Indian envoy warns of 'big red line,' days after charges laid in Nijjar case
India's envoy to Canada insists relations between the two countries are positive overall, despite what he describes as 'a lot of noise.'
North Korea fired a short-range missile into the sea Tuesday at nearly the same moment its UN diplomat was decrying the U.S.'s "hostile policy" against it, in an apparent return to its pattern of mixing weapons displays with peace overtures to wrest outside concessions.
The launch, its third round of weapons firings this month, came only three days after North Korea repeated its offer for conditional talks with South Korea. Some experts say the latest missile launch was likely meant to test how South Korea would respond as North Korea needs Seoul to persuade Washington to ease economic sanctions and make other concessions.
In an emergency National Security Council meeting, the South Korean government expressed regret over what it called "a short-range missile launch" by the North. South Korea's military earlier said the object fired from North Korea's mountainous northern Jagang province flew toward the waters off the North's eastern coast. Further details of the launch were being analyzed.
The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said the launch didn't pose an immediate threat but highlighted "the destabilizing impact of (North Korea's) illicit weapons program." Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said North Korea fired "what could be a ballistic missile" and that his government stepped up its vigilance and surveillance.
A ballistic missile launch would violate a UN Security Council ban on North Korean ballistic activities, but the council typically doesn't impose new sanctions on North Korea for launches of short-range weapons.
The launch came after Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, reached out to Seoul twice on Friday and Saturday, saying her country was open to resuming talks and reconciliatory steps if conditions are met. She criticized Seoul for calling Pyongyang's previous missile tests a provocation and demanded it abandon "unfair double-dealing standards" and "hostile policies."
Her overture followed the North's two previous rounds of missile launches this month -- the first one with a newly developed cruise missile and the other with a ballistic missile fired from a train, a new launch platform. Those launches demonstrated North Korea's ability to attack targets in South Korea and Japan, both key U.S. allies where a total of 80,000 American troops are stationed.
Tuesday's launch "was like testing the South Korean government to see if it would impose a double standard and call it a provocation," said analyst Shin Beomchul with the Seoul-based Korea Research Institute for National Strategy. He said North Korea's status as a nuclear state would be solidified if South Korea and others fail to respond strongly.
Kim Dong-yub, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, said North Korea may have tested a new missile such as a hypersonic glide vehicle that was among an array of high-tech weapons Kim Jong Un has vowed to procure.
South Korea has called Kim Yo Jong's openness to talks "meaningful" but urged North Korea to restore communication channels before any talks between the rivals can be arranged.
The inter-Korean communication lines have remained largely dormant for about 15 months, so restoring them could be a yardstick to assess how serious the North is about its offer. Seoul's Unification Ministry said Tuesday North Korea remains unresponsive to South Korea's attempts to exchange messages over the channels.
At nearly the same time as Tuesday's launch, North Korean Ambassador Kim Song used his speech on the last day of the UN General Assembly's annual high-level meeting to justify his country's development of a "war deterrent" to defend itself against U.S. threats.
"The possible outbreak of a new war on the Korean Peninsula is contained not because of the U.S.'s mercy on the DPRK, it is because our state is growing a reliable deterrent that can control the hostile forces in an attempted military invasion," Kim said. DPRK refers to Democratic People's Republic of Korea, North Korea's official name.
Kim Yo Jong's offer of conditional talks was a response to South Korean President Moon Jae-in's renewed calls for a political declaration to end the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty, leaving the peninsula in a technical state of war.
The three-year conflict pitted South Korea and U.S.-led UN forces against North Korea and China and killed 1 million to 2 million people. In his own speech at the UN last week, Moon proposed the end-of-the-war declaration be signed among the two Koreas, the U.S. and China.
After the North's launch Tuesday, Moon ordered officials to examine its latest weapons firing and previous outreach in a comprehensive manner before formulating countermeasures, according to Moon's office.
A U.S.-led diplomatic effort aimed at convincing North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons in return for economic and political benefits has been stalled