https://ift.tt/2iaDLpO Korea is hinting it will resume long-range missile and nuclear tests in response to what it calls the “intensifying hostile moves” of the United States.
Any such test would significantly escalate U.S.-North Korea tensions, which have already been heightened because of Pyongyang’s six ballistic missile tests to start the new year.
At a Politburo meeting Wednesday attended by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, officials said they would “reconsider all the confidence-building measures previously and voluntarily taken by our state and rapidly examine the issue on resuming all actions which had been temporarily suspended,” according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
That is an apparent reference to Kim’s 2018 announcement that he would voluntarily suspend nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile tests.
North Korea has not conducted a nuclear or ICBM test since 2017, during the height of tensions between Kim and former U.S. President Donald Trump. After subsequent Kim-Trump negotiations broke down in 2019, North Korea resumed launching short-range ballistic missiles.
Already this year, North Korea has conducted two tests of what it described as a hypersonic missile, launched a pair of ballistic missiles from a train, and fired a pair of tactical guided missiles from an airport in Pyongyang.
North Korea was especially angered when the U.S. this month imposed unilateral sanctions against five North Koreans linked to Pyongyang’s weapons program.
In the official Politburo readout released Thursday, North Korean officials blasted the “recent indiscreet moves” by the United States, which it accused of trying to “emasculate our rights to self-defense.” It also complained about recent U.S.-South Korea joint military exercises.