The North Korean leader's powerful sister said on Thursday that the country has never taken down propaganda loudspeakers and will not do so, calling South Korea's belief that Pyongyang was responding to its peace overtures a "pipedream.

North Korea has begun dismantling loudspeakers along the border with South Korea that had been used for propaganda broadcasts, according to the General Staff in Seoul on Saturday, as reported by the Yonhap news agency.

North Korean troops have started removing propaganda loudspeakers used to blare unsettling noises along the border, South Korea's military said Saturday, days after Seoul's new administration dismantled ones on its side of the frontier.