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Tag: North Korea

  • Russia, China, and North Korea celebrate victory that occurred 70 years ago together

    Russia, China, and North Korea celebrate victory that occurred 70 years ago together

    Delegations from China and Russia, North Korea‘s main allies in the Korean War, gathered in Pyongyang this week to commemorate North Korea’s “Victory Day” in that conflict, which ravaged the Korean Peninsula seven decades ago, as they also united over Russia’s destructive invasion of Ukraine, another very modern conflict.

    On Wednesday, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un gave Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu a tour of a defence exhibition in Pyongyang. Images from North Korean media show them passing a variety of weapons, from Pyongyang’s nuclear-capable ballistic missiles to its newest drones. Shoigu was a key architect of Moscow’s assault on Ukraine.

    According to a report from the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), North Korean Defence Minister Kang Sun Nam expressed Pyongyang’s full support “for the just struggle of the Russian army and people to defend the sovereignty and security of the country” at a state reception for Shoigu and the Russian delegation in a reference to the conflict in Ukraine.

    Shoigu then made his own comments, claiming that the Korean People’s Army (KPA) has “become the strongest army in the world” and promising to continue working together to maintain this status.

    Senior North Korean official Kim Song Nam expressed gratitude to Chinese forces for participating in the Korean War on Wednesday at a reception for the delegation led by Politburo member Li Hongzhong, saying North Korea “would not forget forever the heroic feats and merits of the bravery soldiers who recorded a brilliant page in history.”

    The attendance of the Chinese and Russian delegations at the armistice anniversary, according to Ankit Panda, Stanton Senior Fellow in the Nuclear Policy Programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, “underscores the importance Pyongyang attaches to its relationships with both countries.”

    Shoigu’s presence stands out in particular because it demonstrates how close Pyongyang and Moscow have grown since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year, according to Panda.

    The Korean War, which lasted from 1950 to 1953 and was one of the first global hostilities of the Cold War era, came to a conclusion on Thursday, marking its 70th anniversary.

    In the autumn of 1950, China dispatched a quarter of a million soldiers onto the Korean Peninsula to help its ally North Korea and drive out the combined forces of South Korea, the United States, and other nations fighting under the United Nations Command.

    In the Korean War, also known in Beijing as the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, more than 180,000 Chinese soldiers lost their lives.

    The Soviet Union, which preceded Russia, also helped North Korea during the conflict by supplying heavy weapons like tanks and providing military assistance by sending Soviet aircraft to engage US fighters.

    Despite Pyongyang’s claims of victory, the conflict it started in 1950 ended in a standoff, leaving the demilitarised zone that exists today along the 38th parallel largely where it did before the conflict.

    Although a genuine peace agreement has never been signed, the Korean War armistice that was signed on July 27, 1953, put an end to hostilities.

    After the war, the US, which served as the focal point of the UN Command that supported South Korea, had a sizable number of soldiers stationed at several army and air sites in the South. The largest US military base abroad is Camp Humphreys, located in Pyeongtaek, south of Seoul.

    In the meantime, Moscow has consistently supported North Korea throughout the years, particularly given their shared hostility to the West. The same is true of the Chinese Communist Party, particularly under the leadership of Xi Jinping, the country’s current president.

    Panda emphasised how Pyongyang’s interests have been upheld before the UN Security Council by both Moscow and Beijing, permanent members of the organisation, as Western nations led by the US have attempted to impose additional sanctions on North Korea.

    With regard to Ukraine, a former Soviet state that Russia invaded in February 2022 after declaring it to be historically Russian territory, the three authoritarian nuclear powers are now putting up a united front.

    That invasion quickly came to a halt as the Ukrainians mounted a valiant defence of their country and Western powers hurried to transfer arms and ammunition to Kiev as Moscow depleted its own supplies and turned to friends like Iran and North Korea for reinforcements.

    Last year, US officials claimed that North Korea was supplying Russia with millions of rockets and artillery shells for use in the conflict in Ukraine.

    And as the war in Ukraine enters its 18th month, China, although not giving Russia any arms, has remained solidly in Moscow’s camp, with Xi expanding his connection with Putin and mirroring the Kremlin’s rhetoric on the war.

    Following the Wagner mercenary group’s brief mutiny in Russia last month, a spokeswoman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry declared support for the Putin administration.

    An online statement read, “China supports Russia in maintaining national stability and achieving development and prosperity as its friendly neighbour and comprehensive strategic partner of coordination for the new era.”

    The People’s Liberation Army’s English website states that the militaries of China and Russia have been active in the waters off the Korean Peninsula. Their most recent joint exercise, Northern/Interaction-2023, brought together naval and air forces from both nations in drills aiming to “strengthen both sides’ capabilities of jointly safeguarding regional peace and stability and responding to various security challenges.”

    The US Navy’s nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarine made its first port call in South Korea in forty years during those manoeuvres in the waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan, which also coincided with military demonstrations by South Korea and the US.

    A military parade in the city’s centre was scheduled to take place on Thursday as part of Pyongyang’s commemorations of the armistice. North Korea frequently exhibits its newest weapons at significant points in its history.

    The Hwasong-18 ICBM, a solid-fueled, nuclear-capable missile that North Korea claims could target any location in the United States, is one such weapon that could be on show. Two times this year, most recently earlier this month, it has tested the missile.

  • China’s highest-ranking group to visit North Korea since Covid restrictions

    China’s highest-ranking group to visit North Korea since Covid restrictions

    This week, a high-ranking Chinese government group is travelling to North Korea. This delegation is thought to be the most senior from Beijing to pay a visit to Pyongyang since the reclusive nation shut its borders during the Covid-19 outbreak.

    Li Hongzhong, a member of the Chinese Communist Party‘s central policymaking committee and a leader in its rubber-stamp Parliament, will be in charge of leading the group.

    According to a statement from Hu Zhaoming, the spokesperson for the Central Committee’s International Liaison Department, he will take part in festivities commemorating the 70th anniversary of the conclusion of the Korean War.

    Li’s visit comes after an invitation from North Korea, the statement said.

    “The visit will be significant for what it says about Beijing’s support of North Korea as well as Pyongyang’s willingness to relax pandemic-era border restrictions,” said Leif-Eric Easley, professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.

    North Korea sealed its borders during the coronavirus pandemic, deepening the isolation of a country that is already one of the most cut off places in the world.

    Beijing is Pyongyang’s longtime ally.

    In the fall of 1950, China sent a quarter million troops into the Korean Peninsula, supporting its North Korean ally and pushing back the combined forces of South Korea, the United States and other countries under the United Nations Command.

    More than 180,000 Chinese troops died in the Korean War, or what Beijing calls the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea.

    But Easley noted that South Korea is garnering a much larger show of international support for its armistice anniversary commemorations, with representatives from 22 countries expected to attend.

    The Chinese visit, and the ceremonies marking the 70th anniversary of the 1953 armistice that ended fighting on the Korean Peninsula, comesamid simmeringtensions between North Korea and South Korea and its US ally.

    Pyongyang has frequently tested missiles banned under United Nations Security Council resolutions, and on several occasions the US and South Korea have deployed military assets like nuclear-capable submarines and bombers.

    North Koreacontinued its torrid pace of missile testing late Monday, when it fired two short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs) from the Pyongyang area into the waters off the east coast of the peninsula, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).

    The missiles were launched around 11:55 p.m. local time, flying for about five minutes or 400 kilometers (248 miles) before falling into the water, according to the JCS.

    Earlier Monday, US Navy attack submarine USS Annapolis made a port call at Jeju Naval Base on the island off South Korea’s southern coast, according to South Korean Navy spokesperson Jang Do-young.

    The sub was stopping at the island to replenish military supplies while on an operations mission, Jang said.

    The Annapolis’ visit follows the much more provocative arrival of nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarine USS Kentucky at the southern South Korean port of Busan last week.

    North Korea said the visit of the “boomer,” an Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine which can carry up to 20 missiles and 80 nuclear warheads, to Busan crossed a “red line” and said such provocations could produce a drastic response by Pyongyang.

    “I remind the US military of the fact that the ever-increasing visibility of the deployment of the strategic nuclear submarine and other strategic assets may fall under the conditions of the use of nuclear weapons specified in the DPRK law on the nuclear force policy,” a statement from North Korean Defense Minister Kang Sun Nam posted by state media said.

    Relations have been further complicated by the decision of a US soldier to cross the border between North and South Korea last week in the demilitarized zone separating the two nations.

    Pvt Travis King, who was facing disciplinary action and was meant to go back to the US the day before he bolted, is believed to be the first US soldier to cross into North Korea since 1982.

    On Monday, the deputy commander of the United Nations Command (UNC), Gen. Andrew Harrison, said a “conversation has commenced” with North Korea over King.

    Two US officials told CNN that North Korea had acknowledged receiving contact from the UNC, a multinational military force that includes the United States which fought on the side of South Korea during the 1950-53 Korean War.

    But Pyongyang does not seem to be responding to Washington directly.

    The US State Department has not received a response to its messages on King, State Department spokesperson Matt Miller said on Monday. He also said it was his understanding that the US military had not received a response.

    On the UNC side, Miller said it was his understanding “that there have been no new communications since last week, communications that happened in the early days,” but that the North Korean government had acknowledged receipt of the message.

    “I’m not aware of any new communications, other than those that happened in the very early hours, early days after he went across the border,” Miller said at a State Department briefing Monday.

    King has not been publicly seen or heard from since he crossed into North Korea last Tuesday, and North Korea has also not said anything about the status or condition of the missing soldier.

    His reasons for crossing the border into one of the world’s most authoritarian places – and a country which the US does not have diplomatic relations with – have so far remained a mystery.

    Easley, the Ewha Womans University professor, said any quick response from Pyongyang on the status of King was unlikely, especially in light of the armistice commemorations.

    “North Korea is unlikely to engage on Travis King’s case until his interrogation and quarantine are complete, and after the Kim regime celebrates its so-called Victory Day,” Easley said.

  • US soldier who entered North Korea was previously assaulted and imprisoned

    A US soldier entered North Korea on Tuesday, according to new information, but the communist nation hasn’t commented on the incident, so it’s unclear exactly where he is now.

    According to court records, Private Travis King, who is thought to be the first American service member to enter North Korea since 1982, had a history of assault, was being disciplined for his behaviour, and was scheduled to return to the US the day before the incident. The soldier was going to be administratively separated from the US Army, an army official told CNN.

    King’s precise route to the North Korean side of the border is still unknown.

    King had been on a tour of a border area as a civilian when he crossed the demarcation line.

    His motive is also a mystery. King’s mother, Claudine Gates, told ABC she was “shocked” after being told by the US Army that her son had crossed into North Korea.

    “I can’t see Travis doing anything like that,” Gates told ABC, adding that she heard from her son several days ago and he told her that he’d be returning to his base in Fort Bliss.

    The US has been actively reaching out to North Korea to resolve the situation, but it has not yet heard back, a defense official said Wednesday. It is typical of North Korea not to respond to US outreach, the defense official added.

    Adm. John Aquilino, who is in charge of US Indo-Pacific Command, said Tuesday that the US has had “no contact at this point” with North Korea in regards to King. Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum on Tuesday, Aquilino said King “made a run across the demilitarized zone in the Joint Security Area, was picked up by the North Koreans, and we’ve had no contact at this point.”

    Aquilino added that he has “gotten no reports” that King was a North Korea sympathizer.

    The US Army has identified King as a cavalry scout who joined the military in January 2021. US officials did not say how long King had been in South Korea, but at some point he faced disciplinary action for assault and spent about 50 days in a detention facility.

    King was held in a designated detention facility under the Status of Forces Agreement with South Korea, the officials said, which is an agreement that defines how US service members, their family members, and other Defense Department personnel are treated and processed in a foreign country, including its justice system

    A US official told CNN that King was released from detention on July 10 and was set to fly back to the US on Monday.

    Another official told CNN King was escorted to the airport by military officials, but the escorts were unable to accompany him to the gate and he ultimately did not board his flight.

    King appears to have a history of violent behavior. South Korean court documents show that he was accused of assault twice last year, and received a fine for one of the incidents.

    Last October, he was accused of pushing and repeatedly punching a victim in the face in a club in Mapo-gu, Seoul, after being refused a drink he asked for, according to the Seoul Western District Court documents.

    Following the alleged assault, King was taken into police custody and placed in the back seat of a patrol car, when he allegedly used offensive language against Korea, the Korean army and the Korean police while in anger, the court document said.

    He then allegedly kicked the door of the patrol car several times, causing 583,959 Korean won (around $461) of damage, according to the court document. King was fined 5 million Korean won (around $4,000) as a result, the document stated.

    “If the defendant does not pay the above fine, the defendant shall be detained in a labor facility for a period of time converted to 100,000 Korean won per day,” the document said. It is unclear at this point if King paid the fine or served time at a labor facility.

    The court document also referenced an earlier assault case against King from September 2022, which was dropped after the alleged victim expressed his intention not to press charges against King. South Korean police told CNN that King was transferred to US military police after an investigation into an assault last September. It is unclear whether the incident they were referring to was the same case that was dismissed by the court.

    It is unclear whether the time he spent in detention was related to these incidents.

  • First port call by US nuclear-capable submarine in South Korea in forty years

    First port call by US nuclear-capable submarine in South Korea in forty years

    Just days after North Korea purportedly conducted a test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile using solid fuel, the US Navy’s first nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarine to visit South Korea in decades made a port call there.

    The defence ministry of South Korea confirmed on Tuesday afternoon that an Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine was currently based in the port city of Busan.

    While attending the Nuclear Consultative Group’s (NCG) inaugural conference in Seoul, Kurt Campbell, the US National Security Council’s coordinator for the Indo-Pacific, received the news.

    The NCG is a joint US and South Korean panel set up by the countries’ leaders at a summit in Washington in April.

    The arrival of the submarine follows a period of heightened tensions on the peninsula, during which North Korea has both tested what it said was an advanced long range missile and threatened to shoot down US military reconnaissance aircraft engaging in what it called “hostile espionage” activities near its territory.

    Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and a senior official in her own right, said in a statement Monday the deployment of a US ballistic missile submarine to the peninsula would damage already fractured lines of communication between the two sides.

    “The reality before the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) is not dialogue repeatedly touted by the US,” said Kim. Instead, she said, the NCG was “openly discussing the use of nukes against the DPRK and the entry of US strategic nuclear submarine into waters of the Korean Peninsula for the first time in 40-odd years.”

    “The US should know that its bolstered extended deterrence system and excessively extended military alliance system, a threatening entity, will only make the DPRK go farther away from the negotiating table desired by it,” the statement added.

    Known colloquially as “boomers,”each of the Ohio-class subs can carry a maximum of 20 Trident II ballistic missiles.

    The Nuclear Threat Initiative at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies estimates that each Trident missile can carry four nuclear warheads, meaning each US ballistic missile submarine could be carrying about 80 nuclear warheads.

    The port call came out of an agreement between US President Joe Biden and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol when the met in the US capital in April. The “Washington Declaration” included a set of measures aimed at making Pyongyang think twice about launching an attack on its southern neighbor.

    “Our mutual defense treaty is iron clad and that includes our commitment to extend a deterrence – and that includes the nuclear threat, the nuclear deterrent,” Biden said at the time.

    The establishment of the NCG came out of that Biden-Yoon meeting.

    In a joint statement on Tuesday the two allies said the NCG would enhance “combined deterrence and response posture.”

    “As a result, the collective strength of our two nations will directly contribute to the continued peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and across the Indo-Pacific region,” the statement read.

    “This inaugural NCG meeting afforded the United States an opportunity to reaffirm and strengthen the US commitment to provide extended deterrence to the ROK backed by the full range of US capabilities, including nuclear,” it added.

    Analysts said after the “Washington Declaration” that the presence of a US Navy ballistic missile submarine in a South Korean port would be purely symbolic – and in fact would reduce the military value of the sub.

    “Tactically, (the US and South Korea) are diminishing the sub’s most powerful asset; its stealthiness,” Carl Schuster, former director of operations at the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Center in Hawaii, said in April.

    The Trident missiles have a range of 4,600 miles (7,400 kilometers), meaning they are capable of hitting a target in North Korea from vast swathes of the Pacific, Indian or Arctic oceans.

    “Militarily, (these submarines) don’t need to be anywhere near Korea in order to reach potential targets there,” Blake Herzinger, a research fellow at the United States Studies Centre, said in April.

    One of the keys to nuclear deterrence is uncertainty.

    A US ballistic missile sub lurking hundreds of feet below the ocean’s surface thousands of miles from North Korea would still be within striking range of Pyongyang, but would be near impossible for North Korea to spot.

    One arriving in South Korea on a port visit – which must be arranged 24 to 48 hours in advance – would be far more visible, giving North Korea an advantage, Schuster said.

    “If Kim Jong Un was looking to do a surprise strike, we’ve given him the submarine’s location and time it will be there,” Schuster said.

  • Japan, others conduct joint drills after N. Korea’s ICBM launch

    Japan, others conduct joint drills after N. Korea’s ICBM launch

    Japan, South Korea, and the United States have conducted a joint naval missile defense exercise in response to North Korea’s “nuclear and missile threats,” following the recent launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) by Pyongyang.

    On Sunday, the joint drill took place in international waters between South Korea and Japan, involving destroyers equipped with Aegis radar systems from all three countries, as confirmed by the South Korean Navy.

    During the exercise, naval officers practiced procedures to detect and track a computer-simulated ballistic target while sharing relevant information.

    In response to recent events, North Korea launched its latest Hwasong-18 missile from the east coast on Wednesday, considering it a “strong practical warning” to its adversaries. The launch followed heated complaints from North Korea about US spy planes flying over its exclusive economic zone waters and condemning the visit of a US nuclear-powered cruise missile submarine to South Korea. Pyongyang also threatened to take further actions in response.

    The ICBM launch received strong condemnation from Seoul, Tokyo, and Washington, who deemed it a “clear, flagrant violation” of numerous United Nations Security Council resolutions, posing a serious threat to peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and beyond.

