Tag Archives: Tensions

Israeli troops kill Palestinian in West Bank clashes

An Israeli border policeman takes up position during clashes with Palestinian demonstrators at a protest against Trump's decision on Jerusalem, near Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank March 9, 2018. REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) – Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian man during clashes in the occupied West Bank on Friday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

An Israeli military spokesman said the man had been about to throw a fire-bomb at the troops, who were responding to an immediate threat when they shot him. He added that the incident in the city of Hebron would be reviewed.

U.S.-led peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down in 2014 and a new push by President Donald Trump’s administration to restart negotiations has shown little progress so far.

Tensions between the sides have risen since Trump declared on Dec. 6 that he recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Outraged Palestinian leaders said Washington could no longer take the lead in peace efforts but Israel has said the United States should remain peace-broker.

Trump’s announcement and the planned move in May of the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem – home to sites holy to Muslims, Jews and Christians – reversed decades of U.S. policy on the city. Its status is one of the biggest obstacles to reaching a peace agreement.

The Palestinians want East Jerusalem as the capital of a future state. Israel says the entire city is its indivisible, and eternal capital.

(Reporting by Ali Sawafta and Maayan Lubell; editing by David Stamp)

Taiwan president says does not exclude possibility of China attack

Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen speaks during the end-of-year news conference in Taipei, Taiwan December 29, 2017.

TAIPEI (Reuters) – Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen said that she does not exclude the possibility of China attacking the self-ruled island, amid heightened tensions between the two sides including an increasing number of Chinese military drills near Taiwan.

Beijing has taken an increasingly hostile stance toward Taiwan, which it considers a breakaway province, since the election two years ago of Tsai of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party.

China suspects Tsai wants to push for formal independence, a red line for Communist Party leaders in Beijing, though she has said she wants to maintain the status quo and is committed to ensuring peace.

In recent months, China has stepped up military drills around Taiwan, alarming Taipei. China says the exercises are routine, but that it will not tolerate any attempt by the island to declare independence.

“No one can exclude this possibility. We will need to see whether their policymakers are reasonable policymakers or not,” Tsai said in an interview on Taiwan television broadcast late on Monday, when asked whether China could attack Taiwan.

“When you consider it (Taiwan-China relationship) from a regional perspective, any reasonable policymaker will have to very carefully deliberate as to whether launching war is an option,” Tsai said.

“When our government faces resistance and pressure from China, we will find our method to resist this. This is very important,” she added.

“In terms of China circulating around Taiwan or carrying out other military activities, our military is carefully following every action and movement in the scope of its monitoring,” Tsai said. “Our military is very confident to face these situations.”

China considers proudly democratic Taiwan to be its sacred territory and has never renounced the use of force to bring it under Chinese control.

Taiwan and China have also traded accusations this month about China’s opening of new civilian aviation routes close to Taiwan-controlled islands in the Taiwan Strait.

Although China has cut off a formal dialogue mechanism with Taiwan, Tsai acknowledged that both sides currently have a method for communications to avoid misunderstanding.

Taiwan has been pressing for the United States, its main source of arms, to provide more advanced equipment, but has also been trying to bolster its own weapons programs, to avoid what Tsai termed “certain political difficulties” that come with buying weapons overseas in the teeth of Chinese opposition.

Tsai said she believed one day Taiwan would be able to produce its own submarines, an item Taipei has long pressed for to face China’s navy.

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tsai’s remarks.

(Reporting by Jess Macy Yu; Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in BEIJING; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Nations to consider more North Korea sanctions, U.S. warns on military option

South Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs Kang Kyung-wha, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Chrystia Freeland and Japan's Minister of Foreign Affairs Taro Kono are seen during the Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on Security and Stability on the Korean Peninsula in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada January 16, 2018.

By David Brunnstrom and David Ljunggren

VANCOUVER (Reuters) – Twenty nations agreed on Tuesday to consider tougher sanctions to press North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson warned Pyongyang it could trigger a military response if it did not choose negotiations.

