North Korea steps up intimidating missile launches

Tokyo (Japan)

From our correspondent in South Asia

Seoul and Tokyo confirmed the North Korean fire at dawn on Monday February 20. North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles, just 48 hours after the launch of a powerful intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), immediately condemned by the UN secretary general. Soon after, Pyongyang released a statement saying the regime had ‘twice fired multiple 600mm rocket launchers’ into the East Sea, also referring to the stretch of water. known as the Sea of ​​Japan.

In a statement released after the shootings, the North Korean leader’s sister Kim Yo-jong, who is highly influential at the top of the regime, warned that Pyongyang would continue to take “corresponding countermeasures” to any perceived threat. “The frequency of use of the Pacific as a firing range depends on the type of action of the American forces”, she put forward in a press release published by the official North Korean agency KCNA. She was referring to the joint Korean-American military maneuvers to be held in the coming days, seeing them as preparations for an armed conflict and the cause of a deterioration in the security situation on the Korean Peninsula.

For Ankit Panda, a security expert based in the United States quoted by AFP, Saturday’s shooting is of considerable importance, because it “was ordered the same day, so it is not a ” “traditional” test, but of an exercise”. And to add: “We must expect to see additional exercises of this type. Like the proliferation of missile launches last year.

Professor at Ewha University in Seoul, Park Won-gon sees for his part a notable difference: “Last year, the launches were part of their five-year military plan, this time, they clearly indicate that they (will face ) in the United States and South Korea. »

The increased aggressiveness of Pyongyang could, according to him, reflect a worsening of the situation at the national level. According to South Korean officials, their northern neighbor could face serious food shortages after several years of isolation imposed under the pandemic. “North Korea always takes an intransigent approach and creates external crises (…) to overcome its internal difficulties. Uniting the population by insisting on the American-South Korean threat is a classic North Korean attitude. »

The new missile strikes come at a time when relations between Pyongyang and Seoul are already at their lowest level in years. In 2022, the North called its status as a nuclear power “irreversible”, and Kim Jong-un called for an “exponential” growth in the production of armaments, including tactical nuclear weapons. For its part, South Korea called the North its “enemy” in a recent defense document, a term used for the first time in six years.

The two countries have technically been at war since the 1950-1953 Korean War ended in an armistice rather than a peace treaty. And after the failure of a rare diplomatic round in 2019, the talks have completely stalled. North Korea “defined us as an ‘indisputable enemy'” in December 2022, Seoul says in a new Defense White Paper. “Therefore, the North Korean regime and the North Korean army (…) are our enemy”, continues the text. For Yang Moo-jin, professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, “it gives the impression of a return to the Cold War era”.

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