Kim vows to boost North Korea’s nuclear arsenal
SEOUL: North Korea will rapidly accelerate development of its nuclear arsenal, leader Kim Jong Un said while overseeing a vast military parade showcasing his most powerful intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM), state media reported yesterday.
Despite biting sanctions, North Korea has doubled down on Kim’s military modernisation drive, test-firing a slew of banned weapons this year while ignoring United States offers of talks, as analysts warn of a likely resumption of nuclear tests.
Dressed in white military uniform trimmed with gold brocade, Kim watched as tanks, rocket launchers and his largest ICBM were paraded through Pyongyang late Monday for the founding anniversary of North Korea’s armed forces, state media reported.
Kim vowed to “strengthen and develop our nation’s nuclear capabilities at the fastest pace”, according to a transcript of his speech at the event published by the official Korean Central News Agency.
Repeated negotiations aimed at convincing Kim to give up his nuclear weapons programmes have come to nothing, and he warned on Monday that he could use his atomic arsenal if North Korea’s “fundamental interests” were threatened.
“The basic mission of our nuclear force is to deter war, but our nuclear weapons cannot be bound to only one mission,” he said, according to the KCNA transcript.
North Korea had paused long-range and nuclear tests while Kim met then-US president Donald Trump for a bout of doomed diplomacy, which collapsed in 2019.
Last month, Pyongyang test-fired an ICBM at full range for the first time since 2017, and satellite imagery showed signs of activity at a nuclear testing site, which was purportedly demolished in 2018 ahead of the first Trump-Kim summit.
Kim’s messaging on the purpose of his nuclear weapons could be a response to South Korea’s new President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol, who takes office on May 10, analysts said.
“It’s noteworthy that Kim is now talking more specifically about the purpose of his nuclear weapons,” said University of North Korean Studies professor Yang Moo-jin.
“South Korea’s president-elect Yoon has threatened a pre-emptive strike on Pyongyang if needed, and Kim seems to be indirectly saying that he may have to respond with nuclear tactics should Yoon indeed proceed.”