A U.S.-hosted meeting of countries that backed South Korea during the 1950-53 Korea War also vowed to support renewed dialogue between the two Koreas “in hopes that it leads to sustained easing of tensions” and agreed that a diplomatic solution to the crisis was both essential and possible.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has refused to give up development of nuclear missiles capable of hitting the United States in spite of increasingly severe U.N. sanctions, raising fears of a new war on the Korean peninsula.

The United States and Canada co-hosted the day-long meeting in Vancouver to discuss ways to increase pressure on Kim.

U.S. officials have reported a debate within the Trump administration over whether to give more active consideration to military options, such as a pre-emptive strike on a North Korean nuclear or missile site.

Tillerson brushed off a question about such a “bloody nose” strike, telling a closing news conference: “I’m a not going to comment on issues that have yet to be decided among the National Security Council or the president.”

However, he said the threat posed by North Korea was growing.

“We all need to be very sober and clear-eyed about the current situation … We have to recognize that the threat is growing and if North Korea does not chose the pathway of engagement, discussion, negotiation, then they themselves will trigger an option,” Tillerson said.

“Our approach is, in terms of having North Korea chose the correct step, is to present them with what is the best option – talks are the best option; that when they look at the military situation, that’s not a good outcome for them.”

“It is time to talk, but they have to take the step to say they want to talk.”

The Vancouver meeting pledged to ensure that U.N. sanctions already in place were fully implemented and the participants said in a joint statement they agreed “to consider and take steps to impose unilateral sanctions and further diplomatic actions that go beyond those required by U.N. Security Council resolutions.” They gave no details.

Tillerson said all countries needed to work together to improve interdiction of ships attempting to skirt sanctions and said there must be “new consequences” for North Korea “whenever new aggression occurs.”

He said the meeting had agreed that China and Russia, which did not attend the Vancouver talks and sharply criticized them, must fully implement U.N. sanctions.

Speaking in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said Canada and the United States were demonstrating a “Cold War mentality” that would divide the international community and damage chances of an appropriate settlement on the peninsula.

“Only through dialogue, equally addressing the reasonable concerns of all parties, can a way to an effective and peaceful resolution be found,” Lu added.

U.S. officials say discussion of a military strike option has lost some momentum since North and South Korea held formal talks for the first time in two years this month and Pyongyang said it would send athletes to the Winter Olympics that South Korea will host next month.

‘NOT TIME FOR REWARD’

Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono said in Vancouver that the world should not be naive about North Korea’s “charm offensive” in engaging in talks with the South.

“It is not the time to ease pressure, or to reward North Korea,” he said. “The fact that North Korea is engaging in dialogue could be interpreted as proof that the sanctions are working.”

South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said she hoped the dialogue would continue well beyond the Olympics, but stressed that existing sanctions must be applied more rigorously.

Tillerson said North Korea must not be allowed “to drive a wedge” through allied resolve or solidarity and reiterated Washington’s rejection of a Chinese-Russian proposal for the United States and South Korea to freeze military exercises in return for a freeze in North Korea’s weapons programs.

A senior State Department official said U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis briefed the Vancouver participants over dinner on Monday and stressed the U.S. preference for a diplomatic solution, while keeping a military option on the table.

“It was a chance to raise people’s confidence that we have thought through this, that we definitely prefer a diplomatic solution,” the official said.

Russia and China have been accused of not fully implementing the U.N. sanctions, something they deny.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, speaking on Tuesday in the West African state of Sao Tome, said everyone should cherish the present easing of tension on the Korean peninsula.

But history shows that each time tensions ease, there could be interference or backsliding, Wang added.

“Now is the time to test each side’s sincerity,” he said. “The international community must keep its eyes wide open, and see who is really the promoter of a peaceful resolution to the peninsula nuclear issue and who will become the saboteur who causes a return to tensions.”

A U.S. official said Susan Thornton, the State Department’s senior diplomat for East Asia, would travel to Beijing from Vancouver to brief China on the outcome. He said he expected Tillerson to provide readouts to his Russian and Chinese counterparts.

