Just before NATO leaders gather this week in Lithuania for their annual summit, North Korea ratcheted up tensions by accusing US spy planes of violating its airspace and threatening to shoot them down.
According to a spokeswoman for North Korea’s defense ministry, who was quoted by the Korean Central News Agency on Monday, the US is sending a nuclear-capable submarine to the peninsula and using spy planes to undertake hostile spying activities along its east and west coasts.
According to North Korea, drones and surveillance planes violated its airspace by flying for eight straight days around its coasts. It reported the official as stating that there is no assurance that a terrible catastrophe like the downing of the US Air Force strategic reconnaissance jet won’t occur.
That seems to be a reference to North Korea shooting down a US Navy spy plane in 1969, killing all 31 aboard, which the Americans said was doing so in international airspace between the Korean Peninsula and Japan.
The spokesman for the defense ministry further stated that Pyongyang would take steps to stop Washington’s careless behavior.
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Shooting Down US Surveillance Aircraft
The government of Kim Jong Un has occasionally launched ballistic missiles in a fit of rage after issuing threats.
A few minutes after KCNA’s broadcast from a Defense Ministry spokesman criticizing joint US-South Korean military drills and threatening reprisal, it launched two short-range nuclear-capable rockets last month.
Concerns are raised by the most recent threats as South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol attends the summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
In an interview with the Associated Press, Yoon stated that he would turn to the heads of NATO for advice on how to stop Pyongyang from stepping up its nuclear aspirations.
Yoon and other leaders from South Korea, which is not a member of NATO, will be there as the alliance and its allies concentrate on supporting Ukraine.
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Source: yahoo.com