The United States warned on Thursday that North Korea is preparing to carry out its first nuclear test of 2017 later this month.and reacted skeptically to Pyongyang’s announcement that it had just detected its first cases of covid-19.
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“The United States has concluded that North Korea may be prepared to conduct a (nuclear) test as early as this month, its seventh such test. We have shared this information with our allies,” the White House spokeswoman said. , Jen Psaki, at her daily press conference.
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Psaki’s warning fits with forecasts by various experts that the North Korean government could conduct such a test very soon, and is “consistent with recent public statements and destabilizing actions” by Pyongyang, the spokeswoman said.
US President Joe Biden plans to visit Seoul late next weekalthough Psaki declined to confirm whether he plans to travel to the DMZ, the four-kilometre-wide demilitarized strip separating the two Koreas.
North Korea test-fired what Seoul considered three short-range ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan (called the East Sea in the two Koreas) on Thursday, its 16th launch since the start of the year.
The North Korean government has ignored invitations from Seoul and Washington to resume talks on denuclearization, which has been stalled since the failed Hanoi summit in 2019.
Psaki also wryly commented that it is “remarkable” that North Korea has just announced that it has recorded its first case of covid-19, more than two years after the start of the pandemic, and said that the US has no plans to deliver vaccines to that country.
He added that North Korea “has repeatedly refused to receive donations” of vaccines. of the COVAX international mechanism, and believed that this means “exploiting its own citizens, by not accepting this type of aid”.
The hermetic country declared this Thursday a state of “maximum emergency” after detecting its first cases of covid-19, a situation that worries because of how contagious the omicron variant has proven to be and the fact that North Korea has not put a single vaccine nor does it have an inoculation plan yet.
INTERNATIONAL WRITING
*With information from Eph.
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