North Korea’s Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of leader Kim Jong Un, on Tuesday threatened with a series of provocations in response to the US deploying its aircraft carrier in South Korea.
What is happening in South Korea?
On Sunday, the USS Carl Vinson and its strike group arrived in South Korea’s port city of Busan for a scheduled visit. This is the latest such deployment aimed at displaying Washington‘s firm support for South Korea in the face of North Korea’s growing threats and hostilities.
The carrier arrived days after North Korea conducted its fourth missile launch test of the year.
What did Kim Yo Jong say?
Kim Yo Jong called the deployment “confrontation hysteria of the US and its stooges.” She has previously made similar statements, calling South Korea’s live-fire drills “suicidal hysteria.”
North Korea will “carefully examine the option for increasing the actions threatening the security of the enemy at the strategic level to cope with the fact that the deployment of US strategic assets in the Korean Peninsula has become a vicious habit and adversely affects the security of the DPRK,” she said in a statement to state media. The acronym refers to North Korea’s official name.
The USS Carl Vinson is a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier
“As soon as its new administration appeared this year, the US has stepped up the political and military provocations against the DPRK, ‘carrying forward’ the former administration’s hostile policy,” Kim said, according to a report by state media KCNA.
In his first term as US President, Donald Trump held unprecedented summits with North Korea‘s Kim Jong Un and often touted their personal rapport.
This time around, Trump has said he would reach out again, but experts believe the North Korean leader, who is busy ramping up an alliance with Russia, might not be as receptive as before.
“Hostile policy toward the DPRK pursued by the US at present is offering sufficient justification for the DPRK to indefinitely bolster … its nuclear war deterrent,” Kim added.
North Korea has, time and again,n blamed the US and its military alliance with South Korea for exponentially increasing its nuclear capacity.
South Korea ready to repel provocations
In response to Kim’s statement, South Korea’s Defense Ministry warned that it is ready to repel any provocations by North Korea based on the very military alliance that irks the North.
A ministry statement from Seoul called Kim’s warning “sophistry” which would be used to justify her country’s nuclear development and future provocations.
Meanwhile, observers believe her statements suggest that North Korea will likely test-launch powerful missiles with the capacity to reach US military bases in the region.
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