Tag Archives: Nuclear threat

Russia Keeps Nuclear Personnel on High Alert as Peace Talks are Underway

Matthew 24:6 “And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet.”

Important Takeaways:

  • Ukraine, Russia envoys talk under shadow of nuclear threat
  • In a war being waged both on the ground and online, cyberattacks hit Ukrainian embassies around the world, and Russian media.
  • Western nations ramped up the pressure with a freeze on Russia’s hard currency reserves, threatening to bring Russia’s economy to its knees. Russians withdrew savings and sought to shed rubles for dollars and euros, while Russian businesses scrambled to protect their finances.
  • The U.S., European Union and Britain also agreed to block selected Russian banks from the SWIFT system, which facilitates moving money around thousands of banks and other financial institutions worldwide.
  • Ukrainian authorities have been handing out weapons to anyone willing to defend the city. Ukraine is also releasing prisoners with military experience who want to fight, and training people to make firebombs.
  • In another possible escalation, neighboring Belarus could send troops to help Russia as soon as Monday, according to a senior American intelligence official with direct knowledge of current U.S. intelligence assessments.
  • On Monday, the Defense Ministry said extra personnel were deployed to Russian nuclear forces, and that the high alert status applies to all their components: the forces that oversee land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles, and the fleet of nuclear-capable strategic bombers.
  • Exact death tolls are unclear, but the U.N. human rights chief said 102 civilians have been killed and hundreds wounded in five days of fighting — warning that figure was likely a vast undercount — and Ukraine’s president said at least 16 children were among the dead. More than 500,000 people have fled the country since the invasion, another U.N. official said

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Prophecy of Gog and Magog Fulfilled if Putin’s Nuclear Threats are Realized

Zechariah 14:12 And this shall be the plague where with the Lord will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.

Important Takeaways:

  • PUTIN THREATENS TO BRING ZECHARIAH’S FLESH-ROTTING NUCLEAR WAR
  • For the third time this month, Russian President Vladimir Putin is threatening to deploy tactical nuclear weapons. Should this threat be realized, it would conform to several aspects of the Gog and Magog war as described by the prophets
  • Earlier this month, before invading Ukraine, Putin responded to threats by western countries to intervene should he decide to invade.
  • “Of course the [military] potential of NATO and Russia are incomparable. We understand it,” Putin said at a press conference. “But we also understand that Russia is one of the leading nuclear states, and by some modern components, it even outperforms many.”
  • Last week, Putin warned that “whoever tries to hinder us” in Ukraine would see consequences “you have never seen in your history”.
  • The War of Gog and Magog is described in prophecy as being an unusually short war. A tradition from the Vilna Gaon (a prominent 18th century Torah authority) teaches that the war of Gog and Magog will last 12 minutes. According to a 20th-century interpretation, “A third of the world will die, a third will suffer from plague and a third will survive.”

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China will soon surpass Russia as a nuclear threat –senior U.S. military official

By Michael Martina

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – China, in the midst of a rapid nuclear weapons buildup, will soon surpass Russia as the United States’ top nuclear threat, a senior U.S. military official said on Friday, warning that the two countries have no mechanisms to avert miscommunication.

U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General Thomas Bussiere, the deputy commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, which oversees the country’s nuclear arsenal, said China’s development of nuclear capabilities “can no longer be aligned” with its public claim that it wants to maintain a minimum nuclear deterrent.

“There’s going to be a point, a crossover point, where the number of threats presented by China will exceed the number of threats that currently Russia presents,” Bussiere told an online forum.

He said the determination would not be based solely on the number of Beijing’s stockpiled nuclear warheads, but also on how they are “operationally fielded.”

“There will be a crossover point, we believe, in the next few years,” Bussiere said.

Unlike with Russia, the United States did not have any treaties or dialogue mechanism with China on the issue to “alleviate any misperceptions or confusion,” he added.

Bussiere’s comments come as the United States is attempting to realign its foreign policy to put greater emphasis in the Indo-Pacific region to counter China’s growing economic and military might.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed deep concern about China’s growing nuclear arsenal during a meeting with foreign ministers of Asian countries and partner nations in early August.