    The South Korean Navy stated that Sunday’s joint drills provided a valuable opportunity to enhance their military’s response capabilities against ballistic missiles while fostering improved security cooperation among South Korea, Japan, and the US.

    “We will effectively respond to North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats with our military’s strong response system and the trilateral cooperation,” it added.

    Efforts to enhance information-sharing on North Korea’s missiles have been underway among the US and its Asian allies.

    Currently, South Korea and Japan are individually connected to US radar systems but lack direct links with each other’s systems.

  • Kim Jong-un applauds his current ballistic missile launch

    Kim Jong-un applauds his current ballistic missile launch

    Kim Jong-un, who appeared to be enjoying himself, grinned as he observed North Korea launch yet another ballistic missile.

    According to state media, the nation launched its most recent and potent intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) Wednesday, which traversed 1,000 km and flew for 74 minutes.

    Kim may be seen cheering the missile from the command post in pictures of the launch that were published by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

    KCNA reported that the easy-going tyrant, wearing a white suit jacket, ‘personally guided the test-fire of a new-type ICBM Hwasongpho-18 on the spot’.

    He was joined by his wife Ri Sol Ju, General Kim Jong Sik and other top officials.

    According to state media, Kim was ‘greatly satisfied’ with the results of the test run, with photographs showing him standing up to applaud.

    Kim Jong-un has made it a habit to oversee missile launches (Picture: AFP)
    North Korea’s leader stoop up to applaud after the launch (Picture: AFP)

    Yesterday’s solid-fuel ICBM was its first test in three months, South Korea’s military said, with the missile landing in waters between North Korea and Japan.

    ‘The test-fire had no negative effect on the security of the neighbouring countries,’ KCNA reported.

    The launch was organised by the Missile General Bureau, a government agency that South Korean experts say was revealed in February to make it clear that the nation is a nuclear weapons state.

    The Hwasongpho-18 was one of many ICBMs, strategic cruise missiles and short-range missiles North Korea has fired in recent years.

    Kim has long shown his face at missile launches as North Korea’s propaganda wing moves into first gear as the US and South Korea beef up their alliance.

    He has been photographed hunching over in black suits as he watches the ballistic missiles blast off with a pair of binoculars.

    In March last year, Kim threw on a ‘Top Gun-style’ leather flight jacket and black aviator sunglasses as he emerged out of a warehouse to oversee a missile test.

    Footage released by state media even had the moment he walked across the site in slow motion with the hunkering missile behind him.

    As the missile shoots up into the sky, the Workers’ Party of Korea general secretary whipped off his sunglasses before shouting ‘hooray’.

    Though the dictator isn’t always so buttoned or zipped up.

    In October, Kim strayed from his usual all-black attire and donned a white tunic and a safari-style hat for an unplanned missile test.

    It came during a month marked by increasingly aggressive and proactive missile tests, with an intermediate-range ballistic missile flying over northern Japan on October 4 triggering alarms and prompting panicked residents to seek shelter.

    Only two days later, the nation rehearsed the launching of ‘nuclear warheads’ before firing two cruise missiles deployed at units operating ‘tactical nukes’ on October 12.

    The following month – which saw North Korea fire at least 46 ballistic missiles – Kim revealed his daughter to the world for the first time.

    He was pictured walking hand-in-hand with his ‘beloved daughter’, state media said, wearing casual coats as a massive Hwasong-17 looms behind them.

  • North Korea claims to have tested an upgraded solid-fueled ballistic missile

    North Korea claims to have tested an upgraded solid-fueled ballistic missile

    On Wednesday, North Korea claimed to have launched an intercontinental ballistic missile using solid fuel, just days after threatening to take down US Navy reconnaissance aircraft over neighbouring waters.

    The launch comes after a number of other recent intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) tests by North Korea, which have alarmed rivals as the isolated, autocratic country intensifies its efforts to create weapons that could potentially strike important US cities.US Navy

    The launch, according to a White House statement, “risks destabilising the security situation in the region.”

    Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, speaking from the sidelines of the NATO summit meeting on Wednesday, called the launch “unacceptable’” and a threat to regional stability and the international community.

    Wednesday’s test was of the Hwasong-18, a powerful solid-fueled ICBM of a type that Pyongyang last launched in April, according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

    Leader Kim Jong Un said at the time the Hwasong-18 would provide the country with a “powerful strategic attack means” and boost its nuclear capabilities.

    Pyongyang tested the liquid-fueled Hwasong-17 in March.

    The ICBM fired on Wednesday flew about 1,000 kilometers, staying airborne for 74 minutes, according to Japan’s Defense Ministry – a marginal advancement on the ballistic missiles it tested earlier this year.

    Here’s what we know about the ICBMs in North Korea’s arsenal.

    Unknown to most, Kim Jong Un’s sister has become the defiance voice against the US

    The Hwasong-17 is a liquid-fueled ICBM unveiled in 2022, when North Korea held its first long-range missile test in more than four years. Liquid-fuel technology is comparatively easier to master.

    The Hwasong-18, meanwhile, is a solid-fueled missile, according to Pyongyang – which makes it far more advanced, and would allow North Korea to launch long-range nuclear strikes more quickly.

    Solid-fueled ICBMs are more stable, and can be moved more easily to avoid detection before a launch that can be initiated in a matter of minutes, experts say – compared to liquid-fueled missiles that may need hours before launch, giving time for adversaries to detect and neutralize the weapon.

    North Korea’s advancement from the Hwasong-17 last year to the Hwasong-18 this year suggests its missile program is making progress, experts say, reflecting Kim’s goal of matching the military capabilities of other nations like the United States or European countries.

    Successive launches allow North Korea to gather more data to refine its missile technology.

    ICBMs could, at least theoretically, put the entire US mainland in range of a North Korean nuclear warhead – but there’s a lot of unknowns about the missile’s capability to deliver a nuclear payload on target.

    Past tests have shown the possible range of North Korea’s missiles – the tests in March and April all traveled about 1,000 kilometers (621 miles). And the Hwasong-17 test last year flew 1,090 kilometers (681 miles), lasting 68 minutes before landing in the sea.

    The 74-minute flight time of the latest missile is a few minutes longer than those tested in March and April.

    It’s not clear what kind of payloads were involved in these tests. The weight of the payload affects how far a missile can fly, so without this information, observers cannot know for sure the missile’s actual range.

    Another question is whether a North Korean nuclear warhead could survive reentry into Earth’s atmosphere.

    ICBMs are fired into space, where they speed along outside Earth’s atmosphere before their payloads undergo a fiery reentry process, much like a space shuttle or space capsule, before plunging down on their targets.

    If the process of reentering the atmosphere isn’t executed with pinpoint accuracy and with materials that can withstand the immense heat generated, the warhead will burn up before reaching its target. The angle at which the warhead reenters the atmosphere can make the process more difficult.

    “The launch of Hwasong-18 shows that it has a range of about 15,000 kilometers based on the altitude, distance and the flight time of the missile,” said Yang Wook, a researcher at Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul.

    “However, it cannot be evaluated that North Korea has succeeded in obtaining full technology of an ICBM as it hasn’t proved the functions for reentry and accuracy using multi-warheads that are required for the use of the missile,” Yang said.

    Here’s how US missile defense could be fooled by an ICBM

    Kim has laid out an ambitious plan to give North Korea a credible nuclear deterrent, meaning an arsenal powerful enough to prevent any adversary, most notably the US, from attacking.

    Experts have said the leader has set a long list of weapons modernizations in recent years that he is now working through – with ICBMs only one of those items. Other goals may include launching a military satellite, or putting a nuclear-powered submarine to sea.

    Previously, North Korea has announced plans to enhance the accuracy of its missiles and increase the range up to 15,000 kilometers (9,320 miles).

    These ambitions were made clear last year when Kim dramatically ramped up the frequency and intensity of weapons testing, which eased slightly this year, but remains at much higher levels than in past years.

    The country fired more missiles in 2022 than any other year on record – at one point launching 23 missiles in a single day.

    These tests also refocused attention on North Korea’s nuclear goals, with Kim vowing to develop his nuclear forces at the “highest possible” speed last year. The US and international observers began warning last year that an underground nuclear test could be imminent, after satellite imagery showed new activity at North Korea’s nuclear test site. Such a test would be the country’s first since 2017.

    Joseph Dempsey, research associate for defense and military analysis at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said more North Korean tests are likely in the works.

    “North Korea’s emergent ICBM force is still relatively untested … further developmental tests to verify their reliability and operation within a range of flight parameters are to be expected,” he told CNN.

    The test on Wednesday sparked strong condemnation from neighboring countries.

    South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, currently at the NATO summit in Lithuania, said he would call for “strong international solidarity” among bloc members in response to the launch. On Wednesday morning, he presided over an emergency National Security Council meeting from Lithuania.

    US and South Korean officials met shortly after the test to share information, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). Both countries are analyzing the launch.

    The Japanese chief cabinet secretary lodged a protest against North Korea through embassy channels in Beijing.

    The United Nations Security Council has passed resolutions prohibiting Pyongyang’s ballistic missile testing, but last year China and Russia blocked new resolutions, which the US sees as a green light for North Korea to continue its programs.

  • North Korea launches ICBM into waters after threatening US

    North Korea launches ICBM into waters after threatening US

    Per Japan’s Defence Ministry, North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile on Wednesday, opening the door to another potential conflict with the United States and its allies. The missile flew for more than 70 minutes.

    A few minutes longer than the flight times of North Korean missiles tested in March and April of this year is the 74-minute flying time. Both of those were ICBMs, which could reach all of the United States.

    According to Japan’s Defence Ministry, the missile fired on Wednesday covered a distance of 1,000 kilometres (621 miles) and a height of more than 6,000 kilometres (3,700 miles).

    Flight times give an indication of a missile’s range. North Korea tests most of its missiles on a highly lofted trajectory so they splash down in nearby waters. If they were fired on a flatter trajectory that would be used in an actual attack, the flight time shows how far they can go.

    Japan’s Coast Guard said earlier the missile was launched at 9:59 a.m. local time and fell into the Sea of Japan, also known as the East Sea, at 11:15 a.m., citing the Ministry of Defense.

    South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol held an emergency National Security Council meeting in Lithuania on Wednesday morning in response to the missile launch, Yoon’s press office said in a statement. Yoon is in Vilnius to attend the NATO summit.

    Wednesday’s launch comes after Pyongyang earlier this week threatened to shoot down US military reconnaissance planes that fly over nearby waters in the East Sea.

    Kim Yo Jong, a senior North Korean official and sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, accused a US spy plane of entering the North’s exclusive economic zone at least eight times on Monday, according to a statement Tuesday from North Korea’s state news agency KCNA.

    “In case of repeated illegal intrusion, the US forces will experience a very critical flight,” Kim warned in the statement.

    Explained: How much damage can North Korea’s weapons do?

    The missile launch and fiery rhetoric, while not unusual for Pyongyang, come amid heightened tensions as Washington and Seoul ramp up their defense cooperation and the leaders of South Korea, Japan and the US are in Lithuania for a NATO summit, where North Korea was on the agenda.

    A communique from the NATO meeting on Tuesday urged North Korea to abandoned its ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programs, which are in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions banning them.

    “We call on (North Korea) to accept the repeated offers of dialogue put forward by all parties concerned, including Japan, the United States, and the Republic of Korea,” the communique said.

    But North Korea has shown no signs that it is willing to engage in negotiations with Washington or Seoul.

    “Kim Yo Jong’s bellicose statement against US surveillance aircraft is part of a North Korean pattern of inflating external threats to rally domestic support and justify weapons tests,” said Leif-Eric Easley, associate professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.

    “Pyongyang also times its shows of force to disrupt what it perceives as diplomatic coordination against it, in this case, South Korea and Japan’s leaders meeting during the NATO summit.”

    Chun In-bum, a former lieutenant general in the South Korean Army, said the missile test and shootdown threats coming in quick succession shows how North Korea operates.

    “The fact that North Korea gave such a warning (of a shootdown) seems that it issued such a statement to increase tension and focus our attention elsewhere rather than actually shooting a US surveillance plane down,” Chun said.

    Last month, tens of thousands of North Koreans marched in anti-US rallies in Pyongyang, marking the 73rd anniversary of the start of the Korean War. The participants denounced the US as “Destroyer of peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula” and warned of nuclear war, according to KCNA.

    Meanwhile, South Korea, the US and Japan have been holding joint and trilateral military exercises aimed at deterring any North Korean military threat.

    This is a developing story and will be updated.

  • North Korea unveils missile, prompting warning in Japan

    North Korea unveils missile, prompting warning in Japan

    Several governments have issued warnings after North Korea is believed to have fired a ballistic missile today off its east coast.

    At 7:28 p.m. local time, Japan’s Coast Guard reported that a potential ballistic missile launch had occurred.

    Authorities later claimed that it had touched down in the nation’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), which only heightened the already tense situation.

    Members of the emergency gathering team are expected to gather at PM’s Fumio Kishida’s residence to discuss how to respond to the threat from Pyongyang.

    Test-fire of the new Hwasongpho-18 ICBM at an undisclosed location in North Korea (Picture: AFP)

    Separately, the South Korean military said the launch happened on Thursday night but gave no further details.

    This comes came after North Korea’s military vowed an unspecified response after South Korean and US troops finished five rounds of large-scale live-fire drills near the Koreas’ heavily fortified border earlier today.

    This was the last round of firing drills after they began last month. This year’s drills were the biggest of their kind since they began in 1977.

    ‘Our response to (the South Korean-U.S. drills) is inevitable,’ an unidentified spokesperson of the North Korean Defecse Ministry said in a statement carried by state media.

    ‘Our armed forces will fully counter any form of demonstrative moves and provocation of the enemies.’

    Thursday’s drills were observed by South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and other senior South Korean and US military officials.

    Tensions have risen in past months as the pace of both North Korean weapons tests and US-South Korea military exercises has increased in tit-for-tat responses.

    North Korea has test-fired about 100 missiles since the start of 2022.

  • North Korea’s failed satellite launch, to be retried

    North Korea’s failed satellite launch, to be retried

    State-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said that the second stage of the rocket malfunctioned during North Korea‘s effort to launch a military reconnaissance satellite into space on Wednesday. Pyongyang claimed it wanted to conduct a second launch as soon as possible.

    As a result of an anomalous activation of the engine on the second stage after the first stage was detached during normal flight, the new satellite vehicle rocket Chollima-1 lost propulsion and crashed into the West Sea, according to KCNA.

    According to the study, the mission failed because “the reliability and stability of the new engine system” were “low” and the fuel utilised was “unstable.”

    North Korea’s National Space Development Agency said it would investigate the failure “urgently” and carry out another launch after new testing, KCNA reported.

    The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said it identified an object presumed to be part of what North Korea claims to be its space launch vehicle in the sea about 200 kilometers (125 miles) west of Eocheong Island at around 8:05 a.m. and is in the process of obtaining it.

    Earlier, South Korea’s military said Pyongyang fired a “space projectile,” triggering emergency alerts in Seoul and Japan, weeks after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered officials to prepare to launch the country’s first military reconnaissance satellite.

    Both countries later canceled those alerts when it became clear there was no danger to civilian areas from the North Korean launch.

    Analysts said Wednesday morning’s events illustrated problems for both North and South Korea, for Pyongyang in its space program and for Seoul in its public alert process.

    “North Korean space efforts have consistently failed, indicating that whereas its military ballistic capabilities are being developed, its space launch capabilities are not proceeding at the same pace of development,” said Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at The Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

    “That is curious because space launch capabilities and ballistic missile systems are essentially similar technologies in many respects, and North Korean testing of ballistic missile systems have been more successful,” Davis said.

    North Korea has performed dozens of ballistic missile tests over the past two years, which analysts have said have shown a maturation in the program.

    The test of a new solid-fueled intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in April showed that Pyongyang could launch the missiles more quickly in the event of any nuclear confrontation, analysts said.

    The North Korean launch sparked air raid sirens around Seoul about 6:30 a.m., causing confusion among residents who are used to pre-announced tests of the warning system in the middle of the day.

    The sirens were followed by a text sent to cell phones, telling people to prepare to seek shelter.

    The alert was canceled about 20 minutes after it was issued.

    Who implemented the alert remains uncertain. The Interior Ministry said it was issued by the Seoul city government in error.

    Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon apologized to the citizens for “causing confusion” over sending a citywide alert, adding that efforts will be made to refine the system to avoid similar situations.

    Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, said any criticism of government leaders for the alert may be unwarranted.

    “The government would receive more criticism if it did not make every effort for public safety,” Easley said.

    In fact, he said the alert could help shake South Korean residents from complacency about the dangers posed by Pyongyang’s missile programs.

    “The Yoon administration will likely promise improvements to the alert system but may also expect that greater awareness of the North Korean threat will increase support for the government’s military deterrence policies,” Easley said.

    Both the South Korean and Japanese governments condemned the North Korean launch as a violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.

    “Whether it was a success or not (it was) a serious provocation that threatens peace and security on the Korean Peninsula and the international community,” according to a statement from Yoon’s office.

    In Japan, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said Tokyo “vehemently protested” to North Korea. He promised continued “vigilance and surveillance” from the Japanese government.

    Japan’s Defense Ministry had warned on Monday it would destroy any North Korean missile that entered its territory after Pyongyang notified the country of plans to launch a “satellite.”

  • Joe Biden cautions North Korea that a nuclear strike would be “regime end”

    Joe Biden cautions North Korea that a nuclear strike would be “regime end”

    The end of whichever administration begins the aggressive action would be the result of a North Korean nuclear attack, according to President Joe Biden.

    During a joint press appearance with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol at the White House, Biden issued a stern warning to North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un.

    Biden declared on Wednesday afternoon that any nuclear strike by North Korea against the United States, its friends, or partners would be unacceptable and lead to the overthrow of the relevant regime.

    Biden’s notice came as he and Yoon announced the Washington Declaration, an agreement aimed at deterring nuclear aggression from North Korea.

    ‘What the declaration means is we’re going to make every effort to consult with our allies when it’s appropriate if any action is so called for,’ Biden said from the Rose Garden.

