The US and South Korea have been holding a series of annual springtime drills since March.
Seoul:
North Korea on Thursday accused the US and South Korea of raising tensions to the brink of nuclear war through joint military drills involving US strategic assets, state media KCNA said, vowing to respond with “aggressive action”.
KCNA released a commentary by Cho Joo Hyon, whom it called an international security analyst, criticizing the exercise as “a trigger to drive the situation on the Korean peninsula to the point of explosion”.
The article said, “The reckless military confrontation mania of the US and its henchmen against the DPRK is driving the situation on the Korean Peninsula toward an irreversible catastrophe… on the brink of nuclear war.”
It was using an abbreviation for the official name of North Korea, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
It added, “Now the international community unanimously hopes that the dark clouds of nuclear war hanging over the Korean Peninsula will be removed as soon as possible.”
US and South Korean forces have been conducting a series of annual springtime exercises since March, involving an American aircraft carrier and B-1B and B-52 bombers, and their first large-scale amphibious landing exercise in five years Is.
North Korea has reacted sharply to the exercise, calling it a rehearsal for an invasion.
The commentary singled out the air carrier’s involvement as aimed at provoking the confrontation, saying the US had revealed its “disgusting true colors as the main culprit of rising tensions.”
It said the allies had gone beyond the “limits of tolerance” and that Pyongyang would respond through “aggressive action” using its combat deterrence.
It added, “The exercise has turned the Korean Peninsula into a giant powder magazine, which can be detonated at any moment.”
North Korea has been ramping up its military activity in recent weeks, unveiling new, smaller nuclear weapons, producing and testing more weapons-grade nuclear material that it says is nuclear-capable underwater. Attackers are called drones.
Last month, it tested an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of striking anywhere in the US, calling it a response to allied exercises.
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