SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea warned of war as South Korea on Saturday continued blasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda across the rivals’ tense border in retaliation for the North’s purported fourth nuclear test.

North Korean propaganda is filled with warnings of war, but the country is also extremely sensitive to criticism of its authoritarian leadership, which Seoul resumed in its cross-border broadcasts Friday for the first time in nearly five months. Pyongyang says the broadcasts are tantamount to an act of war. When South Korea briefly resumed propaganda broadcasts in August after an 11-year break, Seoul says the two Koreas exchanged artillery fire.

Speaking to a massive crowd at Pyongyang’s Kim Il Sung Square, a top ruling party official said the broadcasts, along with talks between Washington and Seoul on the possibility of deploying in the South advanced warplanes capable of delivering nuclear bombs, have pushed the Korean Peninsula “toward the brink of war.”

Pyongyang’s rivals are “jealous” of the North’s successful hydrogen bomb test, Workers’ Party Secretary Kim Ki Nam said in comments broadcast on state TV late Friday. South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported that frontline South Korean troops, near 11 sites where loudspeakers started blaring propaganda Friday, were on highest alert. Yonhap said Seoul had deployed missiles, artillery and other weapons systems near the border to swiftly deal with any possible North Korean provocation. While the South’s broadcasts also include news and pop music, much of the programming challenges North Korea’s government more directly.

“We hope that our fellow Koreans in the North will be able to live in (a) society that doesn’t invade individual lives as soon as possible,” a female presenter said in parts of the broadcast that officials revealed to South Korean media.

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