The Office of the General Staff of the North Korean People’s Army has announced that it is withdrawing all its military safeguards that the North normally operates by in relation to inter-Korean cooperation and exchanges.

The North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Thursday that the office issued a statement that it will shut down military liaison offices on the western and eastern border areas. The office said it will also begin examining the possibility of blocking South Korean access to the Gaeseong Industrial Complex.

The statement added that the North was taking the measure to counter what it said were confrontational moves by the South.

The North reaffirmed its position that it will destroy any loudspeakers playing propaganda broadcasts across the inter-Korean border that Seoul has said it will operate.

The office also announced that it is scrapping inter-Korean military agreements signed in June 2004 aimed at preventing accidental military clashes near the inter-Korean border in the Yellow Sea.