Pence warns N Korea not to test US resolve, strength

US VICE-PRESIDENT Mike Pence put North Korea on notice yesterday that neither the US nor South Korea would tolerate further missile and nuclear tests, with US attacks in Syria and Afghanistan showing its resolve.

Pence and South Korean acting president Hwang Kyo-ahn, speaking a day after a failed missile test by the North and two days after a huge display of missiles in Pyongyang, also said they would strengthen anti-North Korea defences by moving ahead with the early deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missile defence system.

Pence is on the first stop of a four-nation Asia tour intended to show the US’s allies, and remind its adversaries, that the administration of President Donald Trump was not turning its back on the increasingly volatile region.

Pence said North Korea should mind the actions and intent of the president.

“Just in the past two weeks, the world witnessed the strength and resolve of our new president in actions taken in Syria and Afghanistan.

“North Korea would do well not to test his resolve or the strength of the armed forces of the US in this region.”

The US Navy this month struck a Syrian airfield with 59 Tomahawk missiles.

On Thursday, the US military said it had dropped “the mother of all bombs,” the largest non-nuclear device it has ever unleashed in combat, on a network of caves and tunnels used by Islamic State in eastern Afghanistan.

On a visit to the border between North and South Korea earlier in the day, Pence reiterated the US “era of strategic patience” with Pyongyang was over.

Pence, whose father served in the 1950-53 Korean War, said the US would stand by its “iron-clad alliance” with South Korea and was seeking peace through strength.

The US, its allies and China are working together on a range of responses to North Korea’s latest failed ballistic missile test, Trump’s national security adviser said on Sunday, citing what he called an international consensus to act.

But Pence and Hwang said they were troubled by retaliatory moves by China against the deployment of THAAD in South Korea. China says THAAD’s powerful radar can penetrate its territory and undermine its security. — Reuters