North Korea fires new missile after promising tough response

The escalation continues. North Korea fired a new ballistic missile on Thursday, hours after it promised a “brutal” response to a bolstered military alliance between Washington, Seoul and Tokyo. “North Korea has launched an unidentified ballistic missile into the East Sea,” also known as the Sea of ​​Japan, the South Korean military said.

Earlier this week, during a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali, US President Joe Biden tried to convince his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to petition North Korea to stop nuclear testing, as Washington and Seoul have attributed to him. intention. Joe Biden, his South Korean counterpart Yun Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida also promised on Sunday a “strong and firm” response if Pyongyang conducts the test, the first since 2017 and the seventh in its history.

“Sent to USA and Japan” message

On Thursday, North Korean Foreign Minister Choi Song-hee condemned the leaders’ meetings, saying they “bring the situation on the Korean Peninsula into an unpredictable phase.” “Increasing the US proposal for extended containment and the daily increase in allied military activity around the Korean Peninsula are senseless actions,” Choi Sung-hui said in a statement released by the official KCNA news agency.

The more Washington tries to strengthen its security alliance with Tokyo and Seoul, “the more violent the DPRK’s military response will be,” Choi Sung-hee said, using the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea insignia, the North Korean official’s name. Experts say Thursday’s rocket launch appears to have been timed to coincide with the minister’s announcement. North Korea “launched the missile after issuing a statement a few hours earlier. She is trying to justify the launch and send a message to the United States and Japan,” said Cheong Son, a researcher at the Sejong Institute in South Korea.

In early November, North Korea fired an unprecedented barrage of projectiles, including a ballistic missile that landed near South Korean territorial waters. President Yong condemned the “de facto territorial encroachment”. On November 2 alone, there were 23 North Korean missile launches, more than in all of 2017, when leader Kim Jong-un and then-US President Donald Trump exchanged threats of nuclear war.

Lots of pictures in September and October

In September and October, Pyongyang has already carried out a series of heavy launches, including a ballistic missile that flew over Japan for the first time in five years. The latest series of launches was accompanied by artillery shelling near the inter-Korean demarcation line and large-scale air sorties in the skies of North Korea.

Pyongyang justified its November actions by the “aggressive and provocative” attitude of Seoul and Washington, which at the same time were conducting the largest air maneuvers ever held between them. Analysts say North Korea, which is banned by UN resolutions from launching ballistic missiles, has been buoyed by the possibility of avoiding further UN sanctions due to disagreements in the Security Council.

China, Pyongyang’s main diplomatic and economic ally, joined Russia last May in vetoing a US attempt to tighten sanctions on North Korea. Any additional sanctions would also have limited effect, analysts say, as North Korea has already cut itself off from the world since early 2020 in an attempt to defend against Covid-19.