North Korea, Military | featured news

North Korea has plenty of military firepower even if its threat this week of a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the United States is a hollow one, with South Korea most at risk from the isolated regime's artillery and rockets.

North Korea is warning that it will strengthen its military and nuclear defenses in reaction to what it calls U.S. hostility toward Pyongyang....

South Korea has reached a landmark agreement with the United States to extend the range of Seoul's ballistic missiles by more than twice the current limit to counter the threat from North Korea, the government said on Sunday.

With a terse four-paragraph statement, North Korea on Monday announced the dismissal of its top military leader, the latest in what analysts describe as a series of increasingly bold shake-ups to strengthen support for young leader Kim Jong Eun.

Washington has urged the governments in Tokyo and Seoul to increase cooperation. But the pact triggered an uproar in South Korea, where resentment of Japan’s early 20th-century colonization remains raw and the public regards any sign of Japan’s growing military role with deep suspicion.

A treaty between South Korea and Japan will encourage the sharing of military data on their common concerns: North Korea’s threats and China’s military expansion.

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

North Korea announced on Saturday it has appointed Kim Jong-un, the anointed successor and youngest son of Kim Jong-il, as supreme commander of its 1.2 million-strong military, two days after official mourning for the late leader ended.

The South Korean military fired at a civilian plane near the Yellow Sea border with North Korea, mistaking it for one of the North's military planes, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported Saturday, citing a military source.

The U.S. Navy intercepted a North Korean ship suspected of carrying an illegal shipment of missile parts to Myanmar two weeks ago, the New York Times reported on late on Sunday, citing senior American officials.