Category: North Korea

It must be pretty bad that Kim Jong-un has actually come out and made such a statement. We will see how well a largely malnourished population with minimal health care options is able to handle a COVID outbreak:

 North Korea on Saturday reported 21 additional COVID-19 deaths, with more than 174,400 people nationwide feverish, as its leader Kim Jong-un stated that his country is faced with “great turmoil” due to the spread of the virus.

Pyongyang’s state media released the updated tally compiled the previous day, after Kim presided over an early-morning politburo meeting to review the nation’s “maximum emergency” antivirus system in place.

Mainly discussed in the session were ways for the swift supply and distribution of emergency medical supplies, according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

He was briefed on the current situation from the state emergency epidemic prevention headquarters and described it as “great turmoil since the country’s founding,” it reported. 

He urged relevant authorities to learn from the “successful” coronavirus control measures of other countries, including China.

A total of around 524,440 people in North Korea have shown symptoms of fevers between late April and May 13, the KCNA added. Among them, 243,630 have been completely cured, with roughly 280,810 being treated.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but with their lack of testing and transparency these numbers are probably far worse than what is being reported.

It looks like the Kim regime is wasting no time testing the Yoon administration. It will be interesting to see what they do when President Biden visits South Korea later this month:

North Korea fired three short-range ballistic missiles toward the East Sea Thursday, the South Korean military said, in its first major provocation since the launch of the Yoon Suk-yeol administration.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected the launches from the Sunan area of Pyongyang at 6:29 p.m., and the missiles flew some 360 kilometers at a top altitude of about 90 km.

The launch, the North’s 16th show of force this year, came despite speculation that the North may slow down its weapons tests as it reported its first COVID-19 case earlier in the day with the enforcement of the “maximum emergency” virus control system.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It appears the submarine that North Korea used to fire a missile from this weekend has not been in the best working condition:

The North Korean submarine that fired a ballistic missile from underwater Saturday was the one that had to be towed ashore due to an engine problem following an earlier missile test-firing in October last year, sources said Sunday.

The North is believed to have repaired the Gorae-class vessel since the Oct. 19 test-firing that also took place in waters off the country’s eastern coastal city of Sinpo, where the North’s main submarine shipyard is located.

Due to damage to its engine from the impact of the firing at the time, the 2,000-ton-class submarine could not move on its own and had to be towed by a tugboat to the Sinpo shipyard, according to military and intelligence authorities.

“Though the extent of the damage was not exactly determined, it was not in a condition where it could move on its own. It had to be towed,” a source said on condition of anonymity.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

If this was an ICBM test the fact that it did not rise as high in apogee as other tests indicates something did not go right. For example the March ICBM test had an apogee of 4,475 kilometers. This test had an apogee of 780 kilometers:

North Korea’s state-controlled news outlets were unusually silent Thursday about the country’s latest ballistic missile test the previous day.

There had been no related reports by the secretive nation’s media, including the Korean Central News Agency and the Rodong Sinmun, as of 5 p.m., unlike Pyongyang’s usual practice of quickly boasting publicly about its major weapons tests.

On Wednesday, the North launched a ballistic missile, which flew 470 kilometers at a maximum altitude of 780 km before falling into the East Sea, according to South Korea’s military. Some informed sources said it seems to be an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) fired at a lofted angle.

The North’s media has usually carried reports, coupled with a number of photos, of such major missile tests the next morning, except for failed launches like the one in mid-March.

Observers here raised the possibility that the North failed to achieve its goal in the latest missile firing, the 14th of this year.

Military authorities here appeared intent on figuring out why the North’s state media had not reported on the missile launch.

“What appears to be certain is that the North did not conduct the missile launch at its fullest capacity,” a military source said.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Besides the upcoming inauguration the Defense Chief nominee was testifying which may be the real reason why they fired this missile:

North Korea fired a ballistic missile toward the East Sea on Wednesday, South Korea’s military said, in the recalcitrant regime’s latest saber-rattling that comes less than a week before President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol’s inauguration.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected the launch from the Sunan area in Pyongyang at 12:03 p.m. and that the missile flew 470 kilometers at a top altitude of 780 km and speed of Mach 11.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It seems like the Kim regime is rhetorically building up towards a near term nuclear test. With the new ROK President taking office this month and activists restarting propaganda balloon launches into North Korea it seems like almost a certainty a major provocation is coming:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un stressed the need to bolster the country’s military power to “preemptively and thoroughly contain” nuclear threats from hostile forces, according to Pyongyang’s state media Saturday.

He met with top military commanders who organized a massive street parade in Pyongyang earlier this week, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.

Kim was quoted as calling on his military commanders to maintain the “absolute superiority” of the armed forces and constantly develop in order to “preemptively and thoroughly contain and frustrate all dangerous attempts and threatening moves, including ever-escalating nuclear threats from hostile forces, if necessary.”

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

This could be interpreted to mean that the Kim regime is setting the conditions for yet another nuclear test:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un declared a resolve to further strengthen his regime’s nuclear capabilities, as the country showcased a “giant” intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) at a military parade earlier this week, according to its state media Tuesday.

Delivering a speech during the event, Kim vowed to boost the country’s nuclear capabilities at the “fastest possible speed” at the nighttime parade to celebrate the 90th founding anniversary of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army (KPRA) held Monday, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but the war in Ukraine has further validated to the Kim regime the value of nuclear weapons. You can get away with a lot more bad behavior when you have a credible nuclear deterrent.