Kim Jong-un inspects nuclear warship, assails US-Seoul’s ‘will to ignite war’

The Korean peninsula remains in a technical state of war, divided by the demilitarised zone into North Korea and South Korea.

While inspecting the warship Choe Hyon, a 5,000-tonne-class destroyer first unveiled in April, Kim said the allies’ joint military drills show hostility and their supposed “will to ignite a war”, the North’s Korean Central News Agency said. He said that the exercises have grown more provocative than before by incorporating a “nuclear element”, requiring the North to respond with “proactive and overwhelming” countermeasures.

“The security environment around the DPRK is getting more serious day by day and the prevailing situation requires us to make a radical and swift change in the existing military theory and practice and rapid expansion of nuclearisation,” KCNA paraphrased Kim as saying, using the initials of North Korea’s formal name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.