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North Korea has said it will cut off all inter-Korean communication lines with the South, including a hotline between the two nations' leaders.

The North said this was the first in a series of actions, describing South Korea as "the enemy".

Daily calls, which have been made to a liaison office located in the North Korean border city of Kaesong, will cease from Tuesday.

The two states had set up the office to reduce tensions after talks in 2018.

North and South Korea are technically still at war because no peace agreement was reached when the Korean War ended in 1953.

North Korea "will completely cut off and shut down the liaison line between the authorities of the North and the South, which has been maintained through the North-South joint liaison office... from 12:00 on 9 June 2020," the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) report said.

Military communication channels will also be cut, North Korea said.

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North Korea blows up joint liaison office with South in Kaesong

North Korea has blown up a joint liaison office with the South near the North's border town of Kaesong.

The move comes just hours after the North renewed threats of military action at the Korean border.

The site was opened in 2018 to help the Koreas - officially in a state of war - to communicate. It had been empty since January due to Covid-19 restrictions.

In a statement, South Korea warned it would "respond strongly" if the North "continues to worsen the situation".

The destruction of the office, it said, "abandons the hopes of everyone who wanted the development of inter-Korean relations and peace settlement in the Korean Peninsula".

"The government makes it clear that all responsibility of this situation lies in the North."

Tensions between North and South Korea have been escalating for weeks, prompted by defector groups in the South sending propaganda across the border.

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Former United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in an interview said that North Korea “seems to have succeeded in acquiring de facto nuclear state status” after the nation's leader Kim Jong Un has had three high-profile meetings with President Trump.

Ban, who served as U.N. secretary from 2007 to 2016, told Time magazine that he is “very worried” about ongoing missile tests in North Korea, saying Trump has allowed for the behavior to continue.

“President Trump has been saying that it’s okay that [North Korea] are testing some small range missiles, as it cannot reach the American continent. It’s not only the security and safety of the American continent. It’s the safety, security and threat to the whole of humanity,” Ban said.

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Ban told Time that “embarrassingly, we are seeing some absence of American leadership since the Administration of Donald Trump began ... at a time when American leadership is most needed.”

“President Trump has been able to make a good contribution, but at this time, unfortunately, by just granting a one-on-one summit three times, [it] perhaps played to Trump’s ego and penchant for pageantry, and Kim Jong Un seems to have succeeded in acquiring de facto nuclear state status,” Ban told Time.

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The bombastic rhetoric and belligerent actions are familiar. But beneath the veil of mystery, something is different – and dangerous – about this latest North Korean temper tantrum. It’s not just that Pyongyang hates the balloons carrying Bibles and critical leaflets launched over the DMZ, the proximate cause of the latest friction.

For starters, something is not right with Kim Jong Un. Whether it is COVID19 or the health consequences of being morbidly obese, smoking, drinking, not exercising and a family history of heart problems, he is not well. Even after he surfaced last month, his public appearances have been rare.

How else to explain the spectacular political theater of the rising public profile of Kim’s sister, Kim Yo-jong, hurling epithets and picking a fight with Republic of Korea (ROK) leader Moon Jae-in, threatening and then literally blowing up inter-Korean cooperation? She oversaw the destruction on June 16 of the four-story inter-Korean Liaison building, the symbol of a 2018 reconciliation process.

Dramatic video aside, it will not be the last such bellicose act. At the same time, Pyongyang has moved its forces back to the DMZ, undoing a 2018 demilitarization accord and restoring the status quo ante. There are threats to blow up the Kaesong Industrial Zone, once a shining example of inter-Korean economic cooperation. Many expect a military provocation in the West Sea, where in the past the North has launched attacks over a disputed sea border.

Why? The short answer is the overused tactic of manufacturing pseudo crises to extort concessions. The Kims are angry that the Moon administration in Seoul has been unwilling to break United Nations sanctions and offer economic goodies. This has been the pattern in the past — provocations aimed at payoffs.

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we are seeing some absence of American leadership since the Administration of Donald Trump began

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The short answer is the overused tactic of manufacturing pseudo crises to extort concessions.