North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un (L) inspecting the artillery training exercise by the Korean People’s Army (KPA) (Picture: AFP)
North Korea tested its long-range weapons, that it could use to target South Korea with little warning.
Kim Jong Un brandished a gun while inspecting the Korean People’s Army’s drills, state media KCNA reported on Friday.
Wearing his black leather jacket, the supreme leader oversaw the war games and inspected the artillery systems during his visit to the military base in the country’s western region.
The drill involved units near the border that are within firing range of ‘the enemy’s capital,’ KCNA reported, referring to the South Korean capital of nearly 10 million residents and added it ‘fulfilled important military missions for war deterrence.’
The Korean People’s Army conducts an artillery firing drill (Picture: Reuters)
The drill took place at an undisclosed military location (Picture: Reuters)
This amid heightened tension on the Korean Peninsula as the US and South Korea conduct their annual Freedom Shield exercise, which will focus on deterring Kim’s nuclear threats.
South Korea’s joint chiefs of staff said North Korean test-fired multiple rocket launcher shells and self-propelled artillery shells toward the Yellow Sea.
Thursday’s artillery drill by North Korea was aimed at increasing combat readiness and actual war capability, KCNA said.
Kim urged the military to push forward with preparations so the artillery sub-units could ‘take the initiative with merciless and rapid strikes at the moment of their entry into an actual war.’
The North Korean leader tested firearms during a visit (Picture: Reuters)
Kim urged the military to push forward with preparations (Picture: AFP)
The report said, referring to the leader of the reclusive state: ‘He stressed the need to train all the artillery men of the whole army into experts in artillery engagement … and set forth important tasks for rounding off the artillery war preparations.’
Seoul’s defence minister, Shin Won-sik, visited the Capital Defence Command on Thursday and ordered a firm response if North Korea made provocations aimed at the capital.
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