    The alliance means the US will defend South Korea, which is what Yoon had hoped for.

    ‘Sustainable peace on the Korean Peninsula does not happen automatically,’ said Yoon.

    ‘Our two leaders have decided to significantly strengthen extended deterrence of our two countries against North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats so that we can achieve peace through the superiority of overwhelming forces and not a false peace based on the goodwill of the other side.’

    Biden called the new alliance with South Korea ‘ironclad’.

    ‘The alliance formed in war and has flourished in peace,’ he said.

    ‘Our mutual defense treaty is ironclad and that includes our commitment to extend a deterrence – and that includes the nuclear threat, the nuclear deterrent.’

    Biden cited North Korea’s ‘increased threats and the blatant violation of US sanctions’ in highlighting the important timing of the alliance.

    The agreement comes amid heightened tensions on the peninsula, especially over the past year. North Korea has launched about 100 missiles since the beginning of 2022. Meanwhile, North Korea sees joint military drills between the US and South Korea as a threat.

  • I was raised by North Korea’s dictator – Daughter of Equatorial Guinea’s 1st president 

    I was raised by North Korea’s dictator – Daughter of Equatorial Guinea’s 1st president 

    Many would perceive a ‘brutal dictator’ like Kim Il-Sung, founder of North Korea, to be a hardhearted man, incapable of caring for another but on the contrary, daughter of the first President of Equatorial Guinea, Francisco Macías Nguema, has revealed that Kim Il-Sung affectionately took care of her when she was kept under his care.

    Monique Macias was packed off to North Korea with her siblings in the 1970s when her father, Francisco Macías Nguema, was overthrown by his nephew, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.

    Monique Macías

    “When we arrived [at Pyongyang] I thought we were just going there for a trip with my parents but I wasn’t aware of why we were sent there until suddenly my mother disappeared from my life,” she said. 

    She was only seven (7) when this happened. 

    “[Initially] I thought she [mum] would come back soon but all the time, I said she would come back tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow but she never came back. It passed like years, one year, two years and after three years, then I think I accepted that she was no longer going there, that she’s no longer coming back,” she recalled.

    Francisco Macías Nguema – 1st President of Equatorial Guinea

    During her 15-year stay in his custody, Kim Il-Sung, revealed another side of his personality which had been concealed. 

    Kim Il-Sung was, basically, also a dictator. His rule was characterised by persecution, public execution, enforced disappearances and torture. Due to his atrocious deeds, he was seen as cold-blooded.  

    Monique Macias grew up as an African girl in North Korea – here she writes on identity and how she sees herself now

    Regardless of the general perception of him being a ruthless ruler, he remained loyal to his ‘friend,’ Macías by taking Monique under his protection. 

    “In the beginning we met him more frequently until he sent us to boarding school but he was always there over the phone and he kept the promise he made to my father . He didn’t have to do it, because my father was killed . He could have perfectly sent us back but he didn’t so I do respect that. 

    “If it wasn’t him maybe I wouldn’t be here,” she said. 

    During his dictatorship, Francisco Macías established strong ties with North Korea’s Supreme Leader Kim Il-Sung, who was another world leader known for his human rights abuses. Kim Il-Sung is the grandfather of the current North Korean Leader, Kim Jung Un. 

    Knowing his life and family were in danger from his many enemies, Macias had entrusted his three youngest children to Kim Il-Sung’s care. He had already sent his eldest son, Teo, to Cuba to become a ward of Fidel Castro. 

    Monique toasting with the second wife of Kim Il-Sung

    After Macias was overthrown in a coup by his nephew, Teodoro Obiang, and put on trial and executed, Castro sent Teo home “to the lions’ den” and Maribel rushed back to defend him. 

    During their stay in North Korea, the siblings were all enrolled in the Mangyongdae Revolutionary School on the outskirts of Pyongyang, a boarding establishment for children of party members – all fatherless – where Kim’s nephew, who had a direct line to him, was deputy director. 

    She was enrolled in the Mangyongdae Revolutionary School on the outskirts of Pyongyang

    The school was dominated by boys since it was a boys’ school, but 20 girls were brought in to make the Macias sisters more comfortable on Kim’s orders. 

    In school Monique learnt how to fire Kalashnikov rifles. She also learnt Korean rapidly, but was astonished by the institution’s rigidity, its 5am reveille followed by an hour’s exercise and the way her classmates asked permission to go to the lavatory. When she complained to a teacher, the tiny child was told, “Remember, you’re a soldier.”

    Monique is currently 51 years old. Since leaving North Korea, Macias has been working as a fashion designer in countries including Spain, South Korea, and the U.S. Macias recently wrote a book about her life in North Korea.

  • New ICBM could make it simpler for North Korea to launch a nuclear attack – Analysts

    New ICBM could make it simpler for North Korea to launch a nuclear attack – Analysts

    North Korea claims that the latest intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) it tested on Thursday was solid-fueled, a development that analysts say could enable it to launch long-range nuclear strikes more quickly and easily as it expands its missile program.

    Just after 7 a.m. on Thursday, the new missile, known as the Hwasong-18, was launched, prompting a temporary evacuation order on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido before it fell into the waters east of the Korean Peninsula.

    State-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said on Friday that the missile launch, which was witnessed by the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his daughter, “would serve as a powerful strategic attack means of greater military efficiency.”

    KCNA quoted Kim as saying the Hwasong-18 would “radically promote” his county’s ability to launch a nuclear counterstrike to suppress invasions and protect the nation.

    Analysts noted that North Korea already has that ability, though the new missile may enhance it.

    “I think it demonstrates technological progress, but I would not describe this as a game changer,” said Ankit Panda, a nuclear policy expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

    South Korea’s Defense Ministry said Friday Pyongyang still needs “more time and effort to successfully complete its solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile technology.”

    Thursday’s missile test was North Korea’s 12th of the year, according to CNN’s count, and it came after United States and South Korean forces had earlier this month concluded their biggest military drills in years, including a large amphibious landing exercise.

    It also came just days after a key meeting of North Korea’s Central Military Commission on Monday, when Kim stressed the need to quickly expand Pyongyang’s nuclear deterrence in response to “the ever-worsening security on the Korean Peninsula,” according to KCNA.

    The testing of a solid-fueled ICBM is important because they’re more stable thanthe liquid-fueled ones that North Korea has previously tested on long-range missile launches.

    A solid-fueled ICBM would be fueled during manufacturing and can be moved more easily to avoid detection before a launch that can be initiated in a matter of minutes, according to Joseph Dempsey, a research associate at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

    A liquid-fueled ICBM would need to undergo a fueling process at its launch site that could take hours, giving time for an adversary to detect and neutralize it, Dempsey wrote in an analysis earlier this year.

    Explained: How much damage can North Korea’s weapons do?

    Thursday’s launch came as no surprise to analysts who noted that North Korea had publicized a test of a solid-fueled rocket engine in December.

    Kim has wanted to bring his forces up to the standards of other nations with ICBMs after starting out with easier-to-master liquid-fuel technology – and the apparent success of the solid-fueled ICBM launch suggests his missile program is advancing.

    “At an earlier stage of North Korea’s missile program, liquid-fuel ICBMs represented the quickest and easiest path to achieving the country’s historic goal of being able to threaten the continental United States,” the IISS’ Dempsey wrote.

    “The addition of solid-fuel ICBMs to the missile force would make it a more credible strategic deterrent by providing a more capable, less vulnerable pre-emptive and retaliatory capability,” Dempsey wrote.

    The new Hwasong-18 has three stages, according to KCNA, just like the United States’ main ICBM, the Minuteman III, which is powered by three solid-fueled rocket motors.

    Jeffrey Lewis, an analyst at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, said on Twitter that it was “no surprise” a solid-fueled ICBM wasted tested by North Korea, saying “it’s just easier to use solid-fuel missiles.

    “North Korea was always going to follow the same technical path as the US, Soviet Union, France, China, Israel and India,” he added. “Given that North Korea has been testing large diameter solid rocket motors for … several years, it’s been clear (to me at least) that since 2020 a test like this could have come at any time.”

    Even with Thursday’s test, some doubt remains as to whether a North Korean ICBM could actually deliver a nuclear warhead at a long distance, for instance to the mainland United States.

    Thursday’s test, like earlier North Korean ICBM tests, was fired at highly lofted trajectory, with the missile falling into waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan. To cover the longer distance to the mainland US, an ICBM launched from North Korea would have to be launched at a much flatter trajectory.

    ICBMs are fired into space, where they speed along outside Earth’s atmosphere before their payloads – nuclear warheads – undergo a fiery reentry process, much like a space shuttle or space capsule, before plunging down on their targets.

    If the process of reentering the atmosphere isn’t executed with pinpoint accuracy and with materials that can withstand the immense heat generated, the warhead would burn up before reaching its target. Reentering the atmosphere at a shallow angle that would be needed on a long-range strike can make the process more difficult.

    Panda, the Carnegie expert, said North Korea acknowledges that its lofted ICBM launches do not test reentry technology. But he said Pyongyang likely has the ability to master it.

    “Based on their competency with materials and engineering that we’ve seen in other areas, developing a robust enough reentry vehicle is not a substantial technical challenge,” he said.

    For Thursday’s test, KCNA said the highly lofted angle was used to prevent debris from posing a danger to other countries.

    On Thursday, the launch sparked momentary panic on the Japanese northern island of Hokkaido after the government’s emergency alert system warned residents to take cover. The warning was soon lifted.

    Soon after, fear turned into anger and confusion amid reports that the evacuation order had been sent in error, with local officials saying there was no possibility of the missile hitting the island, and Tokyo later confirming it had fallen outside Japanese territory, in waters off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula.

  • Kim Jong-un tested “most potent missile” in front of his whole family

    Kim Jong-un tested “most potent missile” in front of his whole family

    North Korea claims to have successfully tested a brand-new solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

    The disclosure portends a potential success in the covert regime’s pursuit of a more potent, harder-to-detect weapon that can strike the US mainland.

    The information was released by its official Korean Central News Agency a day after a long-range missile launch from close to Pyongyang created concern in Japan.

    Leader Kim Jong-un, who personally guided the test, warned the Hwasong-18 – the most powerful missile in his nuclear arsenal – would ‘strike extreme uneasiness and horror’ into the country’s enemies.

    He said the weapon would cause them to ‘experience a clearer security crisis, and constantly strike extreme uneasiness and horror into them by taking fatal and offensive counter-actions until they abandon their senseless thinking and reckless acts’.

    Kim also hit out once again at the recent military drills carried out by the US and South Korea.

    KCNA released photos of him watching the launch, accompanied by his wife, sister and daughter, and the missile covered in camouflage nets on a mobile launcher.

    ‘The development of the new-type ICBM Hwasongpho-18 will extensively reform the strategic deterrence components of the DPRK, radically promote the effectiveness of its nuclear counterattack posture and bring about a change in the practicality of its offensive military strategy,’ KCNA said, using the initials of its official name.

    ‘Pho’ means ‘artillery’ in Korean.

    Analysts said it is the North’s first use of solid propellants in an intermediate-range or intercontinental ballistic missile.

    Developing a solid-fuel ICBM has long been seen as a key goal for North Korea, as it could help the North deploy missiles faster during a war.

    Most of the country’s largest ballistic missiles use liquid fuel, which requires them to be loaded with propellant at their launch site – a time-consuming and dangerous process.

    Ankit Panda, a senior fellow at the US-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said: ‘For any country that operates large-scale, missile based nuclear forces, solid-propellant missiles are incredibly desirable capability because they don’t need to be fuelled immediately prior to use.

    ‘These capabilities are much more responsive in a time of crisis.’

    North Korea first displayed what could be a new solid-fuel ICBM during a military parade in February after testing a high-thrust solid-fuel engine in December.

  • Japan ordered to evacuate after North Korean launched of a ‘new missile’

    Japan ordered to evacuate after North Korean launched of a ‘new missile’

    On Thursday, North Korea fired what is thought to be a brand-new ballistic missile, prompting an evacuation order in Japan and the warning to seek cover for people.

    The order on an island in the north was later withdrawn, but it demonstrates the neighboring neighbors’ caution regarding Pyongyang’s escalating missile threats.

    South Korean military officials described the launch as a “grave provocation” and claimed that the missile traveled around 1,000 kilometers before coming to rest in the waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan.

    Tokyo and Seoul do not typically issue evacuation orders for North Korean launches unless they determine weapons are aimed in the direction of their territories.

    A TV screen is seen reporting North Korea's missile launch with a file image of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, April 13, 2023. North Korea launched a ballistic missile that landed in the waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan on Thursday, prompting Japan to order residents on an island to take shelter as a precaution. The order has been lifted. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
    North Korean leader Kim Jong-un appeard on screen during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station (Picture: AP)

    Residents on Japan’s northernmost island of Hokkaido were urged to seek shelter, while train, bus and subway services were also temporarily halted there.

    Warning sirens also blared signalling for people to evacuate.

    It was later rescinded when it became apparent the missile would not hit the island.

    Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told reporters the government’s step was ‘appropriate’.

    Thursday’s launch was the North’s first long-range missile test since the country tested its longest-range Hwasong-17 ICBM on March 16.

    It comes days after Kim Jong-un reviewed his country’s attack plans and vowed to enhance his nuclear arsenal in more ‘practical and offensive’ ways.

    North Korea has launched around 100 missiles since the start of 2022, many of them nuclear weapons capable of striking the US mainland, South Korea and Japan.

    A South Korean military official said the latest test apparently involved a new weapons system displayed at a recent parades.

    They are analysing the projectile’s trajectory and range, and the defence ministry said it could have been a solid-fuel missile.

    If the launch involved a solid-fuel ICBM, it would be the North’s first test of such a weapon.

    North Korea’s known ICBMs all use liquid propellant systems that require them to be fueled before launches.

    But the fuel in a solid propellant weapon is already loaded inside, allowing them to be moved more easily and fired more quickly.

    A solid-propellant ICBM is one of the key high-tech weapons that Kim has vowed to build to better cope with what he calls US military threats.

    The dictator has also spoken of his desire to develop multi-warhead missiles, a nuclear-powered submarine, a hypersonic missile and a spy satellite.

  • North Korea asserts to have tested an underwater nuclear drone called the Haeil-2

    North Korea asserts to have tested an underwater nuclear drone called the Haeil-2

    On Saturday, North Korea asserted that it had tested a brand-new underwater drone that was “capable of delivering a nuclear warhead.”

    According to a report by the government-run Korean Central News Agency, the drone, known as the “Haeil-2 Unmanned Underwater Nuclear Attack Boat,” was tested between April 4 and 7. (KCNA).

    Before its test warhead was exploded underwater on Thursday afternoon, it drifted in the waters off North Korea‘s east coast for more than 71 hours, according to KCNA.

    This is the second time in weeks the reclusive country claims to have tested a nuclear capable drone. In March, Pyongyang said it had tested the Haeil-1, which it claimed was capable of carrying a nuclear warhead that could create a “radioactive tsunami.”

    “As a result of the test, the reliability and fatal strike capability of the underwater strategic weapon system were perfectly proved,” KCNA said of the latest test, of the Haeil-2.

    Pyongyang claims to have been developing nuclear capable drones since 2012 and to have carried out more than 50 tests in the past two years.

    However, analysts have poured doubt on North Korea’s claims, noting that North Korea has previously exaggerated its capabilities and deployment time lines.

    The news follows tests last month of what North Korea said were nuclear-capable cruise missiles.

  • Increased activity underway at North Korea nuclear complex following Kim Jung’s bomb-fuel order – Reports

    Increased activity underway at North Korea nuclear complex following Kim Jung’s bomb-fuel order – Reports

    After the North Korean leader ordered an increase in the production of bomb fuel to increase the country’s nuclear arsenal, a U.S. think tank reported on Saturday that satellite images of the country’s main nuclear site show a high level of activity.

    The Experimental Light Water Reactor (ELWR) at the Yongbyon site may be close to completion and moving into operational status, according to the 38 North North Korea monitoring project, which is based in Washington.

    The report said the images showed that a 5 megawatt reactor at Yongbyon continued to operate and that construction had started on a support building around the ELWR.

    Further, water discharges had been detected from that reactor’s cooling system.

    New construction had also started around Yongbyon’s uranium enrichment plant, likely to expand its capabilities.

    “These developments seem to reflect Kim Jong Un’s recent directive to increase the country’s fissile material production to expand its nuclear weapons arsenal,” the report added, referring to the North Korean leader.

    On Tuesday, North Korea unveiled new, smaller nuclear warheads and vowed to produce more weapons-grade nuclear material to expand its arsenal, while denouncing stepped up military exercises by South Korea and the United States.

    Its state media said Kim had ordered the production of weapons-grade materials in a “far-sighted way” to boost the country’s nuclear arsenal “exponentially.”

    It is unclear whether North Korea has fully developed miniaturized nuclear warheads needed to fit on smaller weapons it has displayed and analysts say perfecting such warheads would most likely be a key goal if it resumes nuclear testing for the first time since 2017.

    South Korea and the United States have warned since early 2022 that North Korea may resume nuclear testing at any time.

    In a report last year, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) estimated North Korea had assembled up to 20 nuclear warheads, and probably possessed sufficient fissile material for approximately 45–55 nuclear devices.

  • Bodyguard of Kim Jong-un likely to ‘face execution’ for allowing him to go out in a stained jacket

    Bodyguard of Kim Jong-un likely to ‘face execution’ for allowing him to go out in a stained jacket

    A bodyguard is likely to face slaughter by firing squad for letting North Korean President Kim Jong-un to leave home with white stains on his coat.

    Last week, as the supreme leader was scrutinizing a missile launch, propaganda photos caught an irregularity.

    Kim’s employees feared they would be penalised for failing to uphold his dignity because his jacket appeared to be covered in white stains.

    Michael Madden, a North Korean specialist, said individuals accountable could face promotions or hard labor, but even execution could not be ruled out.

    ‘But if he got angry about this then a few people will probably get sent to a construction site or a farm for a month or two to think about this minor transgression.’

    He added: ‘It is not unheard of to be sent away for execution.

