North Korea Threatens to Get Physical

Following the announcement of joint military exercises between South Korea and the U.S., North Korea has threatened a “physical response,” describing the military drills as another sign of U.S. hostility and “a threat to the Korean peninsula and the region of Asia as a whole.”

Tensions on the peninsula have dominated the Asean regional security forum currently in progress in Hanoi, Vietnam. —JCL

The Guardian:

North Korea today threatened a “physical response” to planned military exercises by the US and South Korea this weekend, as tensions on the Korean peninsula dominated a regional security forum in Hanoi.

The regime did not specify what that response might be, but said it interpreted the launch on Sunday of four days of naval and air drills in the Sea of Japan as another sign of US “hostility”.

“It is a threat to the Korean peninsula and the region of Asia as a whole,” a North Korea spokesman, Ri Tong-il, told reporters at the Asean regional forum.

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AP / Korean Central News Agency via Korea News Service

Kim Jong Il with Korean People’s Army soldiers during an inspection.