North Korea Not Picking Up Hotlines After Warning South Korea, US Over Joint Drills

South Korea and the United States regularly stage military exercises, mainly in the spring and summer, which North Korea routinely denounces as rehearsals for war.

North Korea did not answer routine calls on inter-Korean hotlines on Tuesday, South Korea said, hours after a senior official in Pyongyang warned the South and the United States over annual joint military drills set to begin this week. Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, accused South Korea of "perfidious behaviour" for going ahead with the drills after North Korea agreed to restore hotlines in late July, having cut them last year amid rising tensions. South Korea and the United States are set to hold computer-simulated exercises next week, but preliminary training began on Tuesday, military sources told Reuters. In a statement carried by North Korean state news agency KCNA, Kim Yo Jong said the exercises were an "act of self-destruction for which a dear price should be paid as they threaten the safety of our people and further imperil the situation on the Korean peninsula".