(LEAD) N.K. leader urges troops to get combat-ready: Seoul minister
2015/02/11 18:15
By Oh Seok-min
SEOUL, Feb. 11 (Yonhap) -- North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has actively toured military units to encourage his troops to be fully prepared to fight as part of efforts to consolidate his regime, Seoul's defense minister said Wednesday.
"Since November when the North began to stage winter drills, Kim has visited military units 10 times. While leading some aggressive exercises, he has encouraged the military to complete their readiness this year to fight," Defense Minister Han Min-koo told lawmakers.
While carrying out an increasing number of intensive military maneuvers, North Korea has "forward-deployed anti-aircraft guns near the military demarcation line and launched relevant drills in order to counter the leaflets sent by our civic groups," Han added.
Some conservative civic groups here have sent leaflets across the inter-Korean border into the communist country, which criticize the authoritarian regime. Despite the North's repeated calls on the South to deter them, the Seoul government has refused to do so, citing the freedom of speech.
"Claiming our naval ships violated the inter-Korean border near the Northern Limit Line (NLL) in the Yellow Sea, the North has sent warnings and continued firing drills," Han noted.
The NLL is the de facto maritime border between the two Koreas, but the North does not recognize the line, demanding it be drawn further south.
In response, the South Korean military has maintained a solid deterrence posture under the South Korea-U.S. alliance mechanism, he added.
According to the authorities here, North Korea has been preparing for a full-scale war since last year after declaring 2015 the year of completing unification.
As the latest of its saber-rattling moves, North Korea fired five short-range missiles into the East Sea on Sunday, two days after it test-fired a new ultra-precision anti-ship rocket in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions.
North Korea leader Kim Jong-un watches the test-firing of a new anti-ship rocket, according to the North's state media on Feb. 7, 2015. (Yonhap file photo)
Asked about the possible deployment of an advanced U.S. missile defense system in South Korea, Han said the issue "should be regarded in security and national defense perspectives."
"The defense ministry now requires strategic ambiguity," Han said in response to a lawmaker's call to shed such ambiguity on the THAAD issue, while noting that the U.S. has not made any request to the Seoul government for consultations on the issue.
The U.S. has said it is considering deploying a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery to South Korea, citing evolving threats from North Korea. It is designed to shoot down short-, medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles at a higher altitude in their terminal phase using a hit-to-kill method.
The minister also said the THAAD "aims to guard against North Korea's nuclear and missile threats," countering lawmakers' criticism for "his failure to ease concern over the THAAD deployment raised by China."
During the South Korean and Chinese defense ministers' meeting last week in Seoul, China voiced concern over a possible deployment of the U.S. missile defense system in South Korea. The deployment could inflame tensions with China and Russia as they see the move as a threat to their security interests.
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