US deploys attack drones to S. Korea

N. Korea boycotts UN session

SEOUL, March 13, (RTRS): The United States has started to deploy attack drones to South Korea, a US military spokesman said on Monday, days after it began to deploy an advanced anti-missile system to counter “continued provocative actions” by isolated North Korea.

The drones, Gray Eagle Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) coming to South Korea are part of a broader plan to deploy a company of the attack drones with every division in the US Army, the spokesman said.

“The UAS adds significant intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capability to US Forces Korea and our ROK partners,” United States Forces Korea spokesman Christopher Bush said in a statement.

He did not say exactly when the drones would arrive in South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK).

North Korea has conducted two nuclear tests and a string of missile tests since the beginning of last year, despite the imposition of new UN sanctions.

Last week, the US ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, said Washington was re-evaluating its North Korea strategy and “all options are on the table.”

The Gray Eagle is a remotely controlled attack drone made by US-based General Atomics. They will be stationed at Kunsan Air Base, 180 kms (112 miles) south of Seoul, Bush said, and would be permanently based in South Korea.

North Korea boycotted a UN review of its human rights record on Monday, as an investigator said an escalation in hostilities on the divided peninsula had further closed off opportunities for dialogue with Pyongyang’s isolated government.

The UN Human Rights Council held a two-hour session on abuses in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) where rights experts called for action against perpetrators of crimes against humanity documented in a 2014 UN report that detailed the use of political prison camps, starvation and executions.

Haley

KUALA LUMPUR:

Also:

Malaysia said talks were underway on Monday for the release of nine citizens stranded in North Korea by a travel ban, while its defence minister tried to ease anxieties among the public about the risks of angering an unpredictable nuclear-armed state.

Formerly friendly relations between the two countries soured in the wake of an investigation into the murder in Kuala Lumpur last month of Kim Jong Nam, the estranged half-brother of North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un.

Angered by the Malaysian police identifying North Korean suspects and wanting to question others, including a diplomat at the embassy in Kuala Lumpur, North Korea slapped a travel ban on Malaysians leaving its borders, prompting tit-for-tat action by Malaysia.

Malaysia also expelled the North Korean ambassador, but in a bit to calm relations Prime Minister Najib Razak said last week that ties with Pyongyang would not be severed and talks are now on between the two governments to settle their issues.