Tag: North Korea

Other than managing the JSA, I don’t know why South Korea would need to do any military cooperation with North Korea:

 South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Wednesday urged an immediate halt to any attempts to seek military cooperation with North Korea, amid reports Russia and the North are eyeing arms and defense technology trade.

Yoon made the remark during a summit with leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Jakarta, after The New York Times reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un may travel to Vladivostok in Russia next week to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and discuss a possible arms deal.

“Attempts at military cooperation with North Korea, which damage peace in the international community, should be stopped immediately,” the presidential office quoted Yoon as saying.

Yoon urged ASEAN to actively participate in efforts to block North Korea’s key sources of funding for its nuclear and missile development, such as cryptocurrency stealing and labor exports, and stressed the need for all United Nations member states to abide by U.N. Security Council sanctions on the North, including a ban on illegal arms trade, his office said.

Yonhap

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What price exactly is North Korea going to pay? Another sternly worded letter?:

National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan is seen speaking during a press briefing at the White House in Washington on Sept. 5, 2023 in this captured image. (Yonhap)

The top U.S. national security adviser urged North Korea not to provide any lethal weapons to Russia on Tuesday, saying it will pay a price if it decides to do so.

National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said there were no indications that the North has provided large amounts of weapons to Russia but that negotiations toward that end between the two countries are “actively advancing.”

“Providing weapons to Russia for use on the battlefield to attack grain silos and the heating infrastructure of major cities as we head into winter, to try to conquer territory that belongs to another sovereign nation is not going to reflect well on North Korea and they will pay a price for this in the international community,” Sullivan told a press briefing at the White House.

Yonhap

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The fish of the East Sea continue to remain under attack by the North Koreans:

North Korea fired several cruise missiles Saturday into the Yellow Sea, just days after it shot off a pair of nuclear-capable ballistic missiles in a show of anger against U.S.-South Korea joint military drills.

The missiles were fired from about 4 a.m. and the launch is being analyzed by US and South Korean intelligence agencies, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement to reporters. Pyongyang had threatened punishment for U.S. and South Korean military drills, which ran for 11 days until the end of August. 

North Korea on Aug. 30 test-fired two suspected short-range ballistic missiles for simulated nuclear strikes, saying it wouldn’t bow down to threats after the U.S. sent a B-1B strategic bomber to airspace off the peninsula for joint drills. After that missile launch, South Korea and U.S. mobilized about 30 aircraft including F-35 stealth fighters for exercises that including air-to-ground live-fire training.

Stars & Stripes

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I hope the Russians bring along a tugboat to help the North Korean ships keep up:

Kim Kyou-hyun (C, back), chief of the National Intelligence Service, attends a plenary session of the intelligence committee at the National Assembly in Seoul on Sept. 4, 2023. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)

Russia proposed conducting three-way naval exercises with North Korea and China when Moscow’s defense minister held a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in late July, South Korea’s intelligence agency was quoted as saying Monday.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu made the proposal when he held a one-on-one meeting with the North’s leader, National Intelligence Service (NIS) Director Kim Kyou-hyun said during a close-door briefing to the parliamentary intelligence committee, according to Rep. Yoo Sang-bum of the ruling People Power Party.

Shoigu visited the North from July 25-27.

Yonhap

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Like it has done just about every August in recent memory, the North Koreans are continuing their offensive on the fish in the East Sea:

North Korea has fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the East Sea, South Korea’s military said Thursday, in apparent protest against combined South Korea-U.S. military drills.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected the launches from an area in or around Sunan in Pyongyang between around 11:40 p.m. and 11:50 p.m. Wednesday.

The missiles each flew some 360 kilometers before splashing into the waters, the JCS said, with the allies’ intelligence authorities conducting further analysis.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.