SEOUL: The US has scrambled to reinforce its Pacific missile defences as North Korea pushed more global alarm buttons yesterday by announcing it had authorised plans for possible nuclear strikes on US targets.
Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel said Pyongyang’s increasingly bellicose threats combined with its military capabilities represented a “real and clear danger” to the US and its allies South Korea and Japan.
The Pentagon said it would send ground-based THAAD missile-interceptor batteries to protect bases on Guam, a US territory some 3,380km southeast of North Korea and home to 6,000 American military personnel.
“They have nuclear capacity now, they have missile delivery capacity now,” Hagel said Wednesday. “We take those threats seriously.”
Shortly afterwards, the North Korean military said it had received final approval for military action against the US, possibly involving nuclear weapons.
“The moment of explosion is approaching fast,” the Korean People’s Army general staff said, responding to what it called the provocative US use of nuclear-capable stealth bombers in war games with South Korea. The US aggression would be “smashed by cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means,” it said in a statement.
While few of the North’s threats have been matched with action, South Korea said it appeared to have moved a medium-range missile capable to its east coast —prompting fears of a strike against the South or Japan. “It could be aimed at test firing or military drills,” South Korean Defence Minister Kim Kwan-Jin said.
A provocative missile test-fired into the sea over Japan is one scenario that analysts have said the North could opt for as a relatively low-risk way of exiting the crisis with a face-saving show of force.
The new nuclear threats drew fresh concern led by UN chief Ban Ki-moon, who said on a visit to Monaco that he was “deeply concerned and troubled” over the escalating rhetoric. “At this time, I think all the parties concerned in the Korean peninsula, in particular the Chinese government, can play a very important role to calm down the situation,” said Ban, a former South Korean foreign minister.
The European Union also called on Pyongyang to stop stoking tensions and instead re-engage with the international community.
Yun Duk-Min, a professor at the Korea National Diplomatic Academy in Seoul, said the latest nuclear threat was similar to one issued a month ago, but with the added weight of “approval” -- presumably by North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un.
“The problem is whether Kim, who is still young and inexperienced, knows how to handle this escalation,” Yun said. “Where does it end? That’s the worrying question.”
North Korea blocked access to its Kaesong joint industrial zone with South Korea yesterday for the second day running, and threatened to pull out its 53,000 workers in a furious reaction to the South’s airing of a “military” contingency plan to protect its own workers there.
“The full closure of the complex is set to become a reality,” a spokesman for the North’s Committee for Peaceful Reunification of Korea said. The North says the South Koreans in Kaesong can leave whenever they want. AFP