Think-tank reports based on satellite imagery say China appears to be constructing hundreds of new silos for nuclear missiles, and Washington has accused Beijing of resisting nuclear arms talks.

China says its arsenal is dwarfed by those of the United States and Russia, and that it is ready for dialogue, but only if Washington reduces its nuclear stockpile to China’s level.

In a 2020 report to Congress, the Pentagon estimated China’s operational nuclear warhead stockpile to be in “the low 200s,” and said it was projected to at least double in size as Beijing expands and modernizes its forces.

According to a State Department fact sheet, the United States had 1,357 nuclear warheads deployed as of March 1.

China’s advances in missile technology to deliver those warheads are also a concern for the United States, and Bussiere said China last year tested more ballistic missile capabilities than the rest of the world combined.

(Reporting by Michael Martina in Washington; Editing by Matthew Lewis)

Trump says North Korea no longer a nuclear threat; North highlights concessions

North Koreans watch the displayed local newspapers reporting the summit between the U.S. and North Korea at a subway station in Pyongyang, North Korea, in this photo taken by Kyodo June 13, 2018. Mandatory credit Kyodo/via REUTERS

By Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea no longer poses a nuclear threat, nor is it the “biggest and most dangerous problem” for the United States, President Donald Trump said on Wednesday on his return from a summit in Singapore with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The summit was the first between a sitting U.S. president and a North Korean leader and followed a flurry of North Korean nuclear and missile tests and angry exchanges between Trump and Kim last year that fueled fears of war.

“Everybody can now feel much safer than the day I took office,” Trump said on Twitter.

U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walk in the Capella Hotel after their working lunch, on Sentosa island in Singapore June 12, 2018. Susan Walsh/Pool via Reuters

U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walk in the Capella Hotel after their working lunch, on Sentosa island in Singapore June 12, 2018. Susan Walsh/Pool via Reuters

“There is no longer a nuclear threat from North Korea. Meeting with Kim Jong Un was an interesting and very positive experience. North Korea has great potential for the future!”

On Tuesday, Trump told a news conference after the summit that he would like to lift sanctions against the North but that this would not happen immediately.

North Korean state media lauded the summit as a resounding success, saying Trump expressed his intention to halt U.S.-South Korea military exercises, offer security guarantees to the North and lift sanctions against it as relations improve.

Kim and Trump invited each other to their respective countries and both leaders “gladly accepted,” the North’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.

“Kim Jong Un and Trump had the shared recognition to the effect that it is important to abide by the principle of step-by-step and simultaneous action in achieving peace, stability and denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” KCNA said.

Trump said the United States would stop military exercises with South Korea while North Korea negotiated on denuclearization.

“We save a fortune by not doing war games, as long as we are negotiating in good faith – which both sides are!” he said on Twitter.

U.S. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said Trump’s reasoning for halting the exercises was “ridiculous”.

“It’s not a burden onto the American taxpayer to have a forward deployed force in South Korea,” Graham told CNN.

“It brings stability. It’s a warning to China that you can’t just take over the whole region. So I reject that analysis that it costs too much, but I do accept the proposition, let’s stand down (on military exercises) and see if we can find a better way here.”

Speaking in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said he hoped all parties could “grasp the moment of positive changes” on the peninsula to take constructive steps toward a political resolution and promoting denuclearization.

“At this time, everyone had seen that North Korea has halted missile and nuclear tests, and the United States and South Korea have to an extent restricted their military actions. This has de facto realized China’s dual suspension proposal,” he told a daily news briefing.

“When it comes to Trump’s statement yesterday that he would halt South Korea and the United States’ military drills, I can only say that China’s proposal is indeed practical and reasonable, is in line with all sides’ interests and can resolve all sides’ concerns.”

China, North Korea’s main ally, last year proposed what it calls a “dual suspension”, whereby North Korea suspend nuclear and missile tests, and South Korea and the United States suspend military drills.

U.S.-North Korea relations: https://tmsnrt.rs/2l2UwW7

SURPRISE

There was some confusion over precisely what military cooperation with South Korea Trump had promised to halt.

