A TOUGH JOB? GEE, WHO KNEW?
North Korea is ready to sink a US aircraft carrier with a “single strike” to demonstrate its military muscle, the country’s official newspaper crowed in a new editorial.
“Our revolutionary forces are combat-ready to sink a US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier with a single strike,” Rodong Sinmun, the newspaper of the country’s ruling Workers’ Party, wrote on Sunday, according to Reuters.
President Trump recently ordered the USS Carl Vinson carrier strike group to head to waters near the Korean peninsula, where it will be joined by two Japanese destroyers for military exercises.
The North Korean paper described the American carrier as a “gross animal” that could be obliterated “to show our military’s force.”
The story followed a two-page feature on leader Kim Jong-un inspecting a pig farm, according to Reuters.
The threat comes shortly after North Korea reportedly arrested a US citizen.
The country’s authorities collared a former Korean-American professor, currently identified only by his surname, Kim, as he was leaving at Pyongyang International Airport last Friday, Yonhap News reports.
It is not clear what he is accused of, but an expert in North Korea tells the paper that he might be intended as “leverage in negotiations” amidst rising tensions between the two countries.
Kim is a former professor at the Yanbian University of Science and Technology, in his late 50s, and had been in the country for a month helping with aid programs.