(Reporting by David Ljunggren and David Brunnstrom; Additional reporting by Nicole Mordant in Vancouver, Michelle Nichols at the United Nations, Philip Wen in Beijing and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; Editing by James Dalgleish and Lisa Shumaker)

Taiwan says Chinese air force exercised near island 16 times in last year

Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen visits the Suyapa Cathedral in Tegucigalpa, Honduras January 9, 2017.

TAIPEI (Reuters) – China’s air force has carried out 16 rounds of exercises close to Taiwan in the last year or so, Taiwan’s defense ministry said on Tuesday, warning that China’s military threat was growing by the day.

China considers self-ruled and democratic Taiwan to be its sacred territory and has never renounced the use of force to bring what it views as a wayward province under Chinese control.

China has taken an increasingly hostile stance towards Taiwan since Tsai Ing-wen from the island’s pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party won presidential elections last year.

Beijing suspects her of pushing for the island’s formal independence, a red line for China. Tsai says she wants peace with China, but that she will defend Taiwan’s security and way of life.

In a lengthy report, Taiwan’s defense ministry listed the number of times China’s air force had drilled near the island since the end of October last year and which aircraft were involved, including bombers and advanced fighter jets.

Of the 16 drills, 15 of them were around Taiwan, flying through the Bashi Channel which separates Taiwan from the Philippines and near Japan’s Miyako island, to the north of Taiwan. The other drill was through the Bashi Channel and out into the Pacific.

China has repeatedly said the drills are routine.

Taiwan’s defense ministry said China was the island’s biggest security threat.

“The Chinese military’s strength continues to grow rapidly,” it said.

“There have been massive developments in military reforms, combined operations, weapons development and production, the building of overseas military bases and military exercises, and the military threat towards us grows daily.”

Chinese missiles can already cover all of Taiwan, and China has been improving its abilities in long-range anti-ship missiles “to build an ability to resist foreign forces”, the ministry added.

Tensions rose earlier this month after a senior Chinese diplomat threatened that China would invade Taiwan if any U.S. warships made port visits there.

Taiwan is well equipped with mostly U.S.-made weapons, but has been pressing Washington to sell more advanced equipment.

The United States is bound by law to provide Taiwan with the means to defend itself, to China’s distaste.

Proudly democratic Taiwan has shown no interest in being run by autocratic China, and Taiwan’s government has accused Beijing of not understanding what democracy is all about when it criticizes Taipei.

(Reporting by Fabian Hamacher; Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Nick Macfie)

In first, U.S. presents its evidence of Iran weaponry from Yemen

In first, U.S. presents its evidence of Iran weaponry from Yemen

By Phil Stewart

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States on Thursday presented for the first time pieces of what it said were Iranian weapons supplied to the Iran-aligned Houthi militia in Yemen, describing it as conclusive evidence that Tehran was violating U.N. resolutions.

The arms included charred remnants of what the Pentagon said was an Iranian-made short-range ballistic missile fired from Yemen on Nov. 4 at King Khaled International Airport outside Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh, as well as a drone and an anti-tank weapon recovered in Yemen by the Saudis.

Iran has denied supplying the Houthis with such weaponry and on Thursday described the arms displayed as “fabricated.”

The United States acknowledged it could not say precisely when the weapons were transferred to the Houthis, and, in some cases, could not say when they were used. There was no immediate way to independently verify where the weapons were made or employed.

But U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley expressed confidence the transfers could be blamed on Tehran.

“These are Iranian made, these are Iranian sent, and these were Iranian given,” Haley told a news conference at a military hangar at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, just outside Washington.

All of the recovered weapons were provided to the United States by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, the Pentagon said. Saudi-led forces, which back the Yemeni government, have been fighting the Houthis in Yemen’s more than two-year-long civil war.

The unprecedented presentation – which Haley said involved intelligence that had to be declassified – is part of President Donald Trump’s new Iran policy, which promises a harder line toward Tehran. That would appear to include a new diplomatic initiative.

“You will see us build a coalition to really push back against Iran and what they’re doing,” Haley said, standing in front of what she said were the remnants of the Nov. 4 missile.

Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who view Tehran as a threat, seized upon the U.S. presentation in calls on Thursday for international action.

Still, it was unclear whether the new evidence would be enough to win support for sanctions on Iran from some U.N. Security Council members, like Russia or China.

British U.N. Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said he didn’t think “there’s anything that could convince some of my council colleagues” to take U.N. action against Iran. Still, he said “we’re going to be pursuing with them nonetheless.”

Under a U.N. resolution that enshrines the Iran nuclear deal with world powers, Tehran is prohibited from supplying, selling or transferring weapons outside the country unless approved by the U.N. Security Council. A separate U.N. resolution on Yemen bans the supply of weapons to Houthi leaders.

Iran rejected the U.S. accusations as unfounded and Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, on Twitter, drew a parallel to assertions by then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell to the United Nations in 2003 about U.S. intelligence on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

No weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq after the U.S.-led invasion.

IRAN LINKS

The Pentagon offered a detailed explanation of all of the reasons why it believed the arms came from Iran, noting what it said were Iranian corporate logos on arms fragments and the unique nature of the designs of Iranian weaponry.

That included the designs of short-range “Qiam” ballistic missiles. The Pentagon said it had obtained fragments of two Qiam missiles, one fired on Nov. 4 against the airport and another fired on July 22.

The Pentagon cited corporate logos it said matched those of Iranian defense firms on jet vanes that help steer the missile’s engine and on the circuit board helping drive its guidance system. It also said the missile’s unique valve-design was only found in Iran.

Iran, it said, appeared to have tried to cover up the shipment by disassembling the missile for transport, given crude welding used to stitch it back together.

“The point of this entire display is that only Iran makes this missile. They have not given it to anybody else,” Pentagon spokeswoman Laura Seal said. “We haven’t seen this in the hands of anyone else except Iran and the Houthis.”

A Dec. 8 U.N. report monitoring Iran sanctions found that the July 22 and Nov. 4 missiles fired at Saudi Arabia appeared to have a “common origin,” but U.N. officials were still investigating the claims that Iran supplied them.

A separate Nov. 24 U.N. report monitoring Yemen sanctions said four missiles fired into Saudi Arabia this year appear to have been designed and manufactured by Iran, but as yet there was “no evidence as to the identity of the broker or supplier.”

The U.N. Iran and Yemen sanctions monitors “saw a majority” of the weaponry displayed by Haley, said a spokesman for the U.S. mission to the United Nations.

The Pentagon put on display other weapons with designs it said were unique to Iran’s defense industry. It pointed to a key component of a Toophan anti-tank guided missile and a small drone aircraft, both of which it said were recovered in Yemen by the Saudis.

It also showed components of a drone-like navigation system like the one the Pentagon says was used by the Houthis to ram an exploding boat into a Saudi frigate on Jan. 30. The United Arab Emirates seized the system in late 2016 in the Red Sea, the Pentagon said.

The U.N. Security Council is due to be briefed publicly on the latest U.N. report monitoring Iran sanctions on Tuesday.

(Additional reporting by Michelle Nichols at the United Nations; Editing by Alistair Bell and James Dalgleish)

Israel closes Gaza border crossings after Palestinian rocket strikes

Israel closes Gaza border crossings after Palestinian rocket strikes

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel announced the closure of its Gaza border crossings on Thursday in response to daily rocket fire from the enclave over the past week after U.S. President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital stoked Palestinian anger.

Israeli aircraft struck three facilities belonging to Hamas, the militant group that controls the Gaza Strip, before dawn on Thursday after the latest rocket attacks, Israel’s military said.

It said it targeted training camps and weapons storage compounds. Hamas usually evacuates such facilities when border tensions spike.

Two of the rockets fired by militants were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system and a third exploded in an open area. There were no reports of casualties on either side of the frontier.

The military said in a statement that “due to the security events and in accordance with security assessments” Kerem Shalom crossing – the main passage point for goods entering the Gaza Strip, and the Erez pedestrian crossing – would be shut as of Thursday. It did not say how long the closure would last.