    ‘There are accounts of the leader’s father, Kim Jong-il, having bodyguards and members of his personal staff sent to prisons and in one case to the firing squad for very minor offenses.

    North Korea launches another missile into its eastern waters in ‘warning to US’

    Kim Jong-un inspects a missile launch wearing a stained jacket
    Kim won’t be happy when he sees pictures of his mucky coat (Picture: Pen News)
    Kim Jong-un inspects a missile launch wearing a stained jacket
    The punishment for his staff could be quite severe (Picture: Pen News)

    ‘One unconfirmed story is that a member of his personal staff sat at his desk and smoked one of his cigarettes. Kim Jong-il discovered this and had the man shot.’

    Mr Madden, who runs the North Korea Leadership Watch website, said the culprits might write a letter of apology to minimise their punishment.

    But he said it was also possible that Kim lets it slide ‘since he is far less prone to mood swings and problems with emotional regulation than his father’.

  • North Korea fires long range missile ahead of Japan-South Korea talks

    North Korea fires long range missile ahead of Japan-South Korea talks

    A few hours prior to the historic summit of the presidents of South Korea and Japan, North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

    The launch of the long-range missile on Thursday morning was confirmed by both South Korean and Japanese officials.

    It flew about 1,000km (620 miles) landing in waters west of Japan.

    It is Pyongyang’s fourth missile launch in a week and comes as the US and South Korea hold joint navy drills.

    The other missiles launched – last Thursday, on Saturday and on Monday – had been short-range ballistic missiles.

    North Korea’s ramped-up missile activity will most likely be top of the agenda when South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol meets Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in Tokyo later on Thursday – the first such visit in 12 years.

    Since Monday, the US and South Korea have been carrying out drills around the Korean peninsula- the allies’ largest in five years. North Korea has repeatedly said it sees such exercises as provocation.

    Thursday’s missile was fired at 07:10 (22:10 GMT) from Pyongyang on the east coast of North Korea, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

    Japan’s defence ministry confirmed it as an ICBM type and said it flew higher than 6,000km for about 70 minutes. It landed at about 08:20 outside of Japan’s exclusive economic zone, the ministry said.

    Japan officials have not reported any damage from the missile.

    Following Thursday’s launch, Mr Yoon ordered his country’s military to continue with the joint US exercises as planned.

    Pyongyang would pay for its “reckless provocations”, he said.

    North Korea last fired an ICBM less than a month ago – an action that sparked a UN emergency meeting and condemnation from G7 countries.

    ICBMs are particularly worrying because of their long range. Experts have said that such missiles launched from North Korea could potentially reach mainland United States.

    Pyongyang is also believed to have developed ICBMs that can carry multiple warheads.

    The escalation in North Korean aggression over the past year is one of the central topics to be discussed at the Tokyo meeting on Thursday.

    Many hope the meeting – which has been hailed as a “milestone” in the rapprochement of South Korea and Japan – will result in closer security ties and military cooperation between the two countries.

    Both countries said they would convene their national security councils following Thursday’s missile launch.

    In 2022, North Korea launched more than 90 missiles – the most it has ever fired in a single year to date – despite being subject to a raft of sanctions from the UN, the US, the EU and its neighbouring countries.

    North Korea has become more assertive in its nuclear strategy under Kim Jong-un, who has overseen much of its recent development of its weapons programme, and four of the six nuclear tests so far.

  • South Korea doesn’t need nuclear weapons to combat the North – Prime minister

    South Korea doesn’t need nuclear weapons to combat the North – Prime minister

    Even as public opinion turns against nuclear weapons amid Asia’s escalating arms race, South Korea’s Prime Minister Han Duck-soo claimed in an exclusive interview with CNN that the country doesn’t need them to counter the danger from North Korea.

    There is no doubt that we should re-arm ourselves, according to several recent public surveys.
    Han told Richard Quest, a CNN anchor and business editor-at-large, during a sit-down in Seoul, “(The surveys say) we should go farther in terms of nuclear capability.

    One such poll, released last February, found that 71% ofmore than 1,300 respondents in the country were in favor of South Korea developing its own nuclear weapons – a once-unthinkable idea that has become increasingly mainstream in the past decade, with rising tensions in the Korean Peninsula and dwindling confidence in South Korea toward US protection.

    However, Han insisted the country has enough in its arsenal to stave off North Korea’s “preposterous ambitions” – and that developing nuclear capabilities was not “the right way.”

    “We have built up a quite adequate level of our deterrence capabilities in close cooperation with the United States,” he said, adding that the government had “put a lot of emphasis” on strengthening its deterrence since President Yoon Suk Yeol took power last year.

    “We should work together with the international community… to put a lot of continuous pressure on North Korea to denuclearize,” he said. “We would like to let North Korea know that developing and advancing nuclear capabilities will not guarantee the peace and prosperity in their country.”

    Relations between North and South Korea have worsened in recent years as Pyongyang ramped up its weapons program, firing a record number of missiles last year – including one that flew over Japan, the first time North Korea had done so in five years, prompting international alarm.

    And for months, the US and international observers have warned that North Korea appears to be preparing for its first underground nuclear test since 2017. The country’s dictator Kim Jong Un also intensified his rhetoric last year; he declared his intention to build the “world’s most powerful” nuclear force, warned adversaries that North Korea was fully prepared for “actual war,” vowed to “never give up” nuclear weapons and dismissed the possibility of negotiating denuclearization.

    In response, the US and its allies South Korea and Japan have stepped up their own military drills and cooperation. Yoon, who has publicly taken a tough stance against North Korea, even raised the prospect of South Korea building its own nuclear arsenal, saying in January it could “deploy tactical nuclear weapons or possess its own nukes.”

    And despite Han voicing opposition to such a plan, he too emphasized South Korea’s preparedness in confronting its nuclear-armed neighbor – as well as its openness for further talks, under certain conditions.

    “We are not disarming ourselves against North Korea,” he said. “But we are not closing the dialogue channel with North Korea … as long as North Korea is abstaining from their very strong nuclear ambitions.”

    Kim Jong Un calls for ‘exponential’ increase in country’s nuclear arsenal

    Han also discussed China’s role in the region, saying the superpower was “not the country it used to be,” in past decades that ushered in economic reforms and liberalization.

    “China is a huge and important global player,” he said. “Including Korea, I think many countries would like to see (China) be more compliant with global rules.”

    He added that though China “will contribute a lot in solving global problems,” the country often doesn’t meet the “expectations a lot of countries would like to have – for example, we hoped that China would be more aggressive and more active in reducing tensions in the Korean Peninsula.”

    For years, China has been North Korea’s biggest trading partner and an economic lifeline, with Pyongyang isolated from much of the world.

    But Beijing, too, is a major player in the Asia arms race.

    In January, US and Japanese ministers warned of the “ongoing and accelerating expansion of (China’s) nuclear arsenal.” Just days later, Japan’s prime minister expressed concern over China’s military activities in the East China Sea, and the launch of ballistic missiles over Taiwan that landed in waters near Japan in August.

    China’s military buildup, aggressive foreign policy and multiple disputed territorial claims haven’t gone unnoticed in Seoul – where attitudes toward Beijing are fast souring.

    In the 2022 survey on South Korean nuclear armament, more than half of respondents said China would be the biggest threat to the country in 10 years, and many cited “threats other than North Korea” behind their support for a domestic nuclear arsenal.

    Han acknowledged that Seoul was closely watching these territorial disputes.

    “Peace in the Taiwan Strait is also very important for the security and peace of the Korean Peninsula,” he said. And though South Korea is “committed” to the one-China policy, he said, “at the same time, we (expect) China to be more rule-based, not behaving as a country … being condemned by international community.”

  • North Korea has fired a missile, Japan says

    North Korea has fired a missile, Japan says

    The government of Japan has confirmed that North Korea has fired an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

    It was launched on Saturday, soared for 66 minutes, and landed in the Sea of Japan, according to the defense ministry.

    That follows a demonstration in which Pyongyang displayed its impressive military prowess while displaying more than a dozen ICBMs.

    On Friday, North Korea pledged to respond to any military exercises between South Korea and the US with a “unprecedentedly strong” retaliation.

    The annual springtime exercises, which are due to start next month, are designed to help fend off North Korea’s increasing nuclear threats. But Pyongyang has long insisted the drills are in preparation to invade North Korea.

    Saturday’s missile, which is the first to be launched since new year’s day, splashed down west of Hokkaido, in Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) at 18:27 (09:27 GMT), Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said. An EEZ is an area of the sea that a country has jurisdiction over. Japan’s is a 200-nautical mile area off its coast.

    It landed some 900km (560 miles) away, and reached an altitude of 5,700km, government spokesperson Hirokazu Matsuno said in Tokyo. While that is incredibly high – the edge of space is about 100km – it is not the highest a North Korean missile has flown.

    In November, an ICBM reached an altitude of 6,100km. Previously, in January 2022, North Korea released extraordinary photos of the Earth that it claimed were taken from a missile launch that reached 2,000km.

    ICBMs are particularly worrying because of their long range, including mainland United States.

    Japan’s Defence Minister Hamada Yasukazu said Saturday’s missile would have been able to do this, with a possible range of 14,000km.

    “This series of actions by North Korea threatens the peace and stability of Japan and the international community, and is absolutely unforgivable,” Mr Matsuno said.

    South Korea’s military reported the missile was launched from the Sunan district, north of Pyongyang, where the international airport is located. It is also where North Korea has launched most of its recent ICBM tests.

    North Korea’s ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programmes are banned by the UN Security Council. But this has not stopped Pyongyang from continuing with its weapons development, and holding elaborate military parades to show them off.

    Just over a week ago, Pyongyang showed off its largest display ever of intercontinental ballistic missiles in a midnight military parade which was attended by leader Kim Jong-un.

    Source: BBC

  • Watch out for an ‘unprecedented’ response: North Korea warns ahead of South-US drills

    Watch out for an ‘unprecedented’ response: North Korea warns ahead of South-US drills

    Pyongyang has threatened an “unprecedentedly strong” response to the upcoming joint military exercises between the US and South Korea. The allied efforts to more effectively combat North Korea’s threats include the exercises scheduled for next week.

    As South Korea and the US get ready for their annual joint military exercises, North Korea on Friday threatened a “unprecedentedly persistent, strong” response.

    Shortly after South Korea announced joint tabletop exercises for the following week, a statement was made.

    “In case the US and South Korea carry into practice their already announced plan for military drills that [North Korea], with just apprehension and reason, regards as preparations for an aggression war, they will face unprecedentedly persistent and strong counteractions,” the North Korean Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by state media.

    Pyongyang called South Korea and the US “the arch-criminals deliberately disrupting” regional peace and stability.

    “This predicts that the situation in the Korean Peninsula and the region will be again plunged into the grave vortex of escalating tension,” the statement said.

    Planned simulated drill on North Korea’s use of nukes

    The South Korea-US joint drills, called the Deterrence Strategy Committee Tabletop Exercise, are set to begin on February 22 at the Pentagon in Washington.

    The drills are part of efforts to thwart North Korea’s increasing nuclear and missile threats.

    The exercises would involve defense policymakers from both sides, Seoul’s Defense Ministry said.

    Military drills with the United States had been scaled back during the coronavirus pandemic. But they are now being bolstered under South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, as he looks to reassure an increasingly nervous South Korean public of Washington’s commitment to deter Pyongyang. 

    North Korea condemns UN Security Council

    North Korea’s Foreign Ministry also cautioned that if the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) continues to be “inveigled” by Washington, it will reconsider additional actions beyond normal military activities, without elaborating further.

    The ministry has accused the US of fueling tensions and using UNSC as “a tool for illegal hostile policy” to pressure North Korea.

    In 2022, North Korea conducted a record number of military tests, firing about 70 ballistic missiles.

    The tests included nuclear-capable weapons with the ability to strike targets in South Korea or reach the US mainland.

  • North Korea’s Kim Jong Un commends army ahead of anticipated military array

    North Korea’s Kim Jong Un commends army ahead of anticipated military array

    To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the North Korean army’s founding, Kim travelled with his daughter to see military officials.

    During celebrations for the 75th anniversary of the founding of his army, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un praised the “irresistible might” of his nuclear-armed forces while paying a visit to military officials with his daughter.

    The visit and speech to military leaders coincide with hints that North Korea is getting ready to hold a sizable military parade in the capital, Pyongyang, where the country’s expanding nuclear and conventional weapons programmes are anticipated to be on display.

    Kim and his general officers paid a visit to their lodging on Wednesday, according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

    The visit comes a day after Kim presided over a meeting with his top military officials and called for an expansion of combat exercises aimed at sharpening war readiness.

    State media photos showed military officials applauding at the banquet, which appeared to be held at Pyongyang’s Yanggakdo Hotel on Tuesday.

    Kim and his daughter, believed to be nine or 10 years old, were dressed alike in black suits and white dress shirts and held hands as they walked down a red carpet alongside Kim’s wife, Ri Sol Ju.

    In her fourth documented public appearance, Kim’s daughter stood closely with her father as he shook the hands of senior officials and sat next to him at a table surrounded by military officers.

    Previously, she had been pictured attending an intercontinental ballistic missile test launch and accompanying her father during meetings with military scientists and an inspection of ballistic missiles.

    “For the strengthening and development of our armed forces, let us all double our efforts and do more for the prosperous development of the socialist motherland,” Kim said during a speech at the banquet, according to KCNA.

    In a separate report, KCNA cited Kim’s leadership of large-scale military drills last year, including the flights of hundreds of fighter aircraft, as “inflicting a strong blow on the largest joint air exercise ever conducted by the United States and its agents” in November.

    Rob McBride, reporting from the South Korean capital, Seoul, said satellite images appeared to show that a set-piece parade was being prepared in the North Korean capital. Such a display of military hardware comes after an unprecedented year of approximately 80 ballistic missile launches by Pyongyang in 2022, he said.

    Such parades are typically held in downtown Pyongyang’s Kim Il Sung Square and are often used to show off new weapons, including ballistic missiles designed to carry nuclear warheads.

    The last four military parades have been held after dark.

    Illuminated aircraft flew low over Pyongyang at about 1am on Wednesday (19:00 GMT, Tuesday), and music could be heard from the square, suggesting a parade was imminent, Seoul-based NK News reported, citing videos it obtained.

    Yang Uk, a research fellow at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies think tank, told Al Jazeera that North Korea wants to show the world “that their tactical nuclear capability is real and it can operate in any situation”.

  • US drills propelling situation to ‘extreme red-line’

    US drills propelling situation to ‘extreme red-line’

    Pyongyang has threatened the “toughest reaction” in response to the United States’ escalation of joint military exercises with South Korea.

    The Korean Peninsula’s situation has reached an “extreme red line” as a result of South Korea and the United States’ joint military exercises, according to North Korea, which has denounced them and warned that they could turn the area into a “huge war arsenal and a more critical war zone.”

    In addition to threatening the “toughest” response, North Korea said in a statement released on Thursday that it was not interested in dialogue as long as Washington continued its so-called “hostile” policies.

    Days after US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visited Seoul and promised to increase Washington’s deployment of cutting-edge military assets, such as fighter jets, to the Korean Peninsula, Pyongyang issued the warning.

    The North Korean statement, attributed to an unidentified spokesperson of its Foreign Ministry, said the expansion of the allies’ drills is threatening to turn the Korean Peninsula into a “huge war arsenal and a more critical war zone”. The statement said Pyongyang is prepared to counter any short-term or long-term military challenge by the allies with the “most overwhelming nuclear force”.

    “The military and political situation on the Korean Peninsula and in the region has reached an extreme red line due to the reckless military confrontational manoeuvres and hostile acts of the US and its vassal forces,” the spokesperson said.

    The “DPRK will take the toughest reaction to any military attempt of the US on the principle of ‘nuke for nuke and an all-out confrontation for an all-out confrontation!’” the spokesperson said, referring to the country by its formal name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

    “If the US continues to introduce strategic assets into the Korean Peninsula and its surrounding area, the DPRK will make clearer its deterring activities without fail according to their nature,” the spokesperson added.

    North Korea for decades has described the US’s combined military exercises with South Korea as rehearsals for a potential invasion, although the allies have described those drills as defensive. North Korea last year ramped up its own weapons demonstrations as the allies resumed their large-scale training that had been downsized for years.

    North Korea’s actions included a slew of missile and artillery launches that it described as simulated nuclear attacks on South Korean and US targets.

    Jeon Ha Gyu, a spokesperson for South Korea’s defence ministry, said the ministry had no immediate comment in response to the North Korean statement.

    He said the allies’ latest aerial drills – which took place on Wednesday and involved the US’s B-1B bombers and F-22 and F-35 fighter jets – were aimed at demonstrating the credibility of the US “extended deterrence”, referring to a commitment to use the full range of its military capabilities, including nuclear ones, to defend South Korea.

    He declined to reveal the exact number of South Korean and US aircraft involved in the exercise.

    South Korea in recent months has sought stronger assurances that the US will swiftly and decisively use its nuclear capabilities to protect its ally in the face of a North Korean nuclear attack. More than 28,500 US troops are based in South Korea as a legacy of the 1950-1953 Korean War, which ended in an armistice rather than a peace treaty.

    During a political conference in December, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called for an “exponential increase” in nuclear warheads, mass production of battlefield tactical nuclear weapons targeting South Korea, and the development of more powerful long-range missiles designed to reach the US mainland.

    Experts say Kim’s nuclear push is aimed at forcing the US to accept the idea of North Korea as a nuclear power and then negotiating badly needed economic concessions from a position of strength.

    Nuclear negotiations between North Korea and the US have been derailed since 2019 because of disagreements over a relaxation of Washington-led economic sanctions against North Korea in exchange for steps by Pyongyang to wind down its nuclear weapons and missile programmes.

    The North Korean spokesperson said Pyongyang was not interested in any contact or dialogue with the US as long as it maintains its “hostile policy and confrontational line”, accusing Washington of maintaining sanctions and military pressure to force North Korea to “disarm itself unilaterally”.

