Seoul to take corresponding action after probe into drone incursions alleged by North: minister

▲ Unification Minister Chung Dong-yong speaks to ministry employees on Jan. 2, 2026, the first business day of the new year. (Yonhap)

N Korea-drones

Seoul to take corresponding action after probe into drone incursions alleged by North: minister

SEOUL, Jan. 14 (Yonhap) -- South Korea will take action corresponding to the results of its ongoing investigation into drone incursions alleged by North Korea, the unification minister said Wednesday.

Unification Minister Chung Dong-young made the remarks at a policy briefing by agencies affiliated with the ministry, a day after Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, again demanded that Seoul apologize for violating the North's sovereignty.

On Saturday, North Korea's military accused Seoul of sending drones carrying surveillance equipment across the border in September and on Jan. 4, claiming the country's sovereignty had been violated.

South Korea immediately launched an investigation into the allegations, including the possibility that civilians may have been behind the claimed drone incursions, while saying the South's military has not sent the drones or operated the models found in the North.

"The military-police fact-finding team is currently working swiftly. As soon as the results are released, (the government) will take corresponding action," Chung said.

The minister also described the recent delivery of the North's back-to-back messages related to the drone allegations through the media, rather than inter-Korean communication channels, as "extremely unnatural and abnormal," and called for the restoration of dialogue between Seoul and Pyongyang.

"I hope the severed inter-Korean contact networks and channels could be restored at the earliest date possible and dialogue can be resumed," Chung noted.

He also signaled that Seoul may issue an apology for drones South Korea sent to North Korea in 2024 under the former Yoon Suk Yeol administration, pending a related court ruling.

Former President Yoon is currently standing trial on charges of benefiting the enemy over the alleged dispatch of military drones to Pyongyang in 2024, allegedly intended to provoke the North and use any potential retaliation as a pretext for declaring martial law.

"After the truth is thoroughly revealed, our government will take corresponding action, as the North Korean leader previously expressed ... an apology and regret for the shooting of a (South Korean) government employee to death in the Yellow Sea in 2020," he noted.

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