Some 15 rockets have been fired into southern Israel since Trump’s Dec. 6 announcement, and none of the projectiles has caused serious injury or damage.

The attacks have drawn Israeli air strikes that have killed two Hamas gunmen. Two other Palestinians have been killed in confrontations with Israeli troops during stone-throwing protests along the border.

Israeli cabinet minister Tzachi Hanegbi said on Israel Radio that while Hamas, which last fought a war with Israel in 2014, was not carrying out the rocket strikes, it needed to rein in militants from “breakaway groups” or it would “find itself in a situation where it has to contend” with the Israeli military.

In Istanbul on Wednesday, a summit of more than 50 Muslim countries condemned Trump’s move and called on the world to respond by recognizing East Jerusalem, captured by Israel along with the West Bank in a 1967 war, as the capital of Palestine.

Trump’s declaration has been applauded by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a recognition of political reality and Jews’s biblical links to Jerusalem, a city that is also holy to Muslims and Christians.

(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi and Jeffrey Heller; Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Edmund Blair)

China says war must not be allowed on Korean peninsula

China says war must not be allowed on Korean peninsula

By Ben Blanchard

BEIJING (Reuters) – War must not be allowed to break out on the Korean peninsula and the issue must be resolved through talks, Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Thursday, while U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned of the danger of “sleepwalking” into conflict.

Xi made his comments to visiting South Korean President Moon Jae-in just days after U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson offered to begin direct talks with North Korea without pre-conditions.

But the White House said on Wednesday that no negotiations could be held with North Korea until it improved its behavior. The White House has declined to say whether President Donald Trump, who has taken a tougher rhetorical line toward North Korea, approved Tillerson’s overture.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tillerson’s offer of direct contacts with North Korea was “a very good signal”, while warning that a U.S. strike on the North would have catastrophic consequences.

North Korea tested its most advanced intercontinental ballistic missile on Nov. 29, which it said could put all of the United States within range, in defiance of international pressure and U.N. sanctions.

While South Korea and China share the goal of getting North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and stop testing increasingly sophisticated long-range missiles, the two have not seen eye-to-eye on how to achieve this.

Meeting in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, Xi told Moon that the goal of denuclearising the Korean peninsula must be stuck to, and that war and chaos cannot be allowed to happen, state media said.

“The peninsula issue must in the end be resolved via dialogue and consultation,” Xi was cited as saying.

China and South Korea have an important shared interest in maintaining peace and stability, and China is willing to work with South Korea to prevent war and promote talks, Xi added.

China would support North and South Korea to improve relations as this was good for easing tension, he said.

Xi’s warm tone followed nearly a year of tense relations between the two countries.

‘DRAMATIC CIRCUMSTANCES’

China has been furious about the deployment of the U.S.-made Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) anti-missile system in South Korea, saying its powerful radar can see far into China and will do nothing to ease tension with North Korea.

China and South Korea agreed in late October that they would normalize exchanges and move past the dispute over THAAD, which froze trade and business exchanges, and Moon has been keen to put the dispute behind them.

Xi reiterated China’s position on THAAD and said he hoped South Korea would continue to “appropriately handle” the issue.

Guterres, speaking to reporters in Tokyo after meeting Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, said Security Council resolutions on North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs must be fully implemented by Pyongyang and other countries.

“It is very clear that the Security Council resolutions must be fully implemented, first of all by North Korea, but by all other countries whose role is crucial to … achieve the result we all aim at, which is the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula,” Guterres said.

He added that Security Council unity was also vital “to allow for the possibility of diplomatic engagement” that would allow denuclearization to take place.

“The worst possible thing that could happen is for us all to sleepwalk into a war that might have very dramatic circumstances,” Guterres said.

He said he expected a meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Friday would deliver a strong expression of unity and the need for diplomacy to resolve the issue.

Japan says now is the time to keep up maximum pressure on North Korea, not start talks on its missile and nuclear programs.

China and Russia, however, have welcomed Tillerson’s overture.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said a strike on North Korea by the United States would have catastrophic consequences and that he hoped to work with Washington eventually to resolve the crisis on the Korean peninsula.