The U.S.-South Korean exercise calendar hits a high point every year with the Foal Eagle and Max Thunder drills, which both wrapped up last month. Another major exercise is due in August.

The United States maintains about 28,500 soldiers in South Korea, which remains in a technical state of war with the North after the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce not a peace treaty.

Trump’s announcement on the exercises was a surprise even to South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in, who has worked in recent months to help bring about the Trump-Kim summit.

Asked about Trump’s comments, South Korean presidential spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom told reporters there was a need to seek measures that would help improve engagement with North Korea but it was also necessary to confirm exactly what Trump had meant.

Moon will be chairing a national security meeting on Thursday to discuss the summit.

Trump’s administration had previously ruled out any concessions or lifting of sanctions without North Korea’s commitment to complete, verifiable and irreversible steps to scrap a nuclear arsenal that is advanced enough to threaten the United States.

But a joint statement issued after the summit said only that North Korea “commits to work toward the complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula”.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is to lead the U.s. side in talks with North Korea to implement outcomes of the summit, arrived in South Korea on Wednesday, to be greeted by General Vincent Brooks, the top U.S. commander in South Korea, and U.S. Charge d’Affaires Marc Knapper.

Pompeo had a meeting with Brooks before heading to Seoul, according to a pool report. He is set to meet Moon on Thursday and hold a three-way meeting with Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha and Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono.

On Tuesday, just after Trump’s surprise announcement, a spokesman for U.S. Forces Korea said they had not received any instruction to cease joint military drills.

Although the Pentagon said Defence Secretary Jim Mattis was consulted, current and former U.S. defense officials expressed concern at the possibility the United States would halt the exercises without an explicit concession from North Korea lowering the threat.

CRITICS IN THE UNITED STATES

Critics in the United States said Trump had given away too much at a meeting that gave Kim long-sought international standing.

The North Korean leader had been isolated, his country accused of widespread human rights abuses and under U.N. sanctions for its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

“For North Korea, they got exactly what they wanted,” said Moon Seong-mook, a former South Korean military official current head of the Unification Strategy Centre in Seoul.

“They had a summit as a nuclear state with Kim on equal turf with Trump, got the United States to halt joint military exercises with South Korea. It’s a win for Kim Jong Un.”

Japan’s Minister of Defence Itsunori Onodera said that, while North Korea had pledged denuclearization, no concrete steps had been taken and Japan would not let down its guard.

“We see U.S.-South Korean joint exercises and the U.S. military presence in South Korea as vital to security in East Asia,” Onodera told reporters. “It is up to the U.S. and South Korea to decide about their joint exercises. We have no intention of changing our joint drills with the U.S.”

Japan would only start shouldering the costs of North Korea’s denuclearization after the International Atomic Energy Agency restarts inspections, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters.

The Singapore summit did not get top billing in the main state news outlets in China.

The English-language China Daily said in an editorial that while it remained to be seen if the summit would be a defining moment, the fact it went smoothly was positive.

“It has ignited hopes that they will be finally able to put an end to their hostility and that the long-standing peninsula issues can finally be resolved. These hopes should not be extinguished,” it said.

(Reporting by Christine Kim; Additional reporting by Hyonhee Shin, Joori Roh and David Brunnstrom in SEOUL, Tim Kelly in TOKYO, Phil Stewart in WASHINGTON, Christian Shepherd in BEIJING and John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI; Writing by Lincoln Feast; Editing by Paul Tait, Robert Birsel)

South Korea’s Moon says three-way summit with North Korea, U.S. possible

FILE PHOTO: South Korean President Moon Jae-in delivers a speech during a ceremony celebrating the 99th anniversary of the March First Independence Movement against Japanese colonial rule, at Seodaemun Prison History Hall in Seoul, South Korea, March 1, 2018. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

By Hyonhee Shin and Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean President Moon Jae-in said on Wednesday a three-way summit with North Korea and the United States is possible and that talks should aim for an end to the nuclear threat on the Korean peninsula.

Moon is planning a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un next month after a flurry of diplomatic activity in Asia, Europe and the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump has also said he would meet Kim by the end of May.

