North Korea revels in ‘great event’
LEADER Kim Jong-un threatened US military bases across the Pacific after North Korea’s test of a powerful new missile triggered emergency UN Security Council talks late on Wednesday on curbing Pyongyang’s nuclear program.
Kim, who personally monitored Wednesday’s Musudan missile test, applauded a “great event” that significantly bolstered the North’s pre-emptive nuclear attack capability, the official KCNA news agency reported. “We have the sure capability to attack in an overall and practical way the Americans in the Pacific operation theatre,” Kim was quoted as saying.
A Korean-language version of the same report had Kim referring to “the American bastards”.
The Musudan has a theoretical range of between 2,500 and 4,000 kilometres, with the upper estimate covering US military bases as far away as Guam.
After a string of failures in recent months, North Korea tested two Musudans on Wednesday, one of which flew 400 kilometres into the Sea of Japan (East Sea).
KCNA said the missile had been fired at a high angle to simulate its full range, and had reached a maximum height of more than 1,400 kilometres.
The test“marked an important occasion in further strengthening the nuclear attack capacity of our state”, Kim said.
The launch was condemned by the international community and the UN Security Council met for closed-door consultations on how best to respond.
Existing UN measures prohibit North Korea from using ballistic missile technology.
The US, NATO, Japan and South Korea also denounced the test, with US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter urging the expansion of missile defence systems in the region. “We need to stay ahead of the threat,” Carter said.
Seoul and Washington are currently in talks about deploy- ing the advanced US THAAD missile system in South Korea – a move opposed by China.
Experts and government officials said the Musudan launch marked another worrying step forward for a weapons program that ultimately aspires to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of delivering a nuclear strike on the US mainland.
“We can’t deny that [North Korea’s] technological development is making progress, and the situation is alarming,” Japanese government spokesman Koichi Hagiuda told reporters.
The North has publicly displayed an ICBM, called the KN08, which uses the same engine technology as the Musudan but has never been test-fired.
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California, said the international community had to find a way to get Pyongyang to accept a missile test moratorium. “If we do nothing, this ends in a successful flight test of the Musudanbased KN-08,” Lewis said.
The front and inside pages of yesterday’s edition of North Korea’s ruling party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, were plastered with pictures of a clearly elated Kim Jong-un watching the test and celebrating with military scientists. There were also multiple photos of the missile blasting off from a mobile launcher near the eastern port of Wonsan.
The international outcry suggests North Korea could face renewed sanctions, either on a unilateral level or from the United Nations.
After Pyongyang conducted a fourth nuclear test on January 6, followed by a long-range rocket launch February 7, the Security Council adopted its most punishing sanctions yet against North Korea.
Any further measures would require the support of vetowielding permanent council member China, traditionally the North’s closest ally.
North Korea also has “no thoughts” of resuming six-party talks on its nuclear program, Choe Son-hui, deputy directorgeneral of the North American affairs bureau in Pyongyang’s Foreign Ministry, said in Beijing yesterday, despite the repeated urgings of its closest ally China.
The North quit the nowstalled negotiations aimed at curbing its nuclear weapons program in 2009, and soon afterwards carried out its second atomic test. The talks are hosted by China, and include South Korea, the United States, Russia, and Japan.