North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has vowed to develop more powerful means of attack, Pyongyang said yesterday, days after the country’s first intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launch in more than four years.
The statement suggests North Korea might perform additional launches or even test a nuclear device soon as it pushes to modernize its arsenal and increase pressure on US President Joe Biden’s administration while nuclear diplomacy remains stalled.
On Thursday, North Korea performed its 12th round of weapons tests this year, launching the newly developed, long-range Hwasong-17, which analysts say was designed to reach anywhere in the US mainland.
Photo: AP
During a photography session with scientists and others involved in the Hwasong-17 test, Kim expressed a resolve to build up the country’s attack capability to cope with threats, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.
“Only when one is equipped with the formidable striking capabilities, overwhelming military power that cannot be stopped by anyone, one can prevent a war, guarantee the security of the country and contain and put under control all threats and blackmails by the imperialists,” KCNA quoted Kim as saying.
Kim said that North Korea would develop more “powerful strike means,” and also expressed his conviction and expectation that his country would “more vigorously perfect the nuclear war deterrence of the country,” KCNA said.
North Korea said the Hwasong-17 flew to a maximum altitude of 6,248km and traveled 1,090km during a 67-minute flight before landing in waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan.
Outside experts said that if the missile is fired on a standard trajectory, flatter than the steep test angle, it could fly as far as 15,000km, enough to reach anywhere in the US mainland and beyond.
Believed to be about 25m long, the Hwasong-17 is North Korea’s longest-range weapon and, by some estimates, the world’s biggest road-mobile ballistic missile system. Its size suggests the missile is meant to carry multiple nuclear warheads, given that North Korea already has single-warhead ICBMs that could also hit most of the US.
US-led diplomacy aimed at convincing North Korea to denuclearize in return for economic and political benefits largely has stalled since 2019. The Biden administration has urged North Korea to return to talks without any preconditions, but Pyongyang has said that Washington must drop its hostility first and has taken steps to expand its weapons arsenals.
Some experts say Kim could soon conduct another ICBM launch, a launch of a satellite-carrying rocket or a test of a nuclear device as he works to perfect his weapons technology, dial up pressure on the US and secure stronger internal royalty.
South Korea yesterday reiterated a previous assessment that there are signs that North Korea is restoring previously demolished tunnels at its underground nuclear testing site.
South Korean Ministry of Unification spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said that a nuclear test by North Korea would pose “a serious threat” to international security and that it must halt any related acts immediately and return to talks.
The Hwasong-17 liftoff was North Korea’s most serious weapons launch since it tested a previously developed ICBM in November 2017. Its previous nuclear test, its sixth overall, was in September 2017.
Indonesia yesterday began enforcing its newly ratified penal code, replacing a Dutch-era criminal law that had governed the country for more than 80 years and marking a major shift in its legal landscape. Since proclaiming independence in 1945, the Southeast Asian country had continued to operate under a colonial framework widely criticized as outdated and misaligned with Indonesia’s social values. Efforts to revise the code stalled for decades as lawmakers debated how to balance human rights, religious norms and local traditions in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation. The 345-page Indonesian Penal Code, known as the KUHP, was passed in 2022. It
‘DISRESPECTFUL’: Katie Miller, the wife of Trump’s most influential adviser, drew ire by posting an image of Greenland in the colors of the US flag, captioning it ‘SOON’ US President Donald Trump on Sunday doubled down on his claim that Greenland should become part of the US, despite calls by the Danish prime minister to stop “threatening” the territory. Washington’s military intervention in Venezuela has reignited fears for Greenland, which Trump has repeatedly said he wants to annex, given its strategic location in the arctic. While aboard Air Force One en route to Washington, Trump reiterated the goal. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it,” he said in response to a reporter’s question. “We’ll worry about Greenland in
PERILOUS JOURNEY: Over just a matter of days last month, about 1,600 Afghans who were at risk of perishing due to the cold weather were rescued in the mountains Habibullah set off from his home in western Afghanistan determined to find work in Iran, only for the 15-year-old to freeze to death while walking across the mountainous frontier. “He was forced to go, to bring food for the family,” his mother, Mah Jan, said at her mud home in Ghunjan village. “We have no food to eat, we have no clothes to wear. The house in which I live has no electricity, no water. I have no proper window, nothing to burn for heating,” she added, clutching a photograph of her son. Habibullah was one of at least 18 migrants who died
Russia early yesterday bombarded Ukraine, killing two people in the Kyiv region, authorities said on the eve of a diplomatic summit in France. A nationwide siren was issued just after midnight, while Ukraine’s military said air defenses were operating in several places. In the capital, a private medical facility caught fire as a result of the Russian strikes, killing one person and wounding three others, the State Emergency Service of Kyiv said. It released images of rescuers removing people on stretchers from a gutted building. Another pre-dawn attack on the neighboring city of Fastiv killed one man in his 70s, Kyiv Governor Mykola
RSS