(ANSA) – BEIJING, FEBRUARY 07 – North Korea will expand and intensify military maneuvers to ensure its armed forces are prepared for war. This is the commitment matured in a meeting of the Central Military Commission held yesterday under the supervision of leader Kim Jong-un, who reappeared in public after more than 30 days of absence, in response to last week’s joint air maneuvers held by South Korea and the United States United. The agenda covered, KCNA said, was approved to have “steady expansion of the Korean People’s Army’s combat capabilities, rigorously perfecting war preparedness.”
The meeting of the Central Military Commission came as satellite images suggest that “major parade preparations” are underway in Pyongyang ahead of major state holidays this month. In fact, North Korea will celebrate tomorrow the anniversary of the foundation of its armed forces and February 16 the ‘Day of the shining star’, dedicated to the birthday of Kim Jong-il, the father of the current leader Kim Jong-un. Seoul and Washington have moved to step up joint military exercises in response to the North’s increasing ballistics tests: last week they staged joint air maneuvers with strategic bombers and stealth fighters, prompting Pyongyang to warn that such exercises could “ignite a showdown across the board”. The joint Seoul-Washington exercises, the first of 2023, were held the day following the commitment expressed in Seoul by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to strengthen cooperation on security matters with ‘extended deterrence’ to counter an increasingly more warlike and nuclear-armed. Kim recently called for an “exponential” increase in Pyongyang’s atomic arsenal, including the mass production of tactical nuclear weapons and the development of new missiles for nuclear counterattacks. The supreme leader also said that his country must “overwhelmingly strengthen military strength” in 2023 in response to what Pyongyang calls the hostility of the United States and South Korea. (ANSA).
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