  • North Korea denies arming the Wagner group in Russia

    North Korea denies arming the Wagner group in Russia

    Denial follows US accusations that North Korea had provided rockets and missiles to the Wagner Group, a Russian military contractor.

    After the United States accused North Korea of supplying rockets and missiles to the Russian Wagner Group and supporting Moscow’s forces in Ukraine, Pyongyang denied arming Russia.

    In a statement released on Sunday, a senior North Korean official denounced the US accusations as “baseless rumour” intended to support Washington’s own military assistance to Ukraine.

    As a result of the private military organization’s alleged weapons transactions with North Korea, which are forbidden by United Nations Security Council resolutions, the US designated Wagner as a “transnational criminal organisation” earlier this month.

    The White House also showed what it said were US intelligence photographs of Russian rail cars entering North Korea, picking up a load of infantry rockets and missiles, and returning to Russia.

    But the director general of the North Korean Department of US Affairs, Kwon Jong Gun, rejected the accusations on Sunday, warning that the US will face a “really undesirable result” if it persists in spreading the “self-made rumour”.

    “Trying to tarnish the image of [North Korea] by fabricating a non-existent thing is a grave provocation that can never be allowed and that cannot but trigger its reaction,” Kwon Jong Gun said.

    He added that the US move was “a foolish attempt to justify its offer of weapons to Ukraine”.

    Earlier this week, US President Joe Biden promised 31 Abrams tanks, one of the US army’s most powerful and sophisticated weapons, to help Kyiv fight off Moscow’s invasion.

    The move drew a rebuke Friday from Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who accused Washington of “further crossing the red line” by sending the tanks into Ukraine.

    Kwon Jong Gun reiterated Pyongyang’s concerns over the tank transfer on Sunday, calling it an “unethical crime” aimed at perpetuating an unstable international situation.

    Along with China, Russia is one of North Korea’s few international friends.

    Russia, one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, has long held the line against increasing pressure on nuclear-armed North Korea, even asking for relief from international sanctions for humanitarian reasons.

    Meanwhile, other than Syria and Russia, North Korea is the only country to recognise the independence of Luhansk and Donetsk, two Russian-backed separatist regions in eastern Ukraine.

    In November, after the White House said Pyongyang was covertly supplying Russia with a “significant” number of artillery shells, North Korea said it had never had arms dealings with Russia and had no plans to do so.

  • Kim Jong Un orders execution of anyone caught watching porn in North Korea

    Kim Jong Un orders execution of anyone caught watching porn in North Korea

    Anyone caught watching porn will be executed by Kim Jong Un’s new secret squads as part of the North Korean dictator’s campaign to combat “foreign influences.”

    According to evidence from a defector in a recent study, enforcers are trying to outlaw foreign television, haircuts, and even birthday parties.

    The ‘gruppa’ or ‘non-socialist groupings’ squads are charged by Pyongyang with pursuing infractions of the official ideology of the Communist Party.

    ‘The groups operate as a hidden tool, which is used by the government to achieve their ultimate objectives of ubiquitous surveillance and the ability to thoroughly oversee each and every resident,’ the report says.

    Foreign media, particularly anything deemed to be ‘Western’, is strictly prohibited in North Korea – which brainwashes its population to unquestionably support Kim Jong Un and his ruling regime. Any dissent is severely punished.

    The dictator views South Korea as an American puppet state, and is highly sensitive to any of its media crossing the border from China, fearing the influence it may have.

    For some time now, any sign that someone may have been consuming media from the South has resulted in brutal consequences.

    Now, according to the report by the Database Centre for North Korean Human Rights (NKDB) based in Seoul, Kim is tightening his grip even more with the gruppa.

    Citizens are being prosecuted for anything from defection, drug dealing, smuggling and begging, to being absent from work, traffic offences, adultery, dying one’s hair, religious practices and taking part in ‘decadent culture’ – which can include parties.

    ‘It is worse than the Kim Jong Il era,’ one testimony quoted in the report said. 

    ‘The border has become tighter, more barbed wire fences have been installed. Also, there were instructions to directly fire at any person crossing the border.

    ‘[…] I’ve heard about people being shot for distributing impure cultural contents. There was one person who was executed for watching pornography and prostituting at his place after Kim Jong Un took office.’

    ‘First they check how you dress. Then what type of music you listen to, what videos you watch, whether you have dyed your hair […] You cannot have a birthday party as a group,’ the defector said, according to the report.

    ‘They keep saying not to have gatherings and drink alcohol because when people are drunk, they will end up singing one or two South Korean songs for sure.’

    The report said that the secret informants are becoming increasingly preoccupied with the smuggling and distribution of South Korean media. 

    Outlawed songs, movies and television shows such as ‘Squid Game’ or ‘Crash Landing on You’ are sometimes smuggled into the country on USB flash drives. 

    One of the methods used by the ‘non-socialist groups’ is to cut off power to the homes of people suspected of watching banned media, and therefore preventing them from removing DVDs of videotapes from the payer and hiding their ‘guilt’.

    Punishments range from demotion at work, being fired, or even sent to a re-education or labour camp. In the most extreme cases – such as being found to have been watching pornography – people could be executed by firing squad.

    ‘If you consume sexual media content in North Korea, you are either punished with a lifetime term of “reform through labour” or even executed by firing squad. Watching typical South Korean or American material will lead to a sentence of fewer than ten years of ‘reform through labour,’ according to another defector’s testimony. 

    Earlier this month, it was reported that four students were expelled from university and forced to work in a coal mine because they sounded as if they had been watching too much foreign TV, by using accents or phrases from the South.

    It is believed the students likely picked up the way of speaking through watching media outlawed by the ruling party.

    Credit: Dailymail.com.uk

  • North Korea sends caution ahead of ‘extreme cold’ weather

    North Korea sends caution ahead of ‘extreme cold’ weather

    Authorities in North Korea have issued warnings about severe weather as a cold wave sweeps the Korean peninsula.


    The poorest region of the country, the northern regions, are expected to experience temperatures below -30C, according to the state radio broadcaster.

    High winds are also anticipated for coastal areas, according to state media.

    Additionally, a cold wave warning has been issued for South Korea, and record-low temperatures have been recorded in northern China.

    Temperatures are also expected to drop to their lowest in a decade in Japan this week.

    While North Korea has been affected by extreme or adverse weather much like other places, little is known about the impact of this on its people.

    Ryanggang, North Hamgyong and South Hamgyong, the country’s poorest provinces and those expected to be most vulnerable to climate shocks, are all located in the north.

    Electricity is uncommon outside the capital Pyongyang, and households in these places reportedly burn wood, and dried plants for warmth during the winter, NK News has reported. It also says many merely use plastic wrap around their doors and windows for insulation.

    Radio Free Asia reported in December that “large numbers” of people in the country had gone missing late last year during another extremely cold spell – many are thought to have either starved or frozen to death, as the mercury dipped below freezing and food became scarce.

    Food insecurity in North Korea is said to be at its worst since a widespread famine in the 1990s, according to Lucas Rengifo-Keller, a research analyst at Peterson Institute for International Economics in the US.

    In 2019, North Korea said it was suffering its worst drought in nearly four decades. This comes after the UN said that up to 10 million North Koreans were “in urgent need of food assistance,” reporting that the people had been surviving on just 300 g (10.5 oz) of food a day that year.

    In 2020, North Korea was struck by five major typhoons, which caused major structural damage to buildings, roads, factories and water systems and displaced thousands of citizens.

    Scientists say extreme weather, including cold waves, is becoming more common because of climate change.

    Tuesday’s cold wave alerts come as Pyongyang prepares to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Korean People’s Army next week.

  • Kim Jo-ng-un: What we can expect from North Korean president in 2023

    Kim Jo-ng-un: What we can expect from North Korean president in 2023

    It fired more missiles than ever before in a single year. In fact, a quarter of all missiles North Korea has ever launched will hit the skies in 2022. It was also the year that Kim Jong-un declared that North Korea had become a nuclear weapons state and that its weapons were here to stay.

    This has raised tensions on the Korean peninsula to their highest since 2017, when then-US President Donald Trump threatened North Korea with “fire and fury.”

    So, what comes next?

    Nuclear weapons development

    In 2022, North Korea made significant progress on its weapons. It began the year by testing short-range missiles designed to hit South Korea, followed by mid-range ones that could target Japan.

    By the end of the year, it had successfully tested its most powerful intercontinental ballistic missile to date, the Hwasong 17, which in theory is capable of reaching anywhere on the US mainland.

    Mr Kim also lowered his threshold for using nuclear weapons. After announcing in September that North Korea had become an irreversible nuclear weapons state, he revealed that these weapons were no longer designed just to prevent war, but that they could be used pre-emptively and offensively, to win a war

    As the year drew to a close, he gathered the members of his ruling Workers’ Party, to set out his goals for 2023.

    Top of his list is to “exponentially increase” the production of nuclear weapons. This must include, he said, the mass production of smaller, tactical nuclear weapons, which could be used to fight a war against South Korea.

    This is the most serious development, according to Ankit Panda, a nuclear weapons expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

    In November 2022 North Korea launched its most powerful ICBM to date.
    Image caption,North Korea launched its most powerful ICBM to date in late 2022

    To make tactical nuclear weapons, North Korea first must produce a miniaturised nuclear bomb, which can be loaded onto a small missile. The world is yet to see proof that Pyongyang has been able to do this. The intelligence community spent most of 2022 waiting for it to test such a device, but the test never came – 2023 may well be the year.

    Other items on Mr Kim’s new year list are a spy satellite, which he claims will be launched into orbit this spring, and a sturdier solid-fuelled ICBM, which could be fired at the US with less warning than his current model.

    We can therefore assume 2023 will have a distinctly 2022 feel, with Pyongyang continuing to aggressively test, refine and expand its nuclear arsenal, in defiance of UN sanctions.

    Indeed, less than three hours into the new year it had already conducted its first missile test.

    But, Mr Panda says, “most missile launches in the coming year may not be tests, but training exercises, as North Korea now prepares to use its missiles in a possible conflict”.

    Any talking?

    With such an extensive list of goals to work through, it is unlikely the North Korean leader will choose this year to return to talks with the US. The last round of denuclearisation negotiations collapsed in 2019, and ever since Mr Kim has shown no sign of wanting to talk.

    One line of thinking is that he is waiting until he has maximum leverage. Not until he has proven beyond doubt that North Korea is capable of inflicting destruction on the US and South Korea will he return to the table to negotiate on his terms.

    Instead, over the past year, North Korea has drawn closer to China and Russia. It could well be in the process of fundamentally changing its foreign policy, said Rachel Minyoung Lee, who worked as a North Korea analyst for the US government for 20 years, and is now with the Open Nuclear Network.

    “If North Korea no longer views the US as necessary for its security and survival, it will profoundly impact the shape and form of future nuclear negotiations,” she said.

    Tensions on the peninsula

    In the meantime, a volatile situation is developing on the Korean peninsula.

    For every perceived “provocation” by the North, South Korea – and sometimes the United States – retaliates.

    This began in May 2022, with the arrival of a new South Korean president, who promised to be tougher on North Korea. President Yoon Suk-yeol is guided by the belief that the best way to stop the North is to respond with military strength.

    He re-started large-scale joint military exercises with the United States, against which the North protested and launched more missiles. This set off a tit-for-tat cycle of military action, which has involved both sides flying warplanes near to their border, and firing artillery into the sea.

    Kim Jong-un (fourth from left) at a meeting
    Image caption,In his new year address Mr Kim vowed to exponentially increase the production of nuclear weapons

    Last week, the situation escalated, when the North unexpectedly flew five drones into South Korean airspace. The South failed to shoot them down, exposing a weak spot in its defences and triggering concern among ordinary South Koreans, who are usually unfazed by the North’s activities.

    The president vowed the South would retaliate and punish the North for every provocation.

    Chad O’Carroll, CEO of Korea Risk Group, an analysis service which monitors North Korea, predicts that in 2023, this could likely lead to a direct confrontation between the two Koreas, which could even result in deaths.

    “Responses by either the North or South could escalate to the point where we see the exchange of actual fire, intentional or otherwise,” he said.

    One mistake or miscalculation and the situation could spiral.

    Inside North Korea

    Just as pressing a question is what does 2023 hold for the people of North Korea?

    They have been subjected to three years of strict pandemic-related border closures. Even trade was suspended in an attempt to keep the coronavirus out, which humanitarian organisations believe has led to severe shortages of food and medicine. Last year, in a rare admission, Mr Kim spoke of a “food crisis”.

    Then in May 2022, North Korea admitted its first outbreak of the virus, but mere months later claimed to have defeated it.

    So will 2023 be the year it finally reopens its border with China, and allows people and supplies back in?

    Kim Jong with his daughter
    Image caption,In November 2022 Mr Kim publicly revealed his daughter for the first time

    China’s reopening brings hope. North Korea is reportedly vaccinating people living along the border in preparation, but given its precarious healthcare, Ms Lee is cautious.

    “Barring an emergency, such as its economy on the brink of collapse, it is unlikely North Korea will fully reopen its borders until the pandemic can be considered over globally, particularly in neighbouring China,” she said.

    One more development to watch for are clues about who will lead North Korea after Mr Kim. His succession plan is unknown, but last year he publicly revealed one of his children for the first time: a girl, thought to be his daughter Kim Chu-ae.

    She has been pictured now at three military events, with more photos released on New Year’s Day, leading some to speculate whether she is the chosen one.

    Of course, North Korea is anything but predictable, and 2023 looks set to be as unpredictable and unstable a year as the last.

    Source: BBB.com

  • Kim directs North Korea to “exponentially increase” its nuclear arsenal

    Kim directs North Korea to “exponentially increase” its nuclear arsenal

    Kim made his remarks as North Korea conducted an unusual late-night New Year’s Day weapons test with a short-range ballistic missile.

    In order to deter the United States and South Korea, Kim Jong Un, the leader of North Korea, has ordered the creation of a new intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and asked for a “exponential” rise in the manufacturing of nuclear warheads.

    After North Korea launched a short-range ballistic missile off its east coast on New Year’s Eve, Kim’s declaration was made public on state media on Sunday.

    During his comments at a key meeting of the ruling Worker’s Party, Kim accused Washington and Seoul of carrying out a “plot to isolate and stifle” North Korea, calling it “unparalleled in human history”, according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). He said the situation called for Pyongyang to “double down our efforts to strengthen our military power overwhelmingly” and “to safeguard our sovereignty, safety and basic national interest to cope with the dangerous military moves by the US and other hostile forces that target us”, KCNA reported.

    “It highlights the importance and necessity of mass producing tactical nuclear weapons and calls for an exponential increase of the country’s nuclear arsenal,” Kim said.

    He also ordered the manufacturing of a new type of ICBM “with a rapid nuclear counterattack capability as its basic mission,” KCNA said.

    Kim also reportedly said North Korea plans to launch its first military spy satellite soon.

    The KCNA report came as South Korea’s military said it detected a missile launched from North Korea’s capital region around 2:50am local time on Sunday (17:50 GMT on Saturday). The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missile travelled about 400km (250 miles) before falling into the water between the Korean Peninsula and Japan.

    The Joint Chiefs of Staff called the launch “a grave provocation” that hurts peace and security on the Korean Peninsula and around the world. It said South Korea closely monitors North Korean moves in coordination with the US and maintains readiness to deal with any provocations.

    The US Indo-Pacific Command said in a statement that the launch highlights “the destabilising impact” of North Korea’s unlawful weapons programmes. It said US commitments to defend South Korea and Japan “remain ironclad”.

    North Korea test-fired more than 70 missiles last year. Some experts say the country eventually aims to boost its weapons arsenals and increase pressure on its rivals to win concessions such as sanctions relief.

    On Saturday, North Korea fired three short-range ballistic missiles towards its eastern waters.

    KCNA said the country had conducted test-firings of its “super-large” multiple rocket launcher to test the weapon’s capability. It said three shells fired from the launcher accurately hit an island target off the country’s eastern coast, and that North Korea fired another shell from the launcher towards its eastern waters on Sunday.

    Outside experts categorise weapons fired from the launcher as ballistic missiles because of their trajectories, ranges and other characteristics.

    North Korea’s missile launch for a second straight day could be a response to rival South Korea’s recent rocket test related to its plan to establish space-based surveillance to better monitor North Korea. On Friday, South Korea’s military said it test launched a solid-fueled rocket, a type of space launch vehicle that it plans to use to put its first spy satellite into orbit in coming years.

    Animosities between the rival Koreas have deepened since early last week, when South Korea accused North Korea of flying drones across the countries’ heavily fortified border for the first time in five years and sent its own drones towards its northern neighbour.

    South Korea acknowledge it failed to shoot down any of the five North Korean drones it said were found south of the border. But South Korea has promised to bolster its air defence network and get tough on future provocations by North Korea.

    Source: Aljazeera.com

  • ‘Wrong and dangerous’ : North Korea blasts Japan’s military buildup, says it would take action

    The foreign ministry of North Korea calls Japan’s new $320 billion security strategy “wrong and dangerous” and vows to respond.

    Japan’s planned military buildup has been denounced by North Korea, which also promised to take action against Tokyo for making the “wrong and dangerous choice” to expand its defence industry.

    The statement on Tuesday from North Korea’s foreign ministry comes just days after Japan unveiled a new $320bn security strategy that outlined plans for Japan’s military to mount “counter-strike capabilities”, and to respond to the threats posed by China, Russia and North Korea.

    Japan’s sweeping, five-year military strategy will see the country become the world’s third-largest military spender after the United States and China.

    Japan’s new security strategy effectively formalises a “new aggression policy” and fundamentally changes East Asia’s security environment, a spokesperson for Pyongyang’s foreign ministry said in a report published by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

    In response to Japan’s move to “realise unjust and excessive ambition”, North Korea “will continue to show how concerned and displeased we are with practical action,” the spokesperson said.

    They also blasted the US for “exalting and instigating Japan’s rearmament and re-invasion plan,” adding that Washington had no right to raise issue with Pyongyang’s efforts to bolster its own defences.

    North Korea’s efforts to upgrade military capabilities have included a record number of ballistic missile launches this year, including missiles capable of carrying nuclear payloads and with varying ranges that could reach the US mainland and allies South Korea and Japan.

