North Korea fires ballistic missile after US submarine arrives in South Korea

By Associated Press: North Korea fired a minimum of one ballistic missile into its japanese sea, South Korea’s army mentioned Tuesday, including to a latest streak in weapons testing that’s apparently in protest of the U.S. sending main naval belongings to South Korea in a present of power.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff didn’t instantly say the place the weapon was launched from and the way far it flew.

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The launch got here hours after South Korea’s navy mentioned a nuclear-propelled U.S. submarine – the USS Annapolis — arrived at a port on Jeju Island. The arrival of the USS Annapolis provides to the allies’ present of power to counter North Korean nuclear threats.

Last week, the USS Kentucky grew to become the primary U.S. nuclear-armed submarine to return to South Korea because the Eighties. North Korea reacted to its arrival by test-firing ballistic and cruise missiles in obvious demonstrations that it may make nuclear strikes in opposition to South Korea and deployed U.S. naval vessels.

Also on Monday, the American-led U.N. Command mentioned it has began a dialog with North Korea a few U.S. soldier who bumped into the North final week throughout one of many world’s most closely fortified borders.

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Andrew Harrison, a British lieutenant common who’s the deputy commander on the U.N. Command, refused to say when the dialog began, what number of exchanges have taken place and whether or not the North Koreans responded constructively, citing the sensitivity of the discussions. He additionally declined to element what the command is aware of about Pvt. Travis King’s situation.

“None of us know where this is going to end,” Harrison mentioned throughout a information convention in Seoul. “I am in life an optimist, and I remain optimistic. But again, I will leave it at that.”

It wasn’t instantly clear whether or not Harrison’s feedback referred to significant progress in communications after the command mentioned in a press release final week that it was “working with” its North Korean counterparts. The U.N. Command, which was created to combat the Korean War, has remained in South Korea to oversee the implementation of the 1953 armistice that stopped the preventing within the battle.

The contact occurred by “mechanisms” arrange below the armistice, Harrison mentioned. That may consult with the so-called pink telephone, a phone line between the command and the North Korean People’s Army on the border truce village of Panmunjom, the place King crossed.

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The Koreas are nonetheless technically at struggle since a peace treaty was by no means signed. The U.S., which fought alongside the South Koreans and different allies in the course of the struggle, by no means established diplomatic relations with the North, however the line is a standard method they impart.

North Korea has remained publicly silent about King, who crossed the border throughout a tour of Panmunjom whereas he was presupposed to be heading to Fort Bliss, Texas, following his launch from jail in South Korea on an assault conviction.

U.S. officers have expressed concern about his well-being and mentioned beforehand that North Korea ignored requests for details about him.

Analysts say North Korea might wait weeks and even months to offer significant details about King to maximise leverage and add urgency to U.S. efforts to safe his launch. Some say North Korea might attempt to wrest concessions from Washington, equivalent to tying his launch to the United States chopping again its army actions with South Korea.