South Korea is expected to deploy new PAC-3 surface-to-air missiles to defend Seoul and its surrounding areas from the North’s missile attacks.
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Fifth, the ball is now very obviously in China’s court: will Beijing finally start to take North Korea’s WMD threat seriously?
The decision came in response to Pongyang’s increasing threat, especially after the nuclear test of January 2016 and subsequent multiple ballistic missile tests.
South Korea’s defense ministry said it will announce later on Wednesday the location of a USA military THAAD anti-missile defense unit, a planned deployment that has angered China and prompted North Korea to threaten retaliation. South Korea’s defense ministry declined to confirm the reports.
There have been protests about the system’s location, with residents fearing harmful economic and environmental effects.
But proponents say THAAD is part of a larger deterrence program needed to counter North Korea’s advancing nuclear and missile capabilities.
Speculation that THAAD would likely be located in this region had already sparked protests from groups concerned that the military installation may put their communities in danger.
No sooner than the deployment decision was announced, did China voice resolute oppo-sition against THAAD and “strongly urge the USA and South Korea to stop”.
The plan to deploy the system, which fires projectiles to smash into enemy missiles, was announced last week.
North Korea is believed to be in possession of some 1,000 ballistic missiles, and 85 percent are targeting South Korea, according to the South Korean military. “In Asia, they will also follow suit regardless of North Korea’s actions”, he said.
“The increased North Korean nuclear and missile threat is an issue directly related to the survival of the nation and our people”, Yoo Jeh-Seung, the ministry’s deputy minister for policy, told reporters.
The town’s relatively remote distance from China, which bitterly opposes the deployment, has also apparently played into the decision.
But South Koreans near the planned defense system are angry, and some wrote letters of complaint in blood.
Amid North Korea’s protest over an advanced anti-missile system that the USA and South Korea have agreed to install in the Korean Peninsula, Seoul announced Wednesday that the site where it will be deployed has been finalized.
The two countries aim to deploy the USA missile defence system in the site by the end of 2017. Soon it will be hard to avoid an escalating militarization of the Korean Peninsula, perhaps with South Korea acquiring nuclear weapons.
The measure, announced on Monday, comes in retaliation towards Washington’s decision of sanctioning North Korea’s leader over notorious human rights abuses. To up the ante, it again launched in June an intermediate range ballistic missile off its east coast.
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In Beijing, foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang voiced repeated concerns regarding THAAD and asked for the process to be suspended, Yonhap reported. It warned both the US and South Korea to desist from taking any steps that could complicate the regional situation and harm China’s strategic interests. The deployment issue is quite sensitive because South Korea and China are one of the largest trading partners and the USA traded carefully not to cause damage to this strong economic relationship.
