▲ This file photo, provided by the unification ministry, shows a South Korean liaison officer talking to his North Korean counterpart at the Seoul bureau of their joint liaison office on Oct. 4, 2021. After a two-month suspension, the two Koreas restored cross-border communication lines that Pyongyang suspended in protest of an annual combined military exercise of South Korea and the United States. (PHOTO NOT FOR SALE) (Yonhap)

(LEAD) N Korea-hotline

(LEAD) N. Korea unresponsive to regular contact via inter-Korean liaison, military hotlines for 5th day

(ATTN: RECASTS headline; UPDATES with latest info, minor edits throughout)

SEOUL, April 11 (Yonhap) -- North Korea remained unresponsive to daily routine calls with South Korea through the inter-Korean liaison and military communication channels for the fifth straight day Tuesday, according to the Seoul government.

The North had not been responsive to both opening and closing routine calls from the South via the liaison line as of 5 p.m., the unification ministry said.

North Korea also did not respond to the South's regular calls via the militaries' East and West seas communication lines, according to the defense ministry.

Earlier in the day, Unification Minister Kwon Young-se issued a rare statement expressing "strong regret" over the North's "unilateral and irresponsible" move. The ministry said it is "putting weight" on the possibility of Pyongyang's "unilateral" suspension of the liaison communication channel.

Friday's cutoff marked the first time the daily phone calls have gone unanswered since last October, when the North failed to respond to an opening call via the joint liaison hotline. Daily communications between the Koreas resumed later in the afternoon after the hourslong suspension.

The two Koreas have made two phone calls daily, at 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., as part of liaison communication to alleviate tensions on the peninsula.

In June 2020, the North cut off the inter-Korean hotline in protest of Seoul activists' leaflet campaigns critical of Pyongyang. The communication lines were restored in July the following year but were severed again for about two months a few weeks later in apparent protest against Seoul-Washington's military exercises.

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