Asia, North Korea | featured news

A half dozen ominous new North Korean missiles showcased at a lavish military parade were clumsy fakes, analysts say, casting more doubt on the country's claims of military prowess after its recent rocket launch failure....

North Korea on Monday accused the South’s government and news media of slandering its leadership and threatened “special actions” by the military.

China has provided some assistance to North Korea's missile program, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Thursday, a week after the hermit state's failed rocket launch triggered international condemnation.

N. Korea's Kim Jong Un, during celebration, addresses public for first time since Friday's failed rocket launch.

The United States will not go forward with planned food aid to North Korea, the White House said on Friday, after the impoverished nation unsuccessfully tried to launch a long-range missile which Washington had warned would have consequences.

North Korea said its much hyped long-range rocket launch failed on Friday, in a very rare and embarrassing public admission of failure by the hermit state and a blow for its new young leader who faces international outrage over the attempt.

North Korea did not launch its long-range rocket Thursday, but the country reiterated a message that it shouldn’t be punished when it goes ahead with the blast sometime within its stated five-day window.

A joke circulating among officials in Beijing pretty much underlines the bind China is in over North Korea's plans to send a satellite into space. North Korea's young ruler Kim Jong-un phones a Chinese leader to tell him about timing of the planned rocket launch. "When will it be?" asks the Chinese leader. Kim replies: "Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four..."

North Korea could carry out a controversial rocket launch this week, straining further the ties between the nuclear-armed state and other countries in the region.

South Korean news outlets quoted anonymous government sources as saying that satellite images of a growing pile of earth at a nuclear site might signal plans for a test.