What is North Korea playing? For 24 hours, Pyongyang has multiplied the firing of missiles provoking the anger of its southern neighbor. North Korea fired more missiles in a single day than it did in all of 2017, when dictator Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump kept exchanging nuclear threats
. How to explain these shots? What is North Korea trying to show? How is the international community reacting? France Bleu explains everything to you.
What happened ?
This Thursday, November 3, North Korea launched three new projectiles, including an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) which apparently failed. The day before, Pyongyang had already fired more than 20 missiles causing renewed tension in the peninsula.
These missiles did not reach South Korea, but a short-range ballistic missile fell very close to South Korean territorial waters for the first time since the end of the Korean War in 1953. This missile landed in waters international, 57 kilometers east of South Korea mainland, the South Korean military said. If it was damaged at sea outside South Korean territorial waters, the missile still fell 26 km south of the “Northern Limit Line” (NLL), which extends the inter-Korean demarcation line out to sea on both sides of the peninsula.
The South Korean president called this shooting in territorial waters “of de facto territorial invasion”. Authorities in the South have therefore closed several air corridors over the Sea of Japan to “ensure the safety of passengers on lines to the United States and Japan”. The South retaliated by launching three missiles at sea, near the area where one of the North Korean projectiles had landed.
How to explain the shootings of North Korea?
This show of force by Pyongyang comes at a time when South Korea and the United States are conducting major air exercises. These exercises, called “Watchful Storm” (“Vigilant Storm”), are the largest joint air maneuvers between the United States and South Korea. The two countries are mobilizing hundreds of stealth aircraft on both sides and staging round-the-clock attacks. last May. This last promised to be firm vis-à-vis Pyongyang. But for its part, North Korea considers this type of exercise as a dress rehearsal to a future invasion of its territory or a reversal of its regime.
The North Korean Dictator particularly feared American and South Korean stealth aircraft, designed to be difficult to detect by enemy radar or infrared sensors. While North Korea has nuclear weapons, unlike its southern neighbor, its air force is its Achilles heel, experts say.
Towards a new nuclear test by North Korea?
Could these missile launches be the beginnings of a new nuclear test on the side of North Korea? Yes, according to Ahn Chan-il, a researcher specializing in North Korea. According to him, these recent series of shootings “are preliminary celebrations for their future nuclear test”, “It also looks like a series of practical tests for their tactical nuclear deployment”he assured AFP. “Further testing, of course, means they’re fine-tuning the preparation and building of their arsenal. So we’re following that very closely.”, added Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). “We hope that doesn’t happen, but unfortunately the indications point the other way.”
The United States and South Korea have been warning for months that North Korea about to carry out a nuclear testwhich would be the seventh in its history and the first for five years. At the end of September, the Kim Jong-un regime had adopted a new doctrine proclaiming the character “irreversible” of the country’s status as a nuclear power, making any future talks about its denuclearization impossible, and reserving the right to carry out preventive strikes. This proclamation was followed, in September and October, by a long series of missile tests, presented by Pyongyang as simulations “tactical nuclear”.
What response from the international community?
France condemned this Wednesday “with the greatest firmness the numerous missile firings, including several ballistic ones” by North Korea, denouncing “new unacceptable provocations”in a statement from his Foreign Ministry. “France is particularly concerned by the fact that one of these ballistic missiles crashed on the South Korean side of the maritime line separating North Korea and South Korea, the so-called ‘Northern limit’ line., the ministry said in a statement. The country also urges the North “to comply without delay with the relevant Security Council resolutions”. The President of the European Council Charles Michel denounced the behavior “aggressive” and “irresponsible” from Pyongyang.