Tag Archives: Missile Launches

More Missile launches from NK: General Jack Keane says it’s about concessions

Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.

Important Takeaways:

  • North Korea fired ballistic missile that landed near South Korea: Seoul
  • According to Cavuto NK has launched 30 missiles in 24 hrs
  • South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed the launch of the short-range ballistic missile from the North’s eastern coastal Wonsan area at 10:48 a.m., just hours after North Korean officials threatened “fiercer” military actions amid alleged provocations by the U.S., South Korea, and Japan.
  • South Korea has boosted its surveillance of North Korea amid the growing missile threat and continues to maintain a military readiness for a potential conflict, officials said.

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North Korea increases pressure with latest missile launches

People watch a TV showing a file picture of a North Korean missile for a news report on North Korea firing short-range ballistic missiles, in Seoul, South Korea, August 2, 2019. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

By Josh Smith

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea fired missiles for the third time in eight days on Friday, a series of launches that analysts say are designed to improve military capabilities and pressure the United States and South Korea as they seek to restart denuclearization talks.

U.S. officials, who have been hoping to revive the stalled talks with North Korea, played down the launches. The North has been testing missiles despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s June 30 meeting with its leader Kim Jong Un, where they agreed to revive the talks.

The diplomatic process may have some bumps but conversations with North Korea are “going on even as we speak”, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in Bangkok, where he is attending a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

South Korea’s government said the latest projectiles fired by the North appeared to be new short-range ballistic missiles.

They flew 220 km (135 miles) and reached an altitude of 25 km (15 miles), the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) in Seoul said.

A U.S. official said U.S. intelligence had detected at least one projectile, and possibly more, that did not pose a threat to North America. U.S. officials said initial information indicated they were similar to two other short-range missile tests by Pyongyang since last week.

North Korean state media said Kim oversaw the firing of what they described as a new large-caliber, multiple-launch guided rocket system on Wednesday. He also observed the launch of a short-range ballistic missile last week.

The launches appear intended to put pressure on South Korea and the United States to stop planned military exercises later this month and offer other concessions.

Kim’s government was assiduously improving military capabilities as well as signaling negotiating demands with the tests, said Leif-Eric Easley, an international relations expert at Seoul’s Ewha University.

“The aim is not only to increase Pyongyang’s ability to coerce its neighbors, another goal is to normalize North Korea’s sanctions-violating tests as if they were as legitimate as South Korea’s defensive exercises.”

‘NO PROBLEM’

Trump was asked at the White House before he set off for a campaign trip to Ohio if he thought Kim was testing him and said the launches did not violate the North Korean leader’s promises.

Trump also said they were short-range missiles. “We never made an agreement on that. I have no problem,” he said.

While Trump says he never made an agreement on short-range missiles, the 15-member United Nations Security Council unanimously demanded in 2006 that North Korea suspend all activities related to its ballistic missile program and “re-establish its pre-existing commitments to a moratorium on missile launching”.

The U.N. Security Council met behind closed doors in New York on Thursday to discuss the latest missile launches.

Foreign ministers attending ASEAN’s East Asia summit of 18 nations expressed concern that the North’s missile tests were having a negative impact on dialogue, a Thai foreign ministry official said.

After the meeting, representatives of Britain, France and Germany urged North Korea to engage in meaningful talks with the United States and said international sanctions need to be fully enforced until Pyongyang has dismantled its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

Pompeo said the U.N. sanctions remained fully in place.

“We’re working with countries all across the world, many in this region, doing great work to enforce those,” he said.

Pompeo also said he was disappointed his North Korean counterpart had canceled a planned trip to the ASEAN meet.

“I think it would’ve given us an opportunity to have another set of conversations,” he said. “I hope it won’t be too long before I have a chance to do that.”

Nuclear envoys from the United States, South Korea and Japan met on the sidelines of the ASEAN meeting on Friday, where they were expected to discuss the North’s latest tests and ways to restart working-level talks between the United States and North Korea.

No immediate impact was seen on Japan’s security after the North’s latest launch, Japan’s defense ministry said.

Andrei Lankov, director of Korea Risk Group, a think tank, said the latest missile tests do not mean Pyongyang was no longer interested in talks with the United States.

“On the contrary, the choice of the short-range missile is a sign that, for the time being, Pyongyang remains serious about making a deal with the U.S.,” he wrote in a report for NK News, a website that monitors North Korea.

(Reporting by Josh Smith in SEOUL, Hyonhee Shin and Patpicha Tanakasempipat in BANGKOK, David Brunnstrom, Phil Stewart, Alexandra Alper and Idrees Ali in WASHINGTON, Michelle Nichols in NEW YORK, and Kaori Kaneko in TOKYO; Editing by Paul Tait and Clarence Fernandez)

North Korea missile launches ‘extremely concerning’: France

A North Korean flag flies on a mast at the Permanent Mission of North Korea in Geneva

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Ballistic missile tests carried out by North Korea on Monday are “extremely concerning” and France favors a quick and firm reaction by the U.N. Security Council, France’s U.N. ambassador said on Tuesday.

North Korea fired three ballistic missiles into the sea off its east coast on Monday, the South Korean and U.S. militaries said, as the leaders of the Group of 20 major economies held a summit in China, the North’s main diplomatic ally.

Speaking ahead of a Security Council meeting to discuss North Korea, Ambassador Francois Delattre said the launches were “a clear and unacceptable new violation of the Security Council resolutions” and a threat to regional and international peace and security.

“We very much favor a quick and firm reaction by the Security Council to this new provocation,” he said.

Koro Bessho, Japan’s U.N. ambassador, added: “We want to have a united and clear message,” without elaborating.

Monday’s missile launches were the latest in a series by North Korea this year in violation of Security Council resolutions that were supported by China and that ban all ballistic missile-related activities by Pyongyang.

North Korea rejects the ban as infringing its sovereign right to pursue a space program and self defense.

North Korea has been under U.N. sanctions since 2006. The 15-member Security Council toughened the sanctions in March in response to North Korea’s fourth nuclear test in January and the launch of a long-range rocket in February.

(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Yara Bayoumy and Frances Kerry)

U.N. Security Council condemns North Korea missile launches

part of a North Korean missile washed up on Japanese beach

By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The United Nations Security Council on Thursday condemned North Korea’s most recent ballistic missile launches as a grave violation of an international ban and called on the 193 U.N. member states to enforce toughened sanctions on the Asian state.

North Korea, or the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, launched what appeared to be an intermediate-range missile on Wednesday to a high altitude in the direction of Japan before it plunged into the sea about two hours after a similar test failed.

“The members of the Security Council deplore all DPRK ballistic missile activities noting that such activities contribute to the DPRK’s development of nuclear weapons delivery systems and increase tension,” the 15-member body said.

“The members of the Security Council further regretted that the DPRK is diverting resources to the pursuit of ballistic missiles while DPRK citizens have great unmet needs,” it said.

After supervising the missile launches, North Korea leader Kim Jong Un said his country now has the capability to attack U.S. interests in the Pacific, official media reported.

The U.N. Security Council met on Wednesday evening to discuss the missile launches. The statement issued on Thursday is almost identical to a condemnation by the council on June 1 over several previous ballistic missile tests by Pyongyang.

U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power signaled that the United States would seek “to identify individual, entities who may be responsible for this repeated series of tests” and could be sanctioned by the Security Council.

North Korea has been under U.N. sanctions since 2006. In March, the Security Council imposed harsh new sanctions on the country in response to North Korea’s fourth nuclear test in January and the launch of a long-range rocket in February.

Power said that since the new sanctions were imposed in March North Korea had carried out 10 ballistic missile tests.

“As DPRK continues to test these delivery systems they make progress and they learn things and thus it is extremely important that we come together and we address any hidden gaps there may be in the enforcement” of the March resolution, Power said on Wednesday.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)