During a photo session with hundreds of participants at the headquarters of the Workers’ Party in Pyongyang, the young ruler lauded them for “glorifying the long-held missions of his predecessors” by successfully carrying out what he said was a hydrogen bomb test? a claim that has become the subject of dispute among outside observers.
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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un praised his scientists for building the country’s latest bomb and told them to do more to boost their nuclear arsenal, according to the official Korean Central News Agency.
Internally, however, Mr. Kim’s massive propaganda apparatus has looked to link the test to his leadership so as to glorify him and portray the test as necessary to combat a U.S.-led attempt to topple the North’s authoritarian system.
China’s environment ministry has conducted real-time radiation monitoring since North Korea conducted its fourth nuclear test last week, but it “basically ruled out” the possibility that the test would have any radiation impact on its areas bordering North Korea.
“History proves that powerful nuclear deterrence serves as the strongest treasured sword for frustrating outsiders’ aggression”, a KCNA editorial said Friday, adding that the “law of the jungle” prevails in the global landscape, with only the strongest surviving. The DPRK quit the talks in April 2009.
The flight “demonstrates one of the many alliance capabilities available for the defense of the Republic of Korea”, Lieutenant General Terrence O’Shaughnessy, United States Forces Korea deputy commander and U.S. Seventh Air Force commander, said after the flight.
Pyongyang said it detonated an underground device on Wednesday, to widespread condemnation, but experts remain sceptical about the claim.
The B-52, flying out of Andersen Air Force Base on Guam, was joined by South Korean F-15 fighter aircraft and U.S. F-16 fighter aircraft.
The US and its ally South Korea are in talks to send further strategic assets to the Korean peninsula, a day after a US B-52 bomber flew over the South in response to the test.
The B-52 Stratofortress is a long-range strategic bomber and part of the U.S. Pacific Command’s continuous bomber presence in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, Pacific Command said.
If China cuts off all fuel supplies, however, there will be total mayhem in North Korea within a week, said Kim Kyoung-sool, a senior researcher at the state-funded Korea Energy Economics Institute.
The vice-foreign ministers of South Korea, the United States and Japan are also expected to meet in Tokyo later this week.
North Korea’s fourth nuclear test has quickly escalated into the most high-profile standoff with the belligerent, brainwashed country in three years.
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In an editorial, China’s official Global Times newspaper blamed the “hostile policy” of the USA toward North Korea for prompting the nuclear tests.