    On Sunday, North Korea fired two projectiles that it said were were tests of its first military reconnaissance satellite and released low-resolution, black-and-white photos that showed a view from space of the South Korean capital, Seoul, and the nearby city of Incheon.

     

    Some analysts in South Korea said the images were too crude to be satellite photos, while the South Korean military maintained that Sunday’s launches were of two medium-range ballistic missiles.

    North Korea hit back at that criticism on Tuesday, with Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, saying it was “inappropriate and hasty” to assess her country’s satellite capabilities from those two photos alone.

    Pyongyang’s efforts to develop a spy satellite were a “pressing priority directly linked to our security,” she said in a statement carried by the KCNA, adding that additional sanctions on her country would not stop such technological developments.

    She went on to dismiss the South Korean government’s assessment that North Korea still has key remaining technological hurdles to overcome for functioning intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that can reach the US mainland – such as the ability to protect its warheads from the harsh conditions of atmospheric re-entry.

    She questioned how North Korea could have received data from warheads until they landed at targeted areas in the ocean in previous launches if the country truly lacked re-entry technology.

    “I think it’s better for them to stop talking nonsense, behave carefully and think twice,” she said.

    Kim Yo Jong also suggested North Korea might fire an ICBM at a normal trajectory instead of the lofted and steep angles that it currently uses to avoid neighbouring countries.

    A full range ICBM test could be considered as a much bigger provocation to the US as the weapon would fly toward the Pacific Ocean.

    “I can clear up their doubt about it,” she said.

    “They will immediately recognise it in case we launch an ICBM in the way of real angle firing straight off.”

     

    Source: Aljazeera.com 

     

     

  • N Korea finalises ‘important’ test of spy satellite: State media

    North Korea has released satellite imagery of the South Korean cities of Seoul and Incheon, which are thought to have been shot during the test.

    North Korea has conducted a “important, final phase” test in the development of a military reconnaissance satellite, which the country plans to complete by April 2023, North Korean state media has reported.

    According to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), North Korea’s National Aerospace Development Administration conducted the test on Sunday at the country’s Sohae satellite launching station in Cholsan, North Pyongan Province.

    A rocket carrying what was described as a “test-piece satellite” — including multiple cameras, image transmitters and receivers, a control device and a storage battery — was launched at a “lofted angle” to an altitude of 500km (311 miles), according to KCNA.

    According to KCNA, the test was designed to review satellite imaging capabilities, data transmission, and a ground control system.

    “We confirmed important technical indicators such as camera operating technology in the space environment, data processing and transmission ability of the communication devices, tracking and control accuracy of the ground control system,” an unnamed North Korean aerospace spokesperson said in the KCNA dispatch.

    North Korea plans to complete “preparations for the first military reconnaissance satellite by April, 2023,” the official said in the KCNA report.

    South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported on Monday that KCNA also released satellite imagery of the South Korean capital “Seoul and its adjacent city of Incheon presumed to be shot from the test-piece satellite”.

    On Sunday, North Korea also fired two medium-range ballistic missiles, which flew for an estimated 500km (311 miles) before splashing down in the sea off the country’s eastern coast. On Friday, Pyongyang announced that it had tested a high-thrust solid-fuel engine which experts said would facilitate quicker and more mobile launch of its ballistic missile arsenal.

    In an emergency meeting on Sunday, top South Korean security officials deplored what they described as North Korea’s continued provocations that they said came despite “the plight of its citizens moaning in hunger and cold due to a serious food shortage”.

    South Korea will respond by boosting trilateral security cooperation with the United States and Japan, according to South Korea’s presidential office.

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has promised to develop high-tech weaponry — including spy satellites and tactical nuclear weapons — as a means to both deter and provide real-time information on military actions by the US and regional allies South Korea and Japan, which he claims are threatening his country.

    Pyongyang has test-fired an unprecedented number of ballistic missiles this year, including a Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) — called the ‘monster missile’ —  in defiance of international sanctions.

    On Friday, the Japanese government adopted a national security strategy that would allow it to carry out preemptive strikes and double its military spending to give itself more offensive footing against threats from China and North Korea.

    The strategy marks a significant break from Japan’s strictly self-defence-only post-World War II military posture. The Japanese strategy names China as “the biggest strategic challenge”, ahead of North Korea and Russia, to Japan’s efforts to ensure peace, safety and stability.

    Japan’s Defence Ministry also said on Sunday that it had detected a fleet of five Chinese warships, including an aircraft carrier off the southern Japanese island of Okidaitojima the previous day. Ministry officials said Chinese fighter jets and helicopters were engaging in takeoff and landing exercises on the carrier and that Japan responded by scrambling fighter jets and dispatching a destroyer to the area.

    Source: Aljazeera.com 

     

  • Kim Jong Un’s daughter appears in public for second time – raising speculation of a successor in the making

    The unexpected second appearance of the North Korean leader’s daughter has raised speculation that she could be a successor in the making or be trained for a leadership position.

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has appeared in public with his daughter for the second time, as the two posed for photos with soldiers, scientists and others involved in this month’s Hwasong-17 missile launch.

    State media outlet KCNA reported that Mr Kim and his daughter found the crowd “filled with boundless passion and happiness” as they expressed “the highest glory and ardent reverence for him”.

    Mr Kim was quoted as saying: “It is the truth taught by history that only when we become the strongest – not the weak – in the present world where the strength in showdown just decides victory, can we defend the present and future of the country and nation”.

    He also said that scientists and technicians should “make a do-or-die struggle… and thus expand and bolster up the nuclear war deterrent of the country at an exceptionally rapid speed”.

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his daughter attend a photo session with the scientists, engineers, military officials and others

    KCNA said that the workers “hardened their resolve” to carry out the task, “burning their hearts with a single mind to repay the privileges and trust shown by him at any cost”.

    The photos were not dated but were released by the North Korean government late on Saturday.

    Independent journalists were not given access to the event, which was described by KCNA as a “photo session”.

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his daughter attend a photo session with the scientists, engineers, military officials and others

    The Hwasong-17 is North Korea’s most powerful intercontinental ballistic missile, and it was tested earlier this month, with some experts saying it has the potential to strike anywhere on the US mainland.

    Mr Kim had boasted that the ICBM was a “reliable and maximum-capacity” weapon to contain US military threats.

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his daughter
    His daughter had watched the test with him – her first appearance in public.

     

    Her second appearance has raised speculation that she could be a successor in the making, but analysts say it would be an unprecedented uphill struggle in North Korea’s male-dominated dynasty.

    KCNA has not identified her, calling her “beloved daughter”, but experts believe she is Ju Ae, estimated to be aged between 12 and 13, although some think she could be as young as nine.

    Mr Kim is believed to have as many as three children – two girls and a boy – but in showing Ju Ae to the world twice in a matter of days, he has indicated that she could be a successor in the making or be trained for a leadership position.

    Source: Skynews.com 

  • China wishes to cooperate with North Korea for peace, Xi tells Kim – KCNA

    Kim receives a message from Xi as North Korea conducts an unprecedented number of missile launches.

    According to the official Korean Central News Agency, Chinese President Xi Jinping has informed North Korean leader Kim Jong Un that Beijing is eager to cooperate with Pyongyang for world peace and stability (KCNA).

    The revelation on Saturday came days after North Korea conducted one of its most powerful ICBM tests, saying it would use its own nuclear weapons to counter any perceived nuclear threats from the United States.

    North Korea has conducted a record-breaking blitz of missile launches in recent weeks and fears have grown that it is building up to a seventh nuclear test, its first since 2017.

    In his message to Kim, Xi said Beijing was ready to work together for “peace, stability, development, and prosperity of the region and the world”, KCNA reported.

    Xi said he was willing to collaborate with Pyongyang as “changes in the world, times, and history are taking place in unprecedented ways”, KCNA said, quoting from the message it said was received in response to congratulations from Kim after the Chinese Communist Party Congress last month handed Xi a third term.

    Days before North Korea’s ICBM launch, Xi met on the sidelines of a G20 summit in Bali with US President Joe Biden, who voiced confidence that Beijing does not want to see a further escalation by Pyongyang.

    Washington has said it wants China, Pyongyang’s most important ally and economic benefactor, to use its influence to help rein in North Korea.

    The November 18 missile launch appeared to be Pyongyang’s newest ICBM with the potential range to hit the US mainland.

    The United Nations Security Council convened an open meeting over the launch, with the US, the United Kingdom, France, and India among 14 nations to “strongly condemn” Pyongyang’s actions.

    But a Western diplomat told the AFP news agency that China and Russia had chosen not to put their names to Monday’s statement.

    Earlier this month, the US had accused Beijing and Moscow of protecting Pyongyang from further punishment.

    Pyongyang is already under multiple sets of international sanctions over its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes, and China accounts for more than 90 percent of the impoverished country’s bilateral trade.

     

  • North Korea launches a ballistic missile into the East Sea: S Korea

    The launch is the latest in a record year of missile tests by North Korea, and it comes as the results of the US midterm elections are announced.

    North Korea has launched a ballistic missile toward the sea off the country’s east coast, the first launch since last week’s barrage of missile launches and heavy artillery fire that saw more than 30 missiles land in the seas off the Korean peninsula, according to South Korea’s military.

    The Joint Chiefs of Staff of South Korea said Wednesday that it detected the launch of a short-range ballistic missile from an area in or around North Korea’s Sukchon in South Pyongan Province at around 3:31 p.m. local time (06:30 GMT).

    Fired towards the East Sea, which is also known as the Sea of Japan, the missile’s “flight distance was detected at about 290 kilometres (180 miles), an altitude of about 30 kilometres, and a speed of about Mach 6”, South Korea’s military reported.

    Japan’s Kyodo news agency, citing a Japanese government source, said the missile landed outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone, which extends 200 nautical miles (370 kilometres) from the country’s coastline.

    Japan’s Coast Guard also tracked the missile and said it appeared to have fallen into the sea minutes after the launch was first reported.

    The launch is the latest in a record year of missile tests by Pyongyang, including an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) last week, and comes at a time of growing concern that North Korea could be preparing for its first test detonation of a nuclear device since 2017.

    The missile launch also comes as the United States – South Korea’s main military ally – counted votes in the  country’s midterm elections, which will determine whether US President Joe Biden’s Democratic Party maintains control of the House of Representative and the Senate or loses one or both to the Republican Party.

    Earlier on Wednesday, South Korea said it had identified debris from an earlier North Korean missile launch as part of a Soviet-era SA-5 surface-to-air missile.

    A South Korean Navy ship used an underwater probe to recover the missile, which was the first time a North Korean ballistic missile had landed near South Korean waters.

    North Korea’s military said the launches were simulated attacks on South Korea and the United States, criticising their exercises as an “dangerous, aggressive war drill.”

    The SA-5 is an air defence missile originally designed by the Soviet Union, where it was designated the S-200, to shoot down strategic bombers and other high-altitude targets.

    The missile was exported around the world, and is still in service in at least a dozen countries, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

     

  • N Korea condemns US-S Korea drills, promises ‘merciless’ response

    Official KCNA media says recent spate of launches were designed to simulate attacks on air bases, aircraft and a major South Korean city.

    North Korea has released images of its recent spate of missile launches, including an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), as it condemned recent military drills between South Korea and the United States as an “open provocation and dangerous war drill” against which it said it had to respond.

    A statement from the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army said North Korea would continue to respond to military exercises by South Korea and the US with “sustained, resolute and overwhelming practical military measures”,  the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on Monday.

    North Korea fired multiple missiles last week, including a possible failed ICBM, cruise missiles and hundreds of artillery shells, as its southern neighbour and the US conducted their Vigilant Storm air drills, which were extended from five days to six in response to Pyongyang’s tests.

    The North Korean military said the exercises were an “open provocation aimed at intentionally escalating the tension” and “a dangerous war drill of very high aggressive nature,” according to the KCNA report.

    Hundreds of US and South Korean warplanes, including B-1B bombers, took part in Vigilant Storm.

    It was the first time B-1Bs have flown to the Korean peninsula since December 2017.

    Composite photos show four missiles taking off from ground-based launchers against a blue sky.
    KCNA said the missiles launched included cruise missiles, tactical ballistic missiles and a ‘special functional warhead’ [KCNA via Reuters]

    North Korea’s army said it had conducted activities simulating various attacks on air bases and aircraft, as well as a major South Korean city, to “smash the enemies’ persistent war hysteria”, KCNA said. It did not mention whether North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had overseen the exercises.

    The report said North Korea had fired two apparently nuclear-capable “strategic” cruise missiles on November 2 towards the waters off Ulsan, a southeastern coastal city in South Korea; a claim that officials in Seoul said was “untrue” and that no missiles had been tracked near there.

    North Korea carried out some 23 launches that day, with one of the missiles landing 26km (16 miles) south of the Northern Limit Line, which serves as an unofficial maritime border between the two Koreas; the first time that has happened since the Korean War ended in an armistice in 1953.

    New ICBM or variant?

    The operations also included a launch of two “tactical ballistic missiles loaded with dispersion warheads”, a test of a “special functional warhead paralysing the operation command system of the enemy”, and an “all-out combat sortie” involving 500 fighter jets.

    Analyst Joseph Dempsey cast doubt on that claim, noting that such a deployment would involve nearly every dedicated combat aircraft in North Korea’s fleet even though many are decades old or not serviceable.

    “[The] 500 figure seems exaggerated or at least misleading,” the research associate at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies said in a thread on Twitter.

    The South Korean Navy rescue vessel used an underwater probe to recover the parts, which are being analysed, the official said.

    US-South Korea joint drills usually trigger strong reactions from North Korea, which sees them as rehearsals for an invasion.

    Experts say Pyongyang is particularly sensitive about drills such as Vigilant Storm because its air force, which lacks high-tech jets and properly trained pilots, is one of the weakest parts of its military.

    While some analysts questioned whether all of the images shared on KCNA were new, others noted that North Korea appeared to have tested either a new type of ICBM or a variant of an existing model.

    “It’s not explicit in their statement, but the design doesn’t correspond to one we’ve seen before,” said Ankit Panda, a weapons expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

    He said the launch shown may have been a developmental platform for evaluating missile subsystems, including possibly a vehicle for multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRVs), which allow a single missile to drop nuclear warheads on different targets.

    “This is definitely an ICBM-size missile,” Panda said.

    North Korea Hwasong-15 missile on a transporter with Kim Jong Un looking on.
    Analysts said the images shared on Monday by KCNA suggested there might have been a new nose cone for the Hwasong-15, which was first tested in 2017 [File: KCNA via Reuters]

    George William Herbert, an adjunct professor at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies and a missile consultant, said the images appeared to show a new nosecone on the Hwasong-15 ICBM, which was first tested in 2017.

    The nosecone has a different shape and appears larger than necessary for the 200- to 300-kiloton nuclear device shown in state media and apparently tested in 2017, he said.

    Herbert said the shape is more suited for a single large warhead than multiple smaller warheads such as a MIRV.

    Source: Aljazeera.com 

  • United States, South Korea extend air drills following North Korea missile launch

    Washington and Seoul will extend the Vigilant Storm air drills that prompted North Korea to issue a warning.

    In response to North Korea‘s latest missile launch, including a suspected intercontinental ballistic missile, South Korea and the United States have agreed to extend their largest-ever military air drills (ICBM).

    Hundreds of South Korean and US warplanes, including F-35 stealth fighters, have been staging round-the-clock simulated missions as part of one of the largest air exercises in history.

    In a statement on Thursday, the South Korean military said the US had agreed to extend the Vigilant Storm air exercises – which were due to end on Friday – owing to North Korea’s “recent provocations”.

    Chairman of South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff Kim Seung-kyum and the head of US Forces Korea Paul LaCamera held a virtual meeting and reaffirmed their commitment to “a stronger combined defence posture”, according to the statement.

    The Vigilant Storm drills – which began on Monday – involved some 240 fighter jets and other aircraft conducting about 1,600 joint missions. The air drills followed just days after the South Korean military wrapped up their 12-day Hoguk 22 field exercises, and in which an undisclosed number of US troops had participated.

    North Korean has condemned joint military drills between the US and South Korea as a rehearsal for invasion and had warned of “powerful follow-up measures” should air warfare exercises go ahead.

    On Thursday, North Korea launched three ballistic missiles, including a suspected ICBM. The launch followed after Wednesday’s firing of 20 missiles, the most in a single day by North Korea, including one that landed off South Korea’s coast for the first time.

    Seoul responded by sending fighter jets to fire air-to-ground missiles into water north of its border.

    Alongside its missile launches, Pyongyang has adopted an escalatory nuclear doctrine that authorises preemptive nuclear attacks over a variety of loosely defined crisis situations.

    South Korea and the US condemned Thursday’s launches, with Washington urging all nations to enforce sanctions on North Korea for violating United Nations Security Council resolutions that bar missiles and nuclear tests.

    Ned Price, a spokesman for the US State Department, said North Korea had demonstrated that it was a threat to “its neighbours, the region, international peace and security, and the global non-proliferation regime”.

    South Korean Vice Foreign Minister Cho Hyun-dong and US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman strongly condemned North Korea’s series of missile launches as “deplorable, immoral” during a phone call on Thursday, Seoul’s foreign ministry said.

    US President Joe Biden and his national security team was “assessing the situation,” National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said in a statement, which added that the United States would take “all necessary measures” to ensure security.

    In brief comments to reporters a few minutes later, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said, “North Korea’s repeated missile launches are an outrage and absolutely cannot be forgiven”.

    Kishida called for greater trilateral security cooperation between the US, Japan and South Korea.

    Nuclear talks between the US and North Korea broke down in early 2019 over disagreements over denuclearisation steps and have remained stalled since.

    North Korea has so far ignored Biden’s calls for open-ended discussions, insisting that Washington should first discard its “hostile” policy, a term it mainly uses to describe sanctions and the joint US-South Korea military exercises.

  •  White House, intelligence suggests North Korea is providing Russia with artillery shells

    White House national security spokesman John Kirby says, the United States has information that suggests North Korea is clandestinely supplying Russia with a “significant” amount of artillery shells for use in Ukraine.

