Kim’s sister says will build overwhelming military power

SEOUL: Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, said the country will continue to build overwhelming and the strongest military power to protect its sovereignty and regional peace, the North’s KCNA news agency reported on Wednesday.

Kim said a series of military exercises by the US military in the region this year starting with live-fire drills conducted with the “South Korean puppet military gangsters” are driving the regional security environment into a dangerous turmoil.

“We will continue to build overwhelming and the most powerful military power to safeguard our sovereignty, security and regional peace,” KCNA quoted her as saying.

The US and South Korean militaries have been conducted a range of drills with greater scale and intensity in recent months under a pledge by the two countries’ leaders to upgrade military readiness against North Korea’s military threats.

About 100 military aircrat conducted twoweek-long aerial drills this month, according to South Korea’s military.

North Korea says US military exercises are preparations for a nuclear war against it.

Washington and Seoul say the drills are defensive in nature and regularly conducted to maintain readiness.

Meanwhile, a North Korean economic delegation has departed Pyongyang for Iran, the nuclear-armed country’s official media reported on Wednesday, on a rare visit that analysts said raises concerns of cooperation between the two states.

The delegation, led by external economic relations minister Yun Jong Ho, flew to Iran on Monday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency said in a one-sentence dispatch that offered no further details.

The visit comes ater Pyongyang bolstered military ties with Moscow in recent months.

Seoul claims the North has sent around 7,000 containers of weapons to Russia for use in Ukraine, possibly in exchange for Moscow’s technical assistance for its budding spy satellite programme.