PYONGYANG: North Korea’s vice foreign minister told The Associated Press on Friday that the situation on the Korean Peninsula is now in a “vicious cycle,” and that Pyongyang won’t “keep its arms crossed” in the face of a pre-emptive strike by US.
In an exclusive interview with the AP in Pyongyang on Friday, Vice Minister Han Song Ryol also blamed President Donald Trump for raising tensions, saying that his “aggressive” tweets were “making trouble.”
Tensions are deepening as the US has sent an aircraft carrier to waters off the peninsula and is conducting its biggest-ever joint military exercises with South Korea. Pyongyang, meanwhile, recently launched a ballistic missile and some experts say it could conduct another nuclear test at virtually anytime.
Trump added to the growing war of words with a tweet on Tuesday that said the North is “looking for trouble.” He added that if China doesn’t do its part to rein in Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions, the US can handle it.
Many North Korea watchers believe North Korea could have a viable nuclear warhead and a ballistic missile capable of hitting the United States’ mainland on Trump’s watch as president — within the next few years.
Outwardly, there are few signs of concern in North Korea despite the political back and forth. Instead, the country is gearing up for its biggest holiday of the year, the 105th anniversary of the birth of the late Kim Il Sung, the country’s founder and leader Kim Jong Un’s grandfather.
The Saturday anniversary may provide the world with a look at some of that arsenal. Expectations are high the North may put its newest missiles on display during a military parade that could be held to mark the event.
At the same time, speculation is growing that Pyongyang may be close to conducting more nuclear or missile tests, despite a raft of international sanctions punishing it over its nuclear weapons program.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe warned Thursday that North Korea may be capable of firing a missile loaded with sarin nerve gas toward Japan, as international concern mounted that a missile or nuclear test by the authoritarian state could be imminent.
N. Korean official blames Trump for region’s ‘vicious cycle’
N. Korean official blames Trump for region’s ‘vicious cycle’
Germany’s Merz urges ‘peaceful coexistence’ a year after deadly market attack
- The market attack happened during campaigning for legislative elections — one of several carried out by migrants that fed into a fierce debate about immigration and security in Germany
MAGDEBURG, Germany: German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Saturday called for “peaceful coexistence” as the country marked the first anniversary of a deadly car-ramming attack at a Christmas market in eastern Germany.
Merz addressed a church ceremony in the city of Magdeburg, where the December 20, 2024, attack killed six and wounded more than 300 others.
“May we all find, today in this commemoration, comfort and peaceful coexistence, especially as Christmas approaches,” he told those gathered at the Protestant Johanniskirche (St. John’s Church), near the site of the attack.
Germany was still “a country where we show unconditional solidarity — especially when injustice prevails — standing shoulder to shoulder wherever violence erupts,” he added.
While the market reopened on November 20, guarded by armed police and protected by concrete barricades, it remained closed on Saturday out of respect to the victims of last year’s attack.
Saudi man Taleb Jawad Al-Abdulmohsen, 51, is currently on trial for the attack. He has admitted to plowing a rented SUV through the crowd in an attack prosecutors say was inspired by a mix of personal grievances, far-right and anti-Islam views.
Merz’s speech came eight months before regional elections, with the far-right AfD riding high in opinion polls in Saxony-Anhalt state, of which Magdeburg is the capital.
The market attack happened during campaigning for legislative elections — one of several carried out by migrants that fed into a fierce debate about immigration and security in Germany.
On December 13, German police said they had arrested five men suspected of planning a similar vehicle attack on a Christmas market in the southern state of Bavaria.
Police and prosecutors said they had detained an Egyptian, three Moroccans and a Syrian over the alleged plot.