    North Korea was trying to conceal the shipments by routing them through nations in the Middle East and North Africa, Kirby said in a virtual briefing.

    “Our indications are that the DPRK is covertly supplying, and we are going to monitor to see whether the shipments are received,” Kirby said, referring to the country by the acronym of its official name, adding that the US would consult with the United Nations on accountability issues over the shipments.

    “It is not an insignificant number of shells, but we don’t believe they are in such a quantity that they would change the momentum of the war,” he said.

    North Korea said in September that it had never supplied weapons or ammunition to Russia and has no plans to do so.

     

  • North Korean missile lands near South Korean waters for the first time

    North Korea has launched the most missiles in a single day, and a ballistic missile has landed near South Korean waters for the first time since the countries’ division in 1948.

    North Korea launched at least 17 missiles off its eastern and western coasts on Wednesday morning, with one landing near the rivals’ tense sea border, according to South Korea’s military.

    Seoul responded quickly by launching missiles.

    It was the most missiles fired by the North in a single day – and the first time a ballistic missile had landed near the South’s waters since the countries’ division in 1948.

    “This is unprecedented and we will never tolerate it,” South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

    The missile landed outside South Korea’s territorial waters, but south of the Northern Limit Line (NLL), a disputed inter-Korean maritime border.

    It landed 35 miles from the South Korean city of Sokcho, on the east coast, and 100 miles from the island of Ulleung, where air raid warnings were issued.

    “We heard the siren at around 8.55 am and all of us in the building went down to the evacuation place in the basement,” an Ulleung county official said.

    “We stayed there until we came upstairs at around 9.15 am after hearing that the projectile fell into the high seas.”

    Yoon Suk-yeol, the South Korean president, said it was an “effective act of territorial encroachment”.

    South Korean warplanes fired three air-to-ground missiles into the sea across the NLL after Mr Yoon’s office pledged a “swift and firm response” so Pyongyang “pays the price for provocation”.

    South Korea is in a period of national mourning after more than 150 people were killed in a deadly crowd crush in the capital, Seoul.

    Hours before the missiles were launched, the North threatened to use nuclear weapons to get the US and South Korea to “pay the most horrible price in history” in protest over the two nations’ ongoing military drills that it views as an invasion rehearsal.

    Washington said the drills were “purely defensive in nature” and that the US had made clear to North Korea that it harbored no hostile intent towards the country.

    Today’s ballistic missile launches mark another step in what feels like an incremental but steady increase of tensions in the Korean Peninsula.

    Not only was this the closest a North Korean missile has come to the South Korean shore since the countries’ division in 1948, but it also comes shortly after its longest known missile flight yet over Japan in early October.

     

  • North Korean tensions: Why is Kim Jong-un putting more on the country?

    Tensions with North Korea come and go, but the situation on the Korean peninsula is the most volatile it has been in five years, and it appears to be getting worse.

    The North has fired a missile over Japan in the last month, forcing residents to seek shelter; this is a hostile and provocative act. It has launched several other ballistic missiles, flown warplanes close to the South Korean border, and fired hundreds of artillery shells into the sea, which have landed in a military buffer zone established by the two Koreas in 2018 to maintain peace.

    Technically, the two countries are still at war.

    On Monday a North Korean merchant ship crossed the countries’ sea border, causing both sides to fire warning shots. South Korea says the incursion was intentional.

    So, what is Kim Jong-un up to? There are three reasons North Korea tends to launch missiles – to test and improve its weapons technology, to send a political message to the world (primarily the US), and to impress its people at home and shore up loyalty to the regime.

    It can be hard to decipher which of these ends Pyongyang’s actions serve, but this time Mr Kim has been explicit. State media has reported several times that the recent launches and drills are in response to military exercises being run by the US, South Korea, and Japan. The North has blamed its enemies for escalating tensions and says its launches are a clear warning they should stop.

    Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo have been holding large-scale military exercises, separately and together, for the past two months, to show they are ready for a North Korean nuclear attack. There is little doubt these have antagonised Mr Kim, who has always viewed such exercises as his enemies rehearsing for an invasion. The reason North Korea started developing nuclear weapons in the first place was to stop itself from being invaded.

    But there is a less explicit reason he could be upping the pressure now. Some believe may be preparing the ground for a more provocative test – the detonation of a nuclear weapon for the first time in five years, or even a small-scale attack on South Korea.

    Last year he laid out a five-year plan, detailing all the new weapons he planned to develop. It included smaller battlefield nuclear bombs and short-range missiles to carry them. The recent tests are evidence Mr Kim is not only working his way through this weapons wish list but that he is training his troops to use them. He used some of the recent drills, he said, to simulate a nuclear attack on South Korea.

    Now Mr Kim needs attention. He needs the world to notice the progress he has made if he is one day to get harsh international sanctions on his country lifted. Sanctions haven’t stopped North Korea from developing weapons, as they were designed to, but they are hurting its economy.

    Talks aimed at reducing those sanctions have long stalled and North Korea is slipping down the global agenda. The world is far more concerned with the war in Ukraine, and the rise of an authoritarian China. President Biden’s position is that sanctions on North Korea can only be eased when it agrees to give up all its nuclear weapons.

    In the meantime, Washington and Seoul have agreed to strengthen their defence of the Peninsula by holding the military exercises Pyongyang hates so much, and responding to its provocations with force. Following the North’s latest round of missile launches and drills, South Korea sent up warplanes and shot artillery of its own.

    If Mr Kim is to get the US to negotiate on terms more favourable to him, he must prove how dangerous his country has become. Last month he declared North Korea to be a nuclear weapons state, a position he said was irreversible.

    We should be worried about how assertive it seems to have become, said Kim Jong-dae, a former advisor in South Korea’s Defence Ministry. He pointed out how in the past North Korea has waited until US forces have finished their military exercises before retaliating. This time they fired artillery into the sea while exercises were ongoing.

    “We have never seen this audacity and aggression before, it is different. It is the North acting like a nuclear state,” he said.

    The US and South Korean governments believe preparations for North Korea’s seventh nuclear weapon test are complete and the North is waiting for the opportune political moment to act. An attractive window is opening, with China’s Communist Party Conference now over and the US midterm elections approaching.

    Meanwhile, South Korea is in the midst of yet another round of war games, with the US scheduled to join in. These may well provide Kim Jong-un with the pretext he has been waiting for.

     

  • Rising tensions: The two Koreas exchange warning shots along the sea boundary

    The moves come amid increased tensions over North Korea’s onslaught of nuclear tests.

    North and South Korea have fired warning shots off their western coasts, accusing each other of breaching their maritime border amid rising tensions over Pyongyang’s nuclear tests.

    South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it broadcast warnings and fired warning shots to repel a North Korean merchant vessel that crossed the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de facto sea boundary, at approximately 3:40 am local time on Monday (18:40 GMT Sunday).

    North Korea’s military said it fired 10 rounds of artillery warning shots toward its territorial waters, where “naval enemy movement was detected”. It accused a South Korean naval ship of intruding into North Korean waters on the pretext of cracking down on an unidentified ship.

    “We ordered initial countermeasures to strongly expel the enemy warship by firing 10 shells of multiple rocket launchers near the waters where the enemy movement occurred,” the North Korean People’s Army said in a statement carried by the official KCNA news agency.

     

    JCS said the North Korean artillery firings breached a 2018 inter-Korean accord on reducing military animosities and undermining stability on the Korean Peninsula. It said the North Korean shells did not land in South Korean waters but that it is boosting its military readiness.

    There were no reports of clashes, but the poorly marked sea boundary of the Korean Peninsula’s west coast is a source of long-running animosities between the two countries. It is the scene of several bloody inter-Korean naval skirmishes and violence in recent years, including North Korea’s shelling of a South Korean island and its alleged torpedoing of a South Korean navy ship that killed 50 people in 2010.

    The latest exchange of fire came amid simmering tension, with North Korea carrying out weapons tests at an unprecedented pace this year.

    In recent weeks, North Korea has launched short-range ballistic missiles and hundreds of artillery rounds off its east and west coasts on several occasions in protest over its southern neighbour’s military activities.

    South Korea’s troops kicked off their annual Hoguk defence drills last week, designed to run until October 28, and boost their own and combined ability with the United States to counter North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats. The two allies are also set to hold joint air force drills next week involving some 240 warplanes, including F-35 fighters operated by both nations. The drills are aimed at inspecting the two countries’ joint operation capabilities and improving combat readiness, the South Korean military said on Tuesday.

    Pyongyang has reacted angrily to the exercises, calling them provocations and threatening countermeasures. Seoul and Washington say their exercises are defensive and aimed at deterring North Korea.

    “Pyongyang’s politics of blaming external threats and projecting confidence in military capabilities can motivate greater risk-taking,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. “North Korean probing of South Korean perimeter defenses could lead to a serious exchange of fire and unintended escalation.”

     

     

  • North Korea says, missile launches represented a nuclear attack drill on the South

    The recent volley of missile launches, according to North Korea, was a “simulation” of a nuclear strike on the South.

    It occurs at a time when intelligence reports suggest North Korea is getting ready to conduct its first nuclear test in five years.

    Pyongyang has fired seven sets of missiles in recent weeks in retaliation for the US and South Korean military exercises.

    On Monday, state media published extensive reports claiming the missiles were designed to carry nuclear weapons.

    They said the military practised loading the missiles with tactical nuclear warheads, which are small short-range weapons aimed for use on the battlefield.

    They also claimed to have successfully simulated hitting South Korea’s military bases, ports and airports, and said the launches were a warning to US and South Korea.

    State news agency KNCA ran photos of leader Kim Jong-un overseeing and “guiding” the tests.

    Kim Jong-un surrounded by military officials as he observes a test launch
    IMAGE SOURCE,KCNA/REUTERS Image caption, State media also published several pictures of Kim Jong-un presiding over the missile launches

    US and South Korean intelligence officials have been suggesting that the North may soon test a nuclear weapon for the first time since 2017.

    Experts believe it could also use the opportunity to detonate a smaller tactical device for the first time – the sort which would fit into the missiles it has been testing.

    Last month North Korea revised its nuclear laws, expanding the range of scenarios in which it could deploy nuclear weapons. Mr Kim also declared North Korea an “irreversible” nuclear power.

    It has also markedly stepped up its frequency of missile firings this year, carrying out over 40 missile launches this year so far – its most ever.

    Most of the launches in the past fortnight have been short-range missiles, which landed in the sea between North Korea and Japan.

    But North Korea also fired a longer-distance missile over Japan last Tuesday – which analysts say is a new intermediate-range ballistic missile, based on the weapon’s design.

    This year has seen the North test-fire missiles from a variety of launch sites including trains and convoys – moving platforms which would make it harder for the weapons to be destroyed in a strike, analysts have suggested.

    They also noted that Monday’s state media reports framed the recent launches as “tactical nuclear operations units” – instead of describing them purely as missile tests – suggesting that North Korea has now developed a system for deploying nuclear weapons.

    The 25 September-October 9 barrage were a response to the US deploying its nuclear-powered aircraft carrier the USS Ronald Reagan to waters around the Korean peninsula, and holding joint drills with Seoul and Tokyo.

    The acceleration marks a significant change from when Pyongyang pursued denuclearisation talks with then US President Donald Trump between 2018 and 2019.

    Analysts say North Korea is also reacting in response to South Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol, who was elected in May and has pursued a more hawkish stance to the North and closer ties with the US.

    North Korea’s recent launches

    • Sunday 25 September: A short-range missile fired the day after a US naval carrier arrived in waters around the Korean peninsula. 600km distance/60km altitude
    • Wednesday 28 September: Two short-range missiles fired on the eve of US Vice President Kamala Harris’ visit to Seoul and the DMZ. 360km distance/30km altitude
    • Thursday 29 September: Two short-range missiles after Harris departed South Korea. 300km distance/50km altitude
    • Saturday 1 October: Two short-range missiles fired amid continuing US-South Korea-Japan drills. 400km distance/50km altitude
    • Tuesday 4 October: An intermediate-range ballistic missile fired over Japan. 4,500km distance/2,800km altitude
    • Thursday 6 October: Two short-range missiles fired. 800km distance/50km altitude
    • Sunday 9 October: Two more short-range missiles

     

     

  • In two weeks: North Korea carries out sixth missile launch

    On Thursday, North Korea launched two more ballistic missiles, making it the sixth such banned launch in less than two weeks.

    On Wednesday, Pyongyang defined its recent offensive as “just counteraction measures” in response to joint military exercises between the US and South Korea.

    On Tuesday Pyongyang fired a missile over Japan, prompting the US to call an emergency UN Security Council meeting.

    At the meeting, the US accused Russia and China of protecting the North from stronger sanctions.

    By opposing further sanctions Moscow and Beijing had given Pyongyang “blanket protection”, the US ambassador to the UN said. The Chinese and Russian representatives said increased dialogue was better than punishment.

    For the past two months the US, South Korea, and Japan have been holding a series of combined exercises as they practice how to defeat and deter a North Korean attack. These drills have antagonised North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who sees them as proof his enemies are preparing for war.

    In its statement, the North accused the US of “escalating the military tensions on the Korean peninsula”.

    On Wednesday the US, Japan, and South Korea carried out further drills, which they said were a response to Tuesday’s launch. The US said there was “no equivalency” between a banned missile test-fire and security drills.

    The US also redeployed its aircraft carrier the USS Ronald Reagan near the Korean peninsula

    South Korea and Japan said the first of Thursday’s missiles, launched at about 06:00 local time (21:00 GMT) flew about 350km (217 miles) with a maximum altitude of around 100km, while the second missile had a flight range of about 800km at an altitude of around 50km.

    The recent flurry of launches is strongly reminiscent of the period leading up to its last nuclear weapon test in 2017.

    Back then, as is happening now, the North tested missiles, there was no dialogue with the US, and Pyongyang fired two missiles over Japan.

    Satellite imagery shows that the North has been restoring tunnels at their nuclear testing site, which they had claimed to have destroyed in 2018 during a short-lived diplomatic rapprochement with the US under President Trump.

    Last month, North Korea also revised its nuclear laws, with leader Kim Jong Un declaring his country an “irreversible” nuclear power.

    With everything in place, Kim appears to be waiting for a politically opportune moment to carry out its seventh nuclear test.

    Analysts believe a test is most likely to happen during the window of three weeks between the Communist Party Congress in China later this month and the US mid-term elections in early November.

    North Korea’s recent launches

    • Sunday 25 September: A short-range missile fired the day after a US naval carrier arrived in waters around the Korean peninsula. 600km distance/60km altitude
    • Wednesday 28 September: Two short-range missiles fired on the eve of US Vice President Kamala Harris’ visit to Seoul and the DMZ. 360km distance/30km altitude
    • Thursday 29 September: Two short-range missiles after Harris departed South Korea. 300km distance/50km altitude
    • Saturday 1 October:Two short-range missiles fired amid continuing US-South Korea-Japan drills. 400km distance/50km altitude
    • Tuesday 4 October: An intermediate-range ballistic missile fired over Japan. 4,500km distance/2,800km altitude
    • Thursday 6 October: Two more short-range missiles fired. 800km distance/50km altitude

  • South Korean military issues apology following terrifying missile launch failure

    After a failed missile launch during a joint drill with the United States alarmed locals in the coastal city of Gangneung, the South Korean military has apologized.

    They reported hearing an explosion and seeing a fire overnight.

    But the military, which has said there were no casualties, did not acknowledge the incident until seven hours later.

    The launch was in response to North Korea firing a missile over Japan early on Tuesday.

    This is the first time Pyongyang has flown a missile over Japan since 2017 – and it prompted a show of force from the US, Japan, and South Korea which conducted military drills. Seoul and Washington also fired a volley of missiles into the East Sea – also known as the Sea of Japan – between the Korean peninsula and Japan.

    The South Korean military later confirmed that one of their missiles failed soon after it was launched and crashed – this was separate from the ones launched by the US.

    The military also said that the Hyunmoo-2 missile carried a warhead but that it did not explode, and apologised for causing worry.

    Residents in Gangneung said they saw a bright flash and heard an explosion at around 01:00 on Wednesday (16:00 GMT Tuesday).

    They were left in the dark for hours, and many of them posted on social media wondering what had happened while sharing photos and videos of the incident. The footage showed what appeared to be a brightly burning fire, with smoke rising from a distance.

    “I can’t sleep because I feel anxious [after hearing] the explosion,” said one user, according to news site Kang Won Ilbo. Another wondered if a plane had crashed.

    Presentational white space

    North Korea’s missile launch on Tuesday was the fifth carried out by Pyongyang in a week. Many of its missile tests are conducted on a flight path that reaches a high altitude, avoiding flights over its neighbours.

    But firing over or past Japan allows North Korean scientists to test missiles under circumstances “that are more representative of the conditions they’d endure in real-world use”, analyst Ankit Panda told news agency Reuters.

    In September, North Korea passed a law declaring itself to be a nuclear weapons state, with leader Kim Jong-un ruling out the possibility of talks on de-nuclearization.

     

  • North Korea has fired Ballistic missile over Japan

    In what looks to be a calculated escalation to grab the attention of Tokyo and Washington, North Korea fired a suspected missile over Japan.

    The ballistic missile travelled about 4,000 kilometres (2,800 miles) before crashing into the Pacific Ocean; on another trajectory, it may have struck the US territory of Guam.

    It is the first missile launch by North Korea over Japan since 2017.

    The launch saw Japan issue a rare alert to some citizens to take cover.

    The UN prohibits North Korea from testing ballistic and nuclear weapons. Flying missiles towards or over other countries without any pre-warning or consultation also contravenes international norms.

    Most countries avoid doing it completely as it can easily be mistaken for an attack. While it is not as big as a nuclear test – which could be next – it can be considered hugely provocative.

    People in the north of Japan, including Hokkaido island and Aomori city, reportedly woke up to the noise of sirens and text alerts that read: “North Korea appears to have launched a missile. Please evacuate into buildings or underground.”

