N. Korea says ICBM can carry ‘large, heavy nuclear warhead’; US calls for global action
SEOUL (AFP/Reuters) – North Korea’s intercontinental ballistic missile is capable of carrying a ‘’large, heavy nuclear warhead’’ that can survive re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere, triggering a call by Washington for global action to hold Pyongyang accountable for its pursuit of nuclear weapons.
Washington described the device, launched on Tuesday in a watershed moment for Pyongyang’s weapons ambitions, as an ICBM, and independent experts said it was capable of reaching Alaska.
US and South Korean troops fired missiles into the waters off South Korea, the US military said on Tuesday, in a show of force after North Korea’s ICBM test.
“The deep strike precision capability enables the (South Korean)-US alliance to engage the full array of time critical targets under all weather conditions,” the US Army said in a statement, adding that the Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) and the Republic of Korea’s Hyunmoo Missile II were utilized.
The Korean Central News Agency said that after personally overseeing the test, leader Kim Jong-Un ‘’said American bastards would be not very happy with this gift sent on the July 4 anniversary’’, the United States’ independence day.
Breaking into peals of laughter, KCNA said, he ‘’added that we should send them gifts once in a while to help break their boredom.”
Kim had inspected the Hwasong14 missile and ‘’expressed satisfaction, saying it looked as handsome as a good-looking boy and was well made.”
“All nations should publicly demonstrate to North Korea that there are consequences to their pursuit of nuclear weapons,” US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said in a statement.
North and South Korea have been divided since the war on the peninsula ended in 1953 with an armistice rather than a peace treaty, and Pyongyang says it needs nuclear weapons to defend itself against the threat of invasion.
The North’s long confrontation with Washington had entered the “final stage,” KCNA cited Kim as saying, and Pyongyang would not put its nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles up for negotiation under any circumstances, ‘’unless the US hostile policy and nuclear threats come to an end completely.”
The North is subject to multiple rounds of United Nations sanctions over its nuclear and missile programs, and the launch triggered a new chorus of condemnation.