The United States, South Korea and Japan conducted joint naval exercises involving a U.S. aircraft carrier in the latest show of strength against nuclear-armed North Korea, South Korea's military said Wednesday as senior diplomats from the three countries met in Seoul. announced that they would hold discussions. The deepening conflict with North Korea.
The drills off South Korea's Jeju Island come as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un continues to engage in provocative behavior with weapons tests and threats, raising tensions in the region to their highest point in years. .
At a rubber-stamp parliament in Pyongyang this week, Mr. Kim declared that North Korea was abandoning its long-standing commitment to peaceful reunification with South Korea, and that North Korea would abandon the idea of a shared nation between the war-torn countries. He ordered that the Korean constitution be rewritten.
His speech on Monday came a day after North Korea conducted its first ballistic test in 2024. State media said the test was a new solid-fuel intermediate-range missile with a hypersonic warhead on its tip, reflecting North Korea's efforts to evolve its lineup of weapons to target U.S. forces. It was reported. It is based in Guam and Japan.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff announced that nine warships from both countries participated in the trilateral naval exercise, which concluded a three-day program on Wednesday, including the US aircraft carrier Carl Vinson and the South Korean and Japanese Aegis ships. .
According to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the exercise strengthens each country's overall deterrence and response capabilities against North Korea's nuclear, missile and underwater threats, as well as training to interdict the illegal maritime transport of weapons of mass destruction. The purpose is
He did not say whether the drill reflected concerns about North Korea allegedly supplying weapons to Russia to support the war in Ukraine.
In Seoul, South Korea's nuclear envoy Kim Gang said Wednesday, a day before a tripartite meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden's deputy special representative for North Korea, John Park, to coordinate the response to North Korea. He was scheduled to meet with Hiroyuki Namazu, Japan's nuclear envoy.
In the face of North Korea's growing nuclear threat, the conservative government of South Korean President Yun Seok-Yeol has expanded military cooperation and training with the United States and Japan, which Mr. Kim has denounced as a rehearsal for invasion. ing.
Yun also called for stronger reassurances from Washington that it would quickly and decisively use its nuclear capabilities to defend its allies in the event of a North Korean nuclear attack.
In a speech to North Korea's Supreme People's Assembly, Kim described South Koreans as “top-class agents” of the confrontation-obsessed United States and repeated threats that North Korea would annihilate South Korea with nuclear weapons if provoked. Ta.
