Hopes of denuclearizing North Korea continue to dwindle. Pyongyang has decided to enshrine its status as a nuclear state in the Constitution, according to a speech by leader Kim Jong-un, reported Thursday, September 28 morning, by the KCNA news agency.
“The DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea] nuclear force-building policy has become permanent as a basic law of the state,” Kim Jong-un announced, using North Korea's official acronym . He added, during a meeting of the People's Assembly held Tuesday and Wednesday, "that no one is allowed to flout" the basic law of the state, according to the official KCNA agency.
A year ago, North Korea, which has already carried out six nuclear tests from 2006 to 2017, announced a new doctrine making its status as a nuclear power "irreversible", and authorizing it to carry out a preventive atomic strike in case of existential threat against his regime. By this time including the status of a nuclear state in the Constitution itself, the Assembly went even further.
“This is a historic event that provides powerful political leverage to remarkably strengthen national defense capabilities,” Mr. Kim said, according to the KCNA agency. The North Korean leader also accused Washington, Seoul and Tokyo of having formed a "triangular military alliance" that "ultimately resulted in the emergence of an Asian version of NATO the primary cause of war and assault ".
“This is the worst real threat, not threatening rhetoric or an imaginary entity,” Mr. Kim added. Faced with this “threat”, according to the leader, it is essential for North Korea “to accelerate the modernization of its nuclear weapons to maintain a definitive advantage in the deterrence strategy”. Kim stressed the need to boost nuclear arsenal production and “diversify the types of nuclear strikes,” according to KCNA.
American policy in Asia singled out
This speech “means that nuclear force becomes a permanent given” in North Korea, according to Yang Moon-jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.
At the United Nations (UN) at the end of September, Pyongyang warned, through its ambassador to the UN, that the Korean peninsula was "on the verge of a nuclear war", pointing the finger at American policy in Asia. Western observers fear that Pyongyang will carry out a new nuclear test, the seventh in its history, and the first since 2017.
“If North Korea uses nuclear weapons, its regime will be stopped by an overwhelming response from the U.S.-South Korean alliance,” South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol warned.
North Korea has increased its testing of banned weapons this year. In the last of these tests, on September 13, it fired two short-range ballistic missiles, while Kim Jong-un was in Russia for a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Last month, Pyongyang failed in its second attempt to put a spy satellite into orbit.
In response, South Korea and the United States have strengthened their defense cooperation, organizing joint exercises as well as naval maneuvers with Japan.
Diplomacy at a standstill
Relations between the two Koreas are at their lowest point in years and diplomacy is at a standstill. On September 2, North Korea held a “tactical nuclear attack simulation” exercise with mock atomic warheads attached to two long-range cruise missiles that were fired into the ocean, according to KCNA.
The state agency had presented this operation as a response to joint military activities between Washington and Seoul which, according to it, have aggravated tensions in the region.
Mr Kim's week-long visit to Russia, his first abroad since the coronavirus pandemic, has reignited Western fears that Moscow and Pyongyang will defy sanctions. Moscow is reportedly interested in purchasing North Korean munitions for its Ukraine offensive, while Pyongyang would like Russia's help in developing its missile program.
