The exercises come as the US and South Korea jointly hold war games in the region
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has overseen a military exercise aimed at demonstrating the country’s power to carry out “preemptive attacks” on rival South Korea, state media reported on Friday. As part of the drills, the military conducted several launches of large-scale artillery rockets.
The South Korean armed forces claimed on Thursday that Pyongyang had launched ten short-range ballistic missiles from the Sunan area, traveling around 350 kilometers (215 miles) before falling into the Sea of Japan.
Both a series of weapons tests by Pyongyang and joint US-South Korean drills that began on May 27 have contributed to rising tension in the region. Earlier this week, the South Korean Air Force announced that over 90 aircraft, including F-35A stealth fighters and US A-10 attack aircraft were taking part in the maneuvers.
According to the North, the latest “salvo of a firepower sub-unit was carried out by operating the integrated fire-control system,” which it described as “a part of the national combined nuclear weapons management system.”
The launches are meant to show North Korea’s resolve not to hesitate to conduct a preemptive strike on its rival if threatened, according to the Korean Central News Agency. The outlet cited Kim Jong-un as saying that the exercise clearly shows “what consequences our rivals will face if they provoke” Pyongyang.
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Seoul has “strongly” condemned North Korea for issuing verbal threats of preemptive strikes against the South, saying that it violates UN Security Council resolutions.
Last month, North Korea carried out a simulated nuclear counterattack against enemy targets, firing several “super-large” multiple rocket launchers towards an island in the Sea of Japan. At the time, Pyongyang highlighted that its “nuclear trigger” command and control system, as well as “the prompt counterattack capacity of the state nuclear force” had been tested. The military practiced operations in a hypothetical scenario in which the highest nuclear crisis alarm is issued in response to an attack, it added.
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