Russia does not accept North Korea’s nuclear status, Putin told an annual news conference. But he also said that some of Washington’s past actions had provoked North Korea into violating a 2005 pact to curb its nuclear program.

“We believe the two sides should now stop aggravating the situation,” Putin said.

North Korea justifies its weapons programs as necessary defense against U.S. plans to invade. The United States, which has 28,500 troops in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean war, denies any such intention.

(Additional reporting by Linda Sieg in TOKYO,; Denis Pinchuk in MOSCOW and Christine Kim in SEOUL; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Japan to acquire air-launched missiles able to strike North Korea

Japan to acquire air-launched missiles able to strike North Korea

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan is to acquire medium-range, air-launched cruise missiles, capable of striking North Korea, a controversial purchase of what will become the longest-range munitions of a country that has renounced the right to wage war.

Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera did not refer to North Korea when announcing the planned acquisition and said the new missiles would be for defence, with Japan still relying on the United States to strike any enemy bases.

“We are planning to introduce the JSM (Joint Strike Missile) that will be mounted on the F-35A (stealth fighter) as ‘stand-off’ missiles that can be fired beyond the range of enemy threats,” Onodera told a news conference.

Japan is also looking to mount Lockheed Martin Corp’s extended-range Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM-ER) on its F-15 fighters, he said.

The JSM, designed by Norway’s Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace , has a range of 500 km (310 miles). The JASSM-ER can hit targets 1,000 km away.

The purchase plan is likely to face criticism from opposition parties in parliament, especially from politicians wary of the watering down of Japan’s renunciation of the right to wage war enshrined in its post-World War Two constitution.

But the growing threat posed by North Korean ballistic missiles has spurred calls from politicians, including Onodera, for a more robust military that could deter North Korea from launching an attack.

Japan’s missile force has been limited to anti-aircraft and anti-ship munitions with ranges of less than 300 km (186 miles).

The change suggests the growing threat posed by North Korea has given proponents of a strike capability the upper hand in military planning.

North Korea has recently test-fired ballistic missiles over Japan and last week tested a new type of intercontinental ballistic missile that climbed to an altitude of more than 4,000 km before splashing into the sea within Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

(Reporting by Linda Sieg; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Turkey says U.S. ‘pulled the pin on bomb’ with Jerusalem decision

ANKARA (Reuters) – The United States has primed a bomb in the Middle East with its decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Thursday.

Yildirim said Turkey’s stark differences with Washington, which have already strained ties between the NATO allies, meant that an overwhelming majority of the Turkish people were now unsympathetic toward the United States.

“The United States has pulled the pin on a bomb ready to blow in the region,” Yildirim told a conference in Ankara.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday reversed decades of U.S. policy by recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and promising to move the U.S. Embassy there.

Following the decision, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the U.S. consulate in Istanbul; on Thursday, there was a heavy police presence with uniformed soldiers patrolling the roof.

“Today, more than 80 percent of our citizens are cold towards the United States and they are right to be so,” Yildirim said, without giving a source for the figure.

Bilateral relations had already been hurt by Washington’s support for the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, seen by Ankara as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has for decades waged an insurgency against the Turkish state.

In addition, Ankara has been angered by the United States’ refusal to extradite U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom it accuses of orchestrating last year’s attempted military coup.

U.S. officials say the courts have not been shown sufficient evidence to extradite Gulen, who has denied any involvement in the coup.

Turkey also says the case of Turkish-Iranian gold trader Reza Zarrab, who is on trial in New York and cooperating with U.S. prosecutors, is an attempt to discredit it and undermine its economy. Zarrab has pleaded guilty to helping Iran avoid U.S. sanctions and detailed a vast international money laundering scheme.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Additional reporting by Mehmet Emin Caliskan; Editing by David Dolan and Kevin Liffey)

North Korea says U.S. threats make war unavoidable as China urges calm

North Korea says U.S. threats make war unavoidable as China urges calm

By Soyoung Kim and Heekyong Yang

SEOUL (Reuters) – Two American B-1B heavy bombers joined large-scale combat drills over South Korea on Thursday amid warnings from North Korea that the exercises and U.S. threats have made the outbreak of war “an established fact”.

