Seoul (AsiaNews) – North Korea threatened “all-out war” in response to exercises by South Korean and US troops due to start today. Pyongyang also told Seoul to stop cross-border propaganda, upping the rhetoric against its archrivals.
Pyongyang announced that it would respond to the upcoming drill with an “unprecedented all-out counteraction” that would turn the South's capital Seoul into a “sea of flames”, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) warned on Sunday.
“The army and people of the DPRK will return bolstered nuclear deterrent of our own style for the continued nuclear threat [. . .] and our own missile striking action for their vicious attempt to eliminate our missiles,” KCNA said.
The latest news release is quite different form more moderate statements made in recent weeks by Pyongyang’s Stalinist regime.
“Pyongyang is scared because people are starving,” a source told AsiaNews. “It knows that it could have on it s hands a mass exodus towards the South, something that the South might not like either.”
At the same time, the bellicose language is “a clear sign that Kim Jong-un, ‘dear leader’ Kim Jong-il’s third son, is in charge. In fact, he has been itching for a fight as the sinking of the Cheonan and the shelling of a South Korean island show.”