(Bloomberg) – North Korea has accused US spy planes of violating its airspace and threatened to shoot them down, escalating tensions just before NATO leaders meet in Lithuania this week for their summit annual.
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A spokesman for North Korea’s Defense Ministry said the United States was engaging in “the most undisguised nuclear blackmail” by planning to bring a nuclear submarine to the peninsula and carrying out “destination activities”. ‘hostile spying’ by flying spy planes off its east and west coasts, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported on Monday.
North Korea has claimed that drones and spy planes flew for eight consecutive days along its coast, with planes violating its airspace. “There is no guarantee that an accident as shocking as the downing of the US Air Force strategic reconnaissance aircraft will not occur,” the spokesperson said.
He added that Pyongyang will take steps to prevent Washington’s “reckless actions”.
Kim Jong Un’s regime has occasionally fired ballistic missiles in anger shortly after issuing threats. Last month, it launched two short-range nuclear-capable rockets just minutes after KCNA released a dispatch from a Defense Ministry spokesman denouncing joint US-South Korean military exercises and threatening retaliation. .
The latest threats are stoking concerns over North Korea as South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol attends the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit. Yoon said in an interview with The Associated Press that he would seek help from NATO leaders on how to dissuade Pyongyang from increasing its atomic ambitions.
South Korea is not a NATO member, but Yoon and other leaders will be present as the bloc and its partners focus their attention on supporting Ukraine.
The United States has carried out aerial reconnaissance flights near North Korea for decades and has a network of spy satellites monitoring its key installations. South Korea’s Defense Ministry and Korean US Forces did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
At an April summit in Washington, Yoon and President Joe Biden agreed to deploy more US nuclear assets in the region. The US president has warned Kim that if he carries out a nuclear strike it will spell the end of his regime.
Six takeaways from the visit to the White House by Yoon of South Korea
In June, the United States sent a nuclear-guided missile submarine to South Korea for the first time in six years in a show of force intended to deter North Korea from carrying out military strikes. He plans to send another soon, Yonhap News Agency reported.
North Korea has fired more than 90 ballistic missiles in the past 18 months as Kim deploys new weapons to launch a nuclear attack on the continental United States and America’s main allies in the region, South Korea and Japan.
–With help from Shinhye Kang, Eunkyung Seo and Seyoon Kim.
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