    As the missile flew overhead, they were warned to look out for falling debris. Many appeared to remain calm according to reports, with one video showing Tokyo commuters walking calmly as loudspeakers blared out warnings.

    But others were more shaken. “If a missile hit, I was worried it would be a big problem not only here but also nationwide,” Aomori resident Kazuko Ebina told the Asahi Shimbun newspaper.

    Officials later said the intermediate-range ballistic missile fell into the Pacific Ocean far from Japan, and there were no reported injuries.

    It had covered the longest distance ever travelled by a North Korean missile, and reached a height of around 1000km – higher than the International Space Station.

    Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida described the launch as “violent behaviour”, while defence minister Yasukazu Hamada said Japan would not rule out any options to strengthen its defences including “counterattack capabilities”.

    The US National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson called it a “dangerous and reckless decision” that was “destabilising” to the region.

    The launch comes as Japan, the US and South Korea have been working together to strengthen their defences, in response to the growing threat posed by the North.

    Last week, the three countries conducted naval exercises together for the first time since 2017. Such drills have long antagonised Pyongyang leader Kim Jong-un, who views them as proof that his enemies are preparing for war.

    Following the combined exercises in 2017, North Korea fired two missiles over Japan in response. A week later, it conducted a nuclear test.

    Recent intelligence has suggested that North Korea is getting ready to test another nuclear weapon.

    It is expected that North Korea would wait till after China – its main ally – holds its Communist party congress later this month.

    But some experts are now asking if it could come sooner than expected – they believe Tuesday’s launch shows that North Korea is preparing the ground for a nuclear test.

    The missile launch is the fifth carried out by Pyongyang in a week. On Saturday, two rockets came down in waters outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

    Many of North Korea’s missile tests are conducted on a high, lofted flight path – reaching a high altitude, avoiding flights over its neighbours.

    But firing over or past Japan allows North Korean scientists to test missiles under circumstances “that are more representative of the conditions they’d endure in real-world use”, analyst Ankit Panda told news agency Reuters.

    These actions have contributed to enduring tensions between North Korea and Japan, rooted in Japan’s previous colonisation of Korea from 1910 to 1945 and the North’s abduction of Japanese citizens in the past.

    Earlier this month, North Korea passed a law declaring itself to be a nuclear weapons state, with leader Kim Jong-un ruling out the possibility of talks on denuclearisation.

    Pyongyang conducted six nuclear tests between 2006 and 2017, incurring widespread sanctions.

    The East Asian state regularly defies the ban on nuclear and missile tests, saying it needs to bolster its defences.

    Additional reporting by Nathan Williams.

    List of missiles held by North Korea and their range

  • The nuclear threat from North Korea hangs over Kamala Harris’s trip to Asia

    Washington issues a warning ahead of the US Vice President’s trip to South Korea, saying that North Korea might conduct a nuclear test while she is there. Ballistic missile tests by Pyongyang continue to ratchet up the critical situation.

    As US Vice President Kamala Harris visits Seoul this week, the US, South Korea, and Japan are closely monitoring North Korea’s Punggye-ri nuclear test site.

    North Korea has carried out over 30 missile tests in 2022 and US officials are warning that Pyongyang could use Harris’s visit as an opportunity to carry out a seventh nuclear test, and the first since 2017.

    “We have made clear that such a test would result in additional actions by the US to demonstrate our ironclad commitment to the security of the Republic of Korea and to our Japanese allies,” an unnamed White House official told reporters during a background conference call last week.

    “We have made clear how concerned we have been by North Korean provocations and destabilizing behavior, and a nuclear test would certainly be in that category,” the official added.

    North Korea on Sunday test-fired a short-range ballistic missile into the Sea of Japan, one day before the US and South Korean troops began combined naval exercises.

    Satellite images of North Korea’s Sinpo naval dockyards, on the east coast, suggest that a new submarine, capable of firing ballistic missiles, is about to be launched.

    Kamala Harris shaking hands with Fumio KishidaKamala Harris met with Japanese PM Fumio Kishida in Tokyo on Monday

    Major US-South Korea military drills

    On Monday, the US and South Korea kicked off four days of joint military maneuvers with at least 20 warships and dozens of aircraft.

    The 101,000-ton aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan is leading a US battle group made up of guided-missile destroyers and the USS Annapolis, a Los Angeles-class fast attack submarine. It is the first joint US-South Korea exercise with an aircraft carrier since 2017.

    In a statement, the South Korean military said the drills are aimed at showing “powerful resolve to respond to North Korean provocations” and improving capabilities to perform joint naval operations.

    On Monday, Kim Song, the head of the North Korean mission to the United Nations, said that US-led exercises are “an extremely dangerous act” that could push the region “to the brink of war.”

    “The security environment of the Korean Peninsula is now caught in a vicious cycle of tensions and confrontation due to the growing hostility of the United States and its following forces against the DPRK [North Korea],” he added.

    Will North Korea test nukes?

    During a visit to South Korea by US President Joe Biden in May, intelligence officials warned that North Korea was “preparing” for a nuclear test during the visit.

    Biden’s visit was not greeted with any North Korean weapons testing, nuclear or otherwise. However, hours after the US president ended his Asia trip, Pyongyang test-fired three ballistic missiles.

    Infografik Raketenreichweiten Korea EN

    This time around, analysts suggest North Korean leader Kim Jong Un could consider putting off a nuclear test in order to not overshadow Chinese President Xi Jinping and the upcoming Chinese Communist Party conference. But that is not a given.

    “There are limits to Pyongyang’s self-restraint,” said Leif-Eric Easley, an associate professor of international studies at Ewha Woman’s University in Seoul.

    “The Kim regime sees itself in an arms race with South Korea and may be looking to make up for a lost time after its pandemic struggles,” he underlined.

    “Significant North Korean missile tests can contribute to national pride and send international signals. Pyongyang could be making a show of strength while a US aircraft carrier is visiting South Korea for defense exercises,” the expert said.

    “North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs are in violation of international law, but Kim tries to depict his destabilizing arms buildup as a righteous effort at self-defense,” and tests are part of a “long-term campaign for advancing offensive military capabilities,” he added.

    The bigger picture for Asian security

    Yakov Zinberg, a professor of international relations specializing in East Asian affairs at Tokyo’s Kokushikan University, told DW that the latest saber-rattling on the Korean Peninsula “is all part of a sequence of actions and reactions among interlocking alliances that inevitably encompass the Taiwan situation and Ukraine.”

    “Harris’s visit is a message that the US remains committed to its allies and partners in the region and is a warning to North Korea not to get any closer to Russia,” he added. North Korea has denied US reports that it has been providing weapons to the Russian military as sanctions squeeze Moscow’s supply.

    Kim Jong Un threatens to use nuclear weapons if attacked

    On Harris’s itinerary will be a visit to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) dividing North and South Korea, which symbolizes tensions on the Peninsula since the Korean War ended in 1953 without a peace treaty formally ending hostilities.

    Park Jung-won, a professor of international law at South Korea’s Dankook University, told DW the vice president’s visit to the DMZ is “highly symbolic.”

    “Pyongyang’s provocations are an effort to take advantage of the global turmoil at the moment and Harris’s visit is largely designed to underline the strength of the alliance with South Korea,” he said.

    Park added that tensions between China and Taiwan also feed into larger strategic calculations in Northeast Asia.

    In an interview earlier this week, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol said that in the event of a conflict breaking out around Taiwan, North Korea is expected to launch an attack against South Korea.

    “I agree with that assessment,” said Park, adding that China and North Korea recognize the strategic advantage of simultaneous conflicts on the Korean Peninsula and Taiwan and the challenges that would pose to the defending states.

    “The US and South Korea must engage in discussions and draw up a detailed action plan for this sort of scenario,” Park said.

  • North Korea fires suspected ballistic missile into sea

    North Korea has fired a suspected ballistic missile off its east coast, its first known test since June, South Korean military officials have said.

    It came after a US aircraft carrier arrived in South Korea to participate in joint drills, and ahead of a planned visit by Vice President Kamala Harris.

    Seoul said the launch was an “act of grave provocation”.

    The UN prohibits North Korea from ballistic and nuclear weapons tests.

    South Korea’s military said it detected a short range missile fired at just before 07:00 local time (23:00 GMT) close to Taechon, more than 100 km (60 miles) north of Pyongyang. It said it flew about 600 km at an altitude of 60 km.

    “Our military maintains a full readiness posture and is closely cooperating with the US while strengthening surveillance and vigilance,” it said in a statement.

    Japan’s coast guard confirmed the launch, warning ships to “be vigilant”. Tokyo’s defence minister Yasukazu Hamada said the missile reached a maximum altitude of around 50 km, falling in waters off North Korea’s eastern coast, and outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

    “It’s North Korea’s way of showing defiance of the [US] alliance,” Soo Kim, an analyst at the Rand Corporation, told AFP.

    The nuclear-powered USS Ronald Reagan docked in the southern port city of Busan on Friday, to take part in joint drills off South Korea’s east coast. The exercises are for the “sake of peace and stability on the Korean peninsula”, according to the South Korean navy.

    Ms Harris will visit South Korea in the coming days as part of a trip to the region that will include the funeral of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

    Tensions on the Korean peninsula have spiked in the past year, with Pyongyang firing a number of ballistic missiles.

    South Korea’s President, Yoon Suk-yeol, who took office in May, has promised a tougher stance on North Korea and indicated closer ties with the US.

    Earlier this month, North Korea passed a law declaring itself to be a nuclear weapons state, with leader Kim Jong-un ruling out the possibility of talks on denuclearisation. Despite widespread sanctions, Pyongyang conducted six nuclear tests between 2006 and 2017.

    List of missiles held by North Korea and their range
    Source: BBC

  • North Korea makes the “irreversible” decision to declare itself a nuclear-armed state

    In a move that its leader Kim Jong Un calls “irreversible,” North Korea has enacted new legislation proclaiming itself a nuclear weapons state.

    Kim vowed the country would “never give up” its nuclear weapons and said there could be no negotiations on denuclearization as he hailed the passage of the law, North Korean state media reported Friday.
    The new law also enshrines Pyongyang’s right to use preemptive nuclear strikes to protect itself — updating a previous stance under which it had said it would keep its weapons only until other countries denuclearized and would not use them preemptively against non-nuclear states.
    Nuclear weapons represent the “dignity, body, and absolute power of the state,” Kim said as he welcomed the decision by the country’s rubber-stamp parliament — the Supreme People’s Assembly — to pass the new law in a unanimous vote.
    “The adoption of laws and regulations related to the national nuclear force policy is a remarkable event as it’s our declaration that we legally acquired war deterrence as a means of national defense,” Kim said.
    “As long as nuclear weapons exist on Earth, and imperialism and the anti-North Korean maneuvers of the US and its followers remain, our road to strengthening our nuclear force will never end.”
    The new law also bans the sharing of nuclear technology with other countries.
    It comes amid rising regional tensions over North Korea’s expansion of its nuclear weapons and missiles program.
    Kim has made increasingly provocative threats of nuclear conflict toward the United States and its allies in Asia in recent months.
    At the same time, the US has become increasingly concerned that North Korea may be preparing to carry out its first underground nuclear test in years
    Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, said the law demonstrated Pyongyang’s hopes of strengthening its relations with China and Russia at a time of heightened global tensions.
    “North Korea mentioning the possibility of using nuclear weapons if and when an attack on the state and leader is imminent is significant, even though it states nuclear weapons as a defensive last resort,” Yang said.

  • North Korea now a nuclear weapons state

    A law has been passed in North Korea, declaring the country a nuclear weapons state.

    State news agency KCNA has revealed that leader Kim Jong-un called the decision “irreversible” and ruled out the possibility of any talks on denuclearisation.

    North Korea now has the right to use a pre-emptive nuclear strike to protect itself, per the law.

    Despite crippling sanctions, Pyongyang has conducted six nuclear tests between 2006 and 2017.

    It has continued to advance its military capability – in breach of United Nations Security Council resolutions – to threaten its neighbours and potentially even bring the US mainland within striking range.

    Mr Kim carried long-range launches and nuclear tests in 2019 following two headline-grabbing but inconclusive summits with then US president Donald Trump.

    But talks between the countries have since stalled. Although the Biden administration has indicated it’s willing to talk to Pyongyang, it hasn’t said whether President Joe Biden would meet Mr Kim.

    The White House also said its attempts to contact Pyongyang and overtures of help over its Covid outbreak had gone unanswered so far.

    The US reviewed its North Korea policy last year and reiterated that “complete denuclearisation” of the Korean peninsula was the goal. Mr Biden said he would pursue it with a mix of diplomacy and “stern deterrence”. Mr Kim responded by saying his country must prepare for both “dialogue and confrontation”.

    Meanwhile, tensions on the Korean peninsula have spiked this year with Pyongyang firing a record number of ballistic missiles.

    South Korea and the US have responded with a volley of missiles and the largest joint military exercises on the peninsula in years.

  • Ukraine war: North Korea arming Russia – US reports

    As a result of Western sanctions, Russia apparently has been obliged to purchase weapons from North Korea in order to maintain its invading force in Ukraine.

    Russian media reports that it has purchased millions of rockets and artillery ammunition from Pyongyang.

    Last week it received the first order of new Iranian drones, US reports said.

    New Russian missile strikes have been reported across Ukraine, with a fuel depot set on fire in the Kryvyi Rih area and deadly attacks on Kharkiv.

    In the north-eastern city of Kharkiv, a woman’s body was found after a strike destroyed the upper part of a block of flats, local authorities said.

    Firefighters near a damaged building in Kharkiv, 6 September
    GETTY IMAGES

    Flats were destroyed in Kharkiv

    In Kryvyi Rih, in central Ukraine, thick black smoke billowed from the depot in a photo posted by the governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region.

    It was attacked with two missiles on Monday evening, Valentyn Reznichenko said, adding that there was no immediate information about casualties.

    In another development, Russian-backed separatists controlling Donetsk said parts of the eastern city had been shelled by Ukrainian government forces on Tuesday, with one civilian wounded.

    A US official said Russia would be forced to buy additional North Korean weaponry as the war dragged on.

    Iran and North Korea, themselves both the targets of significant Western sanctions, have sought to deepen ties with Russia since President Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine in February.

    Kim Jong-un’s government has blamed the US for the conflict and accused the West of pursuing a “hegemonic policy” that justified Russia’s use of force.

    Last month, North Korea recognized the independence of two Russian-backed breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine – the Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics – and vowed to deepen its “comradely friendship” with Moscow. Mr Putin said the two countries would expand their “comprehensive and constructive bilateral relations”, according to North Korean state media.

    The exact size and scale of the new weapons deliveries reported by the New York Times and Associated Press news agency remain unclear.

    But a US official said turning to North Korea for support demonstrated that “the Russian military continues to suffer from severe supply shortages in Ukraine, due in part to export controls and sanctions”.

    Broad economic sanctions have done little to damage Russia’s income from energy exports, according to a Finnish think tank the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air. It estimates Russia has made €158bn (£136bn) from surging fossil fuel prices during the six-month invasion, with EU imports accounting for more than half of that.

    However, the US and EU believe that Moscow’s ability to resupply its military has been impaired.

    Last week, officials in the Biden administration told US media that the first shipments of Iranian-made drones had also been delivered to Russia.

    US intelligence officers believe that Russian operators have travelled to Iran to receive training on the Mohajer-6 and Shahed series weapons.

    But they told reporters recently that many of the drones had been beset by mechanical and technical problems since delivery.

    Iran has officially denied delivering weapons to either side of the conflict, but in July US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said Tehran was planning to supply Moscow with potentially hundreds of drones for its war in Ukraine, some with combat capabilities.

    On Tuesday, UK defence officials said in a daily update that Russia was struggling to maintain its supply of battlefield drones in the face of significant “combat losses”.

    “It is likely that Russia is struggling to maintain stocks of UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles], exacerbated by component shortages resulting from international sanctions,” the update said.

    “The limited availability of reconnaissance UAVs is likely degrading commanders’ tactical situational awareness and increasingly hampering Russian operations,” the officials added.

  • South Korean President told to ‘shut his mouth’ by Kim Jong Un’s sister as she rejects economic aid

    Kim Yo Jong, a member of North Korea‘s politburo, also described President Yoon Suk-yeol as “really simple and still childish” after he offered phased economic aid if the north ends nuclear weapons development.

    The sister of North Korean President Kim Jong Un has told South Korea’s President to “shut his mouth” as she rejected an offer of economic aid in return for nuclear disarmament.

    Kim Yo Jong, a member of North Korea’s politburo, also described South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol as “really simple and still childish”.

    “No one barters its destiny for corn cake,” she added in a statement released by state news agency KCNA.

    South Korea’s unification minister, Kwon Young-se, described her comments as “disrespectful and indecent”.

    It is the first time that a senior North Korean official has commented directly on what Mr Yoon has called an “audacious” plan.

    He has said he is willing to provide phased economic aid to North Korea if it ends nuclear weapons development and begins denuclearization.

    But Ms Kim was scathing in her denouncement of the idea, saying of Mr Yoon: “It would have been more favorable for his image to shut his mouth, rather than talking nonsense as he had nothing better to say.”

    Last week, she threatened retaliation following an outbreak of COVID-19 in the north – something claimed to have been caused by southern activists dropping leaflets and other items from balloons.

    Speaking to a large audience in Pyongyang on 10 August, she said: “What matters is the fact that the South Korean puppets are still thrusting leaflets and dirty objects into our territory.

    “The main culprit who gravely violated our people’s safety inflicted pains and caused anxiety to millions of parents in our country, who had to endure all the hardships to protect the lives of their precious children, were the despicable South Koreans.”

    She added: “We have cleared out the virus spread by the South Korean scum. We must counter it toughly. We have already considered various counteraction plans but our countermeasure must be a deadly retaliatory one.”

    The south’s offer of economic aid was first proposed in May – and Mr Yoon talked about it again on Wednesday as he marked 100 days in office.

    He has also pushed to increase his country’s military deterrence against North Korea, and Seoul has resumed long-suspended joint drills with the United States, including major field exercises due to begin next week.

    Source: Skynews