North Korea accuses U.S. of submarine transactions and warns of countermeasures

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Seoul, South Korea (AP) —North Korea criticized the US decision to provide Australia with a nuclear submarine and warned of unspecified measures if it determined that the deal would affect North Korea’s security.

Unidentified North Korea called the deal between the United States, Britain and Australia on Monday a “very dangerous act” that disrupted the security balance in the Asia-Pacific region and caused a “chain reaction of military expansion competition.” Announced comments from Foreign Ministry officials. .. “

North Korea is scrutinizing the deal and will take action if it “has any negative impact on our security,” officials said.

US President Joe Biden last week unveiled a new alliance to send an Australian fleet of at least eight nuclear submarines, including Australia and the United Kingdom. Biden emphasized that the ship would normally be armed.

The announcement sparked an angry reaction from France, with Australia intending to withdraw the A $ 90 billion ($ 66 billion) contract for a majority of France’s state-owned naval groups to build 12 conventional diesel electric submarines. He accused him of hiding it.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has blamed the switch to a deteriorating strategic environment in the Indo-Pacific. This is a clear reference to China’s large-scale military buildup, which has been accelerating in recent years.

North Korean officials have explicitly mentioned France’s complaint, saying the United States has been accused of counter-stabs even by its allies. North Korea said it supports the view of China and other countries that the agreement “destroys regional peace and security and intensifies the arms race by destroying the international non-proliferation system.”

“The current situation once again shows that (our) efforts to strengthen defense capabilities from a long-term perspective should not be eased at all,” officials told South Korea’s Central News Agency. Told.

North Korea has suspended testing of nuclear bombs and intercontinental ballistic missiles that could attack the continental United States since 2018, when Prime Minister Kim Jong Un began diplomacy with former President Donald Trump.

Nuclear negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang have been stalled since the collapse of the second Trump Kim Conference in 2019, with Americans in exchange for the dismantling of dilapidated nuclear facilities that would have been only a partial surrender. In its nuclear capacity, it rejected North Korea’s request for massive sanctions easing.

North Korea has made clear efforts to put pressure on the Byden administration over stagnant diplomacy while maintaining a voluntary moratorium on nuclear and ICBM tests, with short-range weapons threatening U.S. allies South Korea and Japan. I have continued the experiment.

This month, North Korea tested a new cruise missile to be equipped with a nuclear warhead and demonstrated a new system for launching ballistic missiles from trains.

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