SEOUL, South Korea (AP) – North Korea responded Thursday to new sanctions from South Korea by firing short-range ballistic missiles into the sea in a show of defiance and vowing to “liquidate” all remaining South Korean assets at former cooperative projects in the North.
The moves are the latest in an escalating standoff between the Koreas that began in January when North Korea detonated what it said was an “H-bomb of justice,” its fourth nuclear test. Since then, the North has launched a long-range rocket and the South has shut a jointly run factory park, slapped sanctions on the North, and begun large-scale war games with the United States. North Korea responded by threatening nuclear strikes on South Korea and the U.S. mainland.
The missile firing Thursday came a day after North Korean media printed photos of what appeared to be a mock-up of a nuclear warhead.
The North’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea said in a statement Thursday that North Korea will “liquidate” South Korean assets at the closed factory park in the North Korean border town of Kaesong and at a scrapped tourism resort at Diamond Mountain. In a continuation of bellicose rhetoric that has spiked in recent weeks, it said North Korea will also impose “lethal” military, political and economic blows on the South Korean government to accelerate its “pitiable demise.”
South Korea’s government called the North Korean statement a “provocative act” and warned the North not to damage any South Korean assets.