent easing of one of the peninsula’s most visible propaganda tools will hold.