Police beef up security of Gyeonggi governor's residence following threats over leaflets

All News 15:47 June 21, 2020

SEOUL, June 21 (Yonhap) -- Police strengthened security around the residence of the governor of Gyeonggi Province after a member of a conservative group threatened to explode a gas canister in protest of the provincial government's decision to block attempts to send anti-Pyongyang leaflets into North Korea.

Earlier this month, the government of Gyeonggi, which surrounds Seoul and borders North Korea, announced it will designate four parts of its border areas as off-limits danger zones and thoroughly block any attempt to send anti-North Korea propaganda leaflets across the border.

The following day a member of a conservative group wrote a post on Facebook slamming such measures.

In another post he wrote days later, he vowed to send leaflets near Gov. Lee Jae-myung's house, saying he "will not hesitate to open and light up a hydrogen gas canister if the police uses force."

A police force has been dispatched to the provincial government building and to the official residence and private home of Lee since Saturday morning.

"Police will be deployed until Sunday at midnight as a precautionary measure against any emergency situation, such as the sending of leaflets to the North," a police official said.

Earlier in the week, the Gyeonggi provincial government took one step further in its crackdown on the distribution of propaganda leaflets into the North by issuing an administrative order banning anyone from entering its border areas to send leaflets and threatening legal punishments.

In the order, the Gyeonggi government said it will designate five cities and counties close to the inter-Korean border as off-limits danger zones until the end of November to prevent North Korean defectors and South Korean activists from dispatching anti-Pyongyang leaflets and materials across the border.