Is it just me or do North Koreans threats sound more and more empty every year?:

North Korea has demanded an apology from South Korea after a high-ranking Seoul defense official said the South will strike the North’s nuclear sites if Pyongyang launches a nuclear attack.

The Defense Ministry in Seoul said Sunday that Pyongyang wants a retraction and apology from the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Kim Tae-young, who made the comment Wednesday.

The North has threatened to ban all inter-Korean contacts and projects if its demand is not met.  [KBS Global]

The South Korean government is responding to these demands in the most effective way, with a big yawn:

“He was only referring to a “general guideline” for military counteractions to a worst case scenario of North Korea’s nuclear attack. There was no such wording as ‘preemptive strike’ in the Assembly records,” the South Korean Defense Ministry said in a statement.

The ministry plans to decide by Tuesday whether to make an official reply to the North’s demand.

“We don’t know how to react to the North’s claim now because we haven’t decided yet whether to send a reply to the North. If we reply, it would contain our position that the North’s claim is not true. We may express regret over the North’s falsified argument,” a ministry official said on condition of anonymity.  [Korea Herald]

The North Koreans are trying to make something out of nothing for their fifth columns allies to make hay over before this months South Korean parliamentarian elections.  However the North’s threats are so pathetic now that even the Hankyoreh is supporting the South Korean government on this one:

The new South Korean government seems to have held on to the belief that, no matter how tense the situation, North Korea would eventually agree to participate in further talks. This belief has some merit, …   [Hankyoreh]

When even the leftist Hankyoreh isn’t demanding that the South Korean president give in to North Korean demands you know your threats have worn thin.