“A North Korea-U.S. summit would be a historic event in itself following an inter-Korean summit,” Moon said at the presidential Blue House in Seoul after a preparatory meeting for the inter-Korean summit.

“Depending on the location, it could be even more dramatic. And depending on progress, it may lead to a three-way summit between the South, North and the United States,” he said.

Seoul officials are considering the border truce village of Panmunjom, where Moon and Kim are set for a one-day meeting, as the venue for talks between not only Kim and Moon but also a possible three-way meeting.

A Blue House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Moon did not specifically refer to Panmunjom or that a three-way summit had been discussed with Washington before the president spoke.

The rush of recent diplomatic contacts began in the lead-up to the Winter Olympics in South Korea last month and helped ease tensions on the Korean peninsula caused by North Korea’s pursuit of its nuclear and missile programs in defiance of United Nations Security Council sanctions.

South Korea wants to hold high-level talks with North Korea on March 29 to discuss a date and agenda for the inter-Korean summit and make a formal request to the North on Thursday, Moon’s presidential office said.

North and South Korean officials should be able to agree on when the summit between Moon and Kim will take place once the officials from both sides meet this month, the Blue House official said.

‘CLEAR GOAL’

Moon said the series of summits should aim for a “complete end” to the nuclear and peace issues on the Korean peninsula.

He said he has a “clear goal and vision”, which is for the establishment of a lasting peace to replace the ceasefire signed at the end of the 1950-53 Korean war. It also includes the normalization of North Korea-U.S. relations, the development of inter-Korean ties, and economic cooperation involving Pyongyang and Washington, he said.

However, the United States must also add its guarantee in order for peace to come about, Moon said.

“Whether the two Koreas live together or separately, we have to make it in a way that they prosper together and in peace, without interfering or causing damage to each other,” Moon said.

The Blue House official said this could mean stopping propaganda broadcasts at the border that are commonly blasted from both sides over loudspeakers. The official could not say whether “interference” also referred to criticism over widely recognized human rights violations in North Korea.

South Korea and the United States will resume joint military drills next month, although the exercises are expected to overlap with the summit between the two Koreas.

Seoul and Washington delayed the annual drills until after the Winter Olympics, helping to foster conditions for a restart of such talks.

North Korea regularly denounces the drills as preparation for war but a South Korean special envoy has said Kim understood that the allies must continue their “routine” exercises. That exchange has not been confirmed.

The North’s official KCNA news agency said on Wednesday a “dramatic atmosphere for reconciliation” had been created in cross-border ties and there had also been a sign of change in North Korea-U.S. relations.

That was “thanks to the proactive measure and peace-loving proposal” made by Pyongyang, not Trump’s campaign to put maximum pressure on the country, KCNA said in a commentary.

The Blue House official also said earlier on Wednesday South Korea was in discussions with China and Japan for a three-way summit in Tokyo in early May. The three countries have not held such a meeting since November 2015, with relations soured by historical and territorial tensions.

(Reporting by Hyonhee Shin and Christine Kim; Editing by Paul Tait)

Trump to visit Asia in November, North Korea in spotlight

U.S. President Donald Trump departs aboard Air Force One to return to Washington from Indianapolis International Airport in Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S. September 27, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Donald Trump will travel to Asia in November for the first time since becoming president, stopping in Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines on a trip expected to be dominated by the North Korea nuclear threat.

Joined by his wife Melania, Trump will travel Nov. 3-14. His visit will include attending two major summits, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Vietnam and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations conclave in the Philippines.

Trump’s attendance at the Manila summit had been in doubt until recent days, with officials saying he was reluctant to show support for Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, who has been responsible for a number of anti-American outbursts.

A U.S. official said Asian leaders who met Trump at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last week helped persuade him to attend in unity with key Asian allies.

An Asian diplomat welcomed Trump’s decision to visit Manila “because that reassures the region that Asia policy is not just about North Korea, it’s about Southeast Asia as well.”

The diplomat said Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal early this year had raised questions about the administration’s commitment to the region. But visits by senior officials, including the secretaries of state, defense and commerce, and Trump’s planned trip, showed Washington intended to remain engaged.