The annual U.S.-South Korean “Vigilant Ace” exercises feature 230 aircraft, including a range of the U.S. military’s most advanced stealth warplanes, and come a week after North Korea tested its most powerful intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) to date which it says can reach the mainland United States.

A spokesman for the North’s foreign ministry blamed the drills and “confrontational warmongering” by U.S. officials for making war inevitable.

“The remaining question now is: when will the war break out?” the spokesman said late on Wednesday in a statement carried by North Korea’s official KCNA news agency.

“We do not wish for a war but shall not hide from it.”

China, North Korea’s neighbor and lone major ally, again urged calm and said war was not the answer.

“We hope all relevant parties can maintain calm and restraint and take steps to alleviate tensions and not provoke each other,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said in a statement.

“The outbreak of war is not in any side’s interest. The ones that will suffer the most are ordinary people.”

Tensions on the Korean peninsula have risen markedly in recent months after North Korea’s latest missile and nuclear tests, conducted in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions and international condemnation.

STRATEGIC BOMBERS

On Wednesday, a U.S. B-1B bomber flew from the Pacific U.S.-administered territory of Guam to join the exercises, which will run until Friday.

The flights by the B-1B, one of America’s largest strike aircraft, have played a leading role in Washington’s attempts to increase pressure on North Korea to abandon its weapons program.

In September, B-1Bs were among a formation of U.S. military aircraft that flew further north up North Korea’s coast than at any time in the past 17 years, according to the U.S. Pacific Command.

That prompted North Korea’s foreign minister, Ri Yong Ho, to warn that the North could shoot down the U.S. bombers even if they did not enter North Korean airspace.

“B1-B bombers have been regularly dispatched to the Korean peninsula over the past years; however, it seems that the U.S. Air Force might have enhanced its training to better prepare for actual warfare,” said Yang Uk, a senior fellow at the Korea Defence and Security Forum.

While B-1Bs are no longer equipped to carry nuclear weapons of their own, they would be key to any strike targeting major North Korean facilities, he said.

“That’s why North Korea has been making such a big deal when B1-B bombers are flying overhead.”

ESCALATING TENSIONS

Both sides insist they don’t want war, but blame each other for provocations while saying they will act to defend themselves.

White House national security adviser H.R. McMaster said over the weekend that the possibility of war with North Korea was “increasing every day”.

U.S. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham urged the Pentagon on Sunday to start moving U.S. military dependants, such as spouses and children, out of South Korea, saying conflict with North Korea was getting close.

The Pentagon said it has “no intent” to move any dependants out of the country.

North Korea regularly threatens to destroy South Korea and the United States and says its weapons program are necessary to counter U.S. aggression. The United States stations 28,500 troops in the South, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War.

“Recently, as the U.S. is conducting the largest-ever joint aerial drill on the Korean peninsula targeting the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, its high-level politicians are showing alarming signs by making bellicose remarks one after another,” the North’s foreign ministry spokesman said, using North Korea’s official name.

“These confrontational war-mongering remarks cannot be interpreted in any other way but as a warning to us to be prepared for a war on the Korean peninsula,” he said.

North Korea’s latest missile test prompted a warning from the United States that North Korea’s leadership would be “utterly destroyed” if war were to break out, a statement that drew sharp criticism from Russia.

U.S. President Donald Trump has said the whole of North Korea would be destroyed in the event of war.

The rising tensions coincide with a rare visit to the isolated North by United Nations political affairs chief Jeffrey Feltman this week, the highest-level U.N. official to visit North Korea since 2012.

Feltman met North Korean Foreign Minister Ri on Thursday, following his meeting with the vice foreign minister a day earlier, KCNA said.

(Additional reporting by Hyonhee Shin and Josh Smith in Seoul and Christian Shepherd in Beijing; Editing by Nick Macfie)