North Korean leader's sister calls South's medical aid offer an 'insult' and 'provocation'

Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, on Friday reiterated Pyongyang’s rejection of Seoul’s offer to provide humanitarian medical assistance, criticizing the gesture as a “farce.”

Her statement, carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency, came a day after she rejected the South’s plan to send 1,431 medical items across 166 categories to the North as part of a humanitarian medical support program. She called the offer an “insult” and “political provocation.”

“The racket of ‘mine explosion’ and the farce of ‘medical equipment support’ orchestrated by the ROK are just the two sides of the same coin minted by its inveterate bad habit of escalating confrontation with our state,” Kim Yo-jong said.

ROK stands for the Republic of Korea, South Korea’s official name.

She claimed that South Korea’s medical aid proposal and its accusations against North Korea over a recent land mine explosion near the inter-Korean border were intended to damage Pyongyang’s reputation and image.

North Korea has denied responsibility for the Sept. 21 mine blast inside the demilitarized zone, which left three South Korean soldiers injured, accusing the South of fabricating the findings and warning of "immediate and merciless" retaliation if its troops are fired upon.

“The farces recently staged by Seoul are unprecedented politically-motivated, military and moral provocations against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” Kim Yo-jong said, adding that North Korea will continue to “disregard” and “reject” the South.

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is North Korea’s official name.

The South’s Ministry of Unification secured a sanctions exemption in May from the United Nations Security Council’s North Korea sanctions committee for the humanitarian program.

Yonhap