Kim vows North Korea’s nukes are not on negotiation table
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un vowed Wednesday his nation will “demonstrate its mettle to the U.S.” and never put its weapons programs up for negotiations, a day after successfully testing its first intercontinental ballistic missile.
The hard line suggests that North Korea will conduct more weapons tests until it perfects nuclear-armed missiles capable of striking anywhere in the United States. Analysts say Kim’s government believes nuclear weapons are key to its own survival and could be used to wrest concessions from the United States.
Tuesday’s ICBM launch, confirmed by U.S. and South Korean officials, was a milestone in North Korea’s efforts to develop long-range nuclear-armed missiles. But the North isn’t there yet, and many analysts say it needs more tests to perfect such an arsenal.
Worry spread in Washington and at the United Nations, where the United States, Japan and South Korea requested an emergency UN Security Council session on Wednesday.
U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. response would include “stronger measures to hold the DPRK accountable,” using the acronym for the nation’s formal name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
In a show of force, U.S. and South Korean troops fired “deep strike” precision missiles off South Korea’s east coast on Wednesday. South Korea’s military later released
previously shot video showing the test-firing of sophisticated South Korean missiles and a computer-generated image depicting a North Korean flag in flames with the backdrop of a major building in Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital.
North Korean state media on Wednesday described leader Kim as “feasting his eyes” on the ICBM, which was said to be capable of carrying a large nuclear warhead, before its launch.
“With a broad smile on his face,” Kim urged his scientists to “frequently send big and small ‘gift packages’ to the Yankees,” it said, an apparent reference to continuing the stream of nuclear and missile tests Kim has ordered since taking power in late 2011.
North Korea was also pleased that its test came as Americans celebrated Independence Day. State media said Kim told “scientists and technicians that the U.S. would be displeased to witness the DPRK’s strategic option”
on its Independence Day.
Kim also said North Korea “would neither put its nukes and ballistic rockets on the table of negotiations in any case nor flinch even an inch from the road of bolstering the nuclear force chosen by itself unless the U.S. hostile policy and nuclear threat to the DPRK are definitely terminated,” the Korean Central News Agency reported.
The missile launch was a direct rebuke to U.S. President Donald Trump’s earlier declaration on Twitter that such a test “won’t happen!” and to South Korea’s new president, Moon Jae-in, who was pushing to improve strained ties with the North.
South Korea’s Defence Ministry said it was unable to verify whether North Korea has mastered re-entry technology for an ICBM. It said North Korea may now conduct a nuclear test with “boosted explosive power” to show off a warhead to be mounted on a missile.