North Korea firing more projectiles, rules out talks

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea on Friday bluntly criticized South Korean President Moon Jae-in for continuing to hold military exercises with the U.S. and over his rosy comments on inter-Korean diplomacy, and said Pyongyang has no current plans to talk with Seoul.

The statement by an unidentified government spokesman came hours before South Korea’s military detected two projectiles North Korea fired into the sea to extend a torrid streak of weapons display that’s apparently aimed at pressuring Washington and Seoul over their joint drills and slow nuclear negotiations.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the projectiles launched from the North’s eastern coast flew about 230 kilometers (143 miles) on an apogee of 30 kilometers (18 miles) before landing in waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan. The U.S. and South Korean militaries were analyzing the launches but didn’t immediately say whether the weapons were ballistic missiles or rocket artillery.

The North has ignored South Korean calls for dialogue recently and is seen as trying to force Seoul to make stronger efforts to coax major concessions from Washington on its behalf.

Moon, in a televised speech on Thursday, said a momentum for dialogue remains alive despite the series of “worrying actions taken by North Korea recently.” He called for Pyongyang to choose “economic prosperity over its nuclear program.”

The spokesperson of the North’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Country said Moon’s comments would make a “boiled head of a cow (fall into) a side-splitting laughter.”

“A sure thing is that the (South) Korean chief executive is (such a) funny man as he just reads what was written by his juniors,” the statement said, while avoiding calling Moon by his name.

The statement also criticized South Korea’s recent acquisition of advanced U.S.-made fighter jets and said it would be “senseless” for Moon to believe that inter-Korean dialogue will automatically begin after the end of the ongoing U.S.South Korean drills.

“We have nothing to (talk about) any more with (South) Korean authorities nor have any (plans) to sit with them again,” the statement said.