Politics North Korea: Airspace violation by South Korean drone

Pyongyang has accused South Korea of violating North Korea's sovereignty with a drone flight. A surveillance drone is said to have taken off from the South Korean city of Incheon on January 4 and filmed important facilities in North Korea with a camera. The flying object was shot down by the North Korean military within its own airspace, the state news agency KCNA reported. It also published photos of the downed drone and its alleged surveillance footage. The information cannot be independently verified.

Keystone-SDA

10.01.2026, 06:47

SDA

North Korea also accused its neighboring country of a similar incident in September last year. At that time, South Korea's military also allegedly flew a drone over North Korean airspace. This drone was also shot down, KCNA reported.

South Korea's Defense Minister Ahn Gyu Back denied the involvement of the army in both cases. The drones in question in the photos now published were not models used by the South Korean military, he told South Korea's official Yonhap news agency. North Korea's claims were "absolutely not true".

KCNA quoted a North Korean military spokesman as describing South Korea to Pyongyang as the "most hostile state" whose nature will never change. "The military warmongers of the Republic of Korea will surely have to pay a heavy price for their unforgivable hysteria," the statement continued.

North Korea had already accused South Korea of using a drone to penetrate the North Korean capital Pyongyang in October 2024. South Korea's ex-president Yoon Suk Yeol, who is accused by South Korean investigators of ordering a secret drone operation on North Korean territory to provoke a military response from the neighboring state, is said to be behind the incident. Yoon, who unexpectedly declared martial law in December 2024 and is now in custody, denies the allegations.

Formally speaking, North and South Korea are still in a state of war, as the Korean War from 1950 to 1953 only ended with an armistice, but a peace treaty was never signed.