Philippine Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano said Duterte was looking forward to meeting Trump, adding that the relationship between the two countries was so resilient that ties would always recover, regardless of disagreements.

Trump, who has been locked in an increasingly bitter war of words with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, will have the opportunity to bolster allied resolve for what he calls the “complete denuclearization” of Pyongyang.

He has denounced Kim as a “rocket man” on a suicide mission for test launches of ballistic missiles and for nuclear weapon tests. He has warned North Korea would face total devastation if it threatens the United States. Kim has blasted Trump as “mentally deranged.”

“The president’s engagements will strengthen the international resolve to confront the North Korean threat and ensure the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” the White House said in announcing the trip.

Trump’s visit to China will reciprocate a trip to the United States made in April by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Trump has applied heavy pressure on China to rein in North Korea. While his efforts have had limited success thus far, he went out of his way to thank Xi on Tuesday for his efforts.

“I applaud China for breaking off all banking relationships with North Korea – something that people would have thought unthinkable even two months ago. I want to thank President Xi,” Trump said at a news conference with Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.

Speaking in Beijing, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told China’s top diplomat State Councilor Yang Jiechi that the two presidents had established a “very regular and close working relationship”.

Yang described Trump’s visit as of great importance to the bilateral relationship. “Let us concentrate on cooperation and properly manage our differences in a spirit of mutual respect and mutual benefit,” he said to Tillerson.

At the same time, Trump’s national security team is conducting a broad review of U.S. strategy toward China in search of ways to counter Chinese trade practices and open up market access, a senior administration official said.

The United States also considers Chinese entities behind the theft of intellectual property and cyber attacks and wants to find ways to address these concerns, the official said.

There was no definite timetable for concluding the review.

“We’re looking at all of it,” the official said.

(Reporting by Steve Holland, additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in WASHINGTON, Phil Stewart in BEIJING and Martin Petty in MANILA; Editing by Andrew Hay and Richard Pullin)

Trump to press South Korea leader on trade as North Korea looms

U.S. President Donald Trump welcomes South Korean President Moon Jae-in to the White House in Washington, U.S., June 29, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

By Jeff Mason and David Brunnstrom

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump will press South Korean President Moon Jae-in to solve trade differences over cars and steel in meetings in Washington focusing on the nuclear threat from North Korea.

Concerns about the U.S. military’s THAAD missile defense system and China’s role in the region also are likely to come up in talks between Trump and Moon at the White House.

Moon, making his first trip to the United States since becoming his country’s president in May, joined Trump and his wife, Melania, for dinner in the White House State Dining Room on Thursday evening ahead of further talks on Friday.

“I know you’ve been discussing with our people some of the complexities of North Korea and trade and other things, and we’ll be discussing them all as we progress, and it could be very well late into the evening,” Trump told Moon.

“I’d like to also congratulate you upon your election victory. It was a great victory, and you did a fantastic job. A lot of people didn’t expect that, and I did expect it. I thought that was going to happen.”

Both men have an interest in building a strong relationship but tensions could puncture that effort.

Trump has spoken harshly about U.S. trade imbalances with South Korea and threatened to tear up a trade agreement with the country. Moon has taken a wary stance on the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system that the United States deployed in South Korea in March.

“I think they’ll have a friendly and frank discussion about the trade relationship,” a White House official told reporters on Wednesday, noting concerns about barriers to U.S. auto sales and surplus Chinese steel that arrives in the United States via South Korea.

After the dinner, Trump tweeted that he had a “very good meeting” with Moon and that “many subjects (were) discussed including North Korea and new trade deal!”

The U.S. goods trade deficit with South Korea has more than doubled since the KORUS pact took effect in 2012, from $13.2 billion in 2011 to $27.7 billion in 2016. It was forecast to boost U.S. exports by $10 billion a year but they were $3 billion lower in 2016 than in 2011.

In an interview with Reuters in April, Trump called the 5-year-old trade deal “horrible” and said he would either renegotiate or terminate it.

During remarks at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday, Moon said unfair trade practices would be eradicated and factors that limited competition, such as market entry barriers and price regulations, would be re-evaluated under his administration.

Trump has made challenging trade agreements a hallmark of his administration since taking office in January.

NORTH KOREA FOCUS

Despite tensions over that issue, his meetings with Moon are likely to focus largely on North Korea.

Moon has said he wants to form a friendship with the former New York businessman and find common ground on how to resolve the crisis over North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.

Trump wants to build ties with an important new leader in the region as he grows frustrated that his relationship with Chinese President Xi Jinping has not resulted in stronger action by Beijing to rein in Pyongyang.

The United States on Thursday imposed sanctions on two Chinese citizens and a shipping company for helping North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs and accused a Chinese bank of laundering money for Pyongyang.

The Trump administration also announced it plans to sell Taiwan about $1.42 billion in arms.

Moon told Reuters in an interview last week he wanted to discuss a two-phased approach to resolving the North Korean nuclear issue, starting with a freeze on North Korea’s nuclear and missile development followed by complete dismantlement.

“I am planning to have frank and open discussions with President Trump on the step-by-step approach,” he said.

The THAAD defense system could be a sticking point.

Moon, who has advocated a more moderate approach toward Pyongyang, expressed shock late last month upon learning that four more launchers for the controversial system had been brought into the country. He ordered an investigation after his Defense Ministry failed to inform him of the move.

The system, whose installation irritated China, is meant to counter the threat from North Korea’s missile program. The White House said it did not expect THAAD to be a major point of conversation and Moon is expected to assure Washington that his recent decision to postpone full THAAD deployment to conduct an environmental review was a measure to follow domestic law.

Despite potential areas of disagreement, the two leaders are expected to express common resolve over threats from North Korea.

“The similarities in our approaches are already evident,” the White House official said, noting that both men had expressed willingness to engage with Pyongyang under the right conditions. “Even once the conditions may present themselves, to enter into dialogue we must maintain and actually increase pressure on North Korea. That’s President Moon’s approach; it’s President Trump’s approach.”

(additional reporting by James Oliphant; Editing by Bill Trott and Tom Brown)

Russia’s Putin says ready to help resolve North Korea nuclear issue: South Korea

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends an opening of the Center via a teleconference with Bethlehem, before a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas at the Bocharov Ruchei state residence in Sochi, Russia, May 11, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Kochetkov/Pool

By Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – Russia’s President Vladimir Putin told his newly elected South Korean counterpart, Moon Jae-in, in a phone call on Friday that he is ready to play a “constructive role” in resolving North Korea’s nuclear threat, the South’s presidential office said.

Putin made the comment after Moon said the foremost task to boost cooperation between the two countries was to strengthen strategic bilateral communication to find a solution to curb North Korea’s nuclear threat, the Blue House said in a statement.

“We hope for Russia to play a constructive role in order for North Korea to stop with its nuclear provocations and go the way of denuclearization,” Moon was citing as saying to Putin in the 20-minute conversation.

“I, too, aim to find a way to begin talks quickly between North and South Korea as well as the six-party talks,” Moon said, referring to talks aimed at denuclearizing North Korea involving the United States, China, Japan, Russia and the two Koreas.

The talks collapsed in 2008 after North Korea launched a rocket.

Tension has been high for months on the Korean peninsula over North Korea’s nuclear and missile development and fears it will conduct a sixth nuclear test or test another ballistic missile in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions.

Moon is a liberal who advocates a more conciliatory approach to North Korea compared with his conservative predecessor.

Moon also expressed hopes the two countries would be able to cooperate in developing East Asia, including extending a natural gas pipeline from Siberia to South Korea, the Blue House said.

Putin said he was ready to help in all of the matters they discussed and the two leaders invited each other for state visits, the Blue House added.

Moon said he would send a special envoy to Russia soon and Putin said he would welcome the envoy.

The two leaders said they looked forward to meeting at the Group of 20 summit meeting in Germany in July.

Earlier in the day, Moon spoke with British Prime Minister Theresa May and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Blue House said. He asked them to help in curbing North Korea’s nuclear program and both promised to.

(Reporting by Christine Kim; Additional reporting by Se Young Lee; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Commander says U.S. may need stronger defense against North Korea missiles

The Commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, Admiral Harry Harris, testifies before a House Armed Services Committee hearing on "Military Assessment of the Security Challenges in the Indo-Asia-Pacific Region" on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S, April 26, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas

By Phil Stewart and David Brunnstrom

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The top U.S. commander in the Pacific told Congress on Wednesday the United States may need to strengthen its missile defenses, particularly in Hawaii, given the advancing threat from North Korea’s missile and nuclear weapons programs.

Just before the entire U.S. Senate was due to receive a top-level briefing on North Korea at the White House, Admiral Harry Harris said he believed Pyongyang’s threats against the United States needed to be taken seriously.

Graphic – Carl Vinson strike group: http://tmsnrt.rs/2pqOMWA

Graphic – North Korea’s nuclear program: http://tmsnrt.rs/2n0gd92

Earlier on Wednesday, the U.S. military moved parts of an anti-missile defense system to a deployment site in South Korea, triggering protests from villagers and by China – whose help is vital to agreeing and implementing tougher economic sanctions to try to persuade North Korea to abandon its weapons programs.

North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile threat is perhaps the most serious security challenge confronting U.S. President Donald Trump. He has vowed to prevent North Korea from being able to hit the United States with a nuclear missile.

Harris told lawmakers the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system would be operational “in coming days.”

He said the defenses of Hawaii were sufficient for now but could one day be overwhelmed, and suggested studying stationing new radar there as well as interceptors to knock out any incoming North Korean missiles.

“I don’t share your confidence that North Korea is not going to attack either South Korea, or Japan, or the United States … once they have the capability,” Harris told one lawmaker.

Washington and Pyongyang have stepped up warnings to each other in recent weeks amid concerns that Pyongyang may soon conduct a sixth nuclear bomb test.

Washington has said all options are on the table, including military strikes, but officials have stressed that the current focus is on stepped-up sanctions on North Korea, which are expected to be discussed at a U.N. Security Council meeting on Friday chaired by U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

Harris’s testimony was the latest sobering reminder of growing U.S. alarm about North Korea. The country has yet to test a missile capable of reaching the United States, but experts say it could have the capability some time after 2020.

U.S. officials have warned that a conflict with North Korea could have a devastating effect on ally South Korea and U.S. troops based there, a point Pyongyang underscored by a big live-fire exercise on Tuesday to mark the foundation of its military.Harris conceded that North Korean retaliation to any U.S. strikes could cause many casualties in South Korea, but added that there was the risk “of a lot more Koreans and Japanese and Americans dying if North Korea achieves its nuclear aims and does what (North Korean leader Kim Jong Un) has said it’s going to do.”

North Korea has vowed to strike the United States and its Asian allies at the first sign of any attack on its territory.

SHOW OF FORCE

In a show of force, the United States is sending the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier group to waters off the Korean peninsula, where it will join the USS Michigan, a nuclear submarine that docked in South Korea on Tuesday. South Korea’s navy has said it will hold drills with the U.S. strike group.

Harris said the carrier was in the Philippine Sea, within two hours’ striking distance of North Korea if need be.

The earlier-than-expected steps to deploy the missile defense system were denounced both by China, where the foreign ministry vowed Beijing would “resolutely take necessary steps to defend its interests,” and the frontrunner in South Korea’s May 9 presidential election.

Moon Jae-in has called for a delay in the deployment, saying the new administration should make a decision after gathering public opinion and more talks with Washington.

A spokesman for Moon said moving the parts to the site “ignored public opinion and due process” and demanded the deployment be suspended.

Television footage showed military trailers carrying equipment, including what appeared to be launch canisters, to the battery site.

More than 10 protesters were injured in clashes with police, Kim Jong-kyung, a leader of villagers opposing the deployment, told Reuters. Kim said about 200 protesters who rallied overnight would keep up their opposition.

Beijing says the system’s advanced radar can penetrate deep into its territory and undermine its security, but Harris scoffed and suggested Beijing should focus on trying to influence North Korea.

In another move likely to irk China, Harris said he thought there would soon be more U.S. freedom of navigation operation in the South China Sea.

China claims almost the entire South China Sea, where about $5 trillion worth of sea-borne goods pass every year, and has angrily protested previous U.S. operations there.

Harris sought to separate the issue from North Korea.

“We should encourage China and be appreciative of what they are doing with regards to North Korea and we should also be willing to criticize them for their aggressiveness and coerciveness in the South China Sea,” he said.

North Korea’s foreign ministry called U.S. attempts to make Pyongyang give up its nuclear weapons through military threats and sanctions “a wild dream” and like “sweeping the sea with a broom”.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi urged all sides to ease tensions and work toward a peaceful solution through negotiations.

“Security and stability is quite fragile and there is a great danger that a new conflict, or incidents could happen at any time,” he said.

U.S. officials say Washington sees no value in returning to international talks on North Korea until Pyongyang shows it is serious about denuclearization.

(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in Beijing and Phil Stewart, David Brunnstrom and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Editing by Clive McKeef and James Dalgleish)

Japanese demand for nuclear shelters, purifiers surges as North Korea tension mounts

A North Korean navy truck carries the 'Pukkuksong' submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) during a military parade marking the 105th birth anniversary of country's founding father, Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang,

By Kiyoshi Takenaka

TOKYO (Reuters) – Sales of nuclear shelters and radiation-blocking air purifiers have surged in Japan in recent weeks as North Korea has pressed ahead with missile tests in defiance of U.N. sanctions.

A small company that specializes in building nuclear shelters, generally under people’s houses, has received eight orders in April alone compared with six orders during a typical year.

The company, Oribe Seiki Seisakusho, based in Kobe, western Japan, also has sold out of 50 Swiss-made air purifiers, which are said to keep out radiation and poisonous gas, and is trying to get more, said Nobuko Oribe, the company’s director.

A purifier designed for six people sells for 620,000 yen ($5,630) and one designed for 13 people and usually installed in a family-use shelter costs 1.7 million yen ($15,440).

Concerns about a possible gas attack have grown in Japan after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told a parliament session this month that North Korea may have the capacity to deliver missiles equipped with sarin nerve gas.

“It takes time and money to build a shelter. But all we hear these days, in this tense atmosphere, is that they want one now,” Oribe said. “They ask us to come right away and give them an estimate.”

Another small company, Earth Shift, based in Shizuoka prefecture, has seen a tenfold increase in inquiries and quotes for its underground shelters, Akira Shiga, a sales manager at the company said. The inquiries began gradually increasing in February and have come from all over Japan, he said.

FILE PHOTO: A soldier films North Korean soldiers, officers and high ranking officials attending a military parade marking the 105th birth anniversary of country's founding father Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang, North Korea

FILE PHOTO: A soldier films North Korean soldiers, officers and high ranking officials attending a military parade marking the 105th birth anniversary of country’s founding father Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang, North Korea, April 15, 2017. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj/File Photo

EVACUATION DRILLS

North Korean missiles have fired with increasing frequency. Last month, three fell into waters within Japan’s exclusive economic zone, some 300-350 kilometers off the coast of northern Akita prefecture.

The Japanese government on Friday urged local governments to hold evacuation drills in case of a possible missile attack, heightening a sense of urgency among the public.

Some orders for the shelters were placed by owners of small-sized companies for their employees, and others by families, Oribe said. A nuclear shelter for up to 13 people costs about 25 million yen ($227,210) and takes about four months to build, he said.

The shelter his company offers is a reinforced, air-tight basement with an air purifier that can block radiation as well as poisonous gas. The room is designed to withstand a blast even when a Hiroshima-class nuclear bomb exploded just 660 meters away, Oribe said.

North Korea said on Sunday it was ready to sink a U.S. aircraft carrier to demonstrate its military might, in the latest sign of rising tension in the region.

The United States ordered the USS Carl Vinson carrier strike group to sail to waters off the Korean peninsula in response to mounting concern over the reclusive state’s nuclear and missile programmes.

In Japan’s previous experience with sarin gas in 1995, members of a doomsday cult killed 12 people and made thousands ill in attacks on Tokyo subways.

(Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka Additional reporting by Teppei Kasai; Editing by Malcolm Foster and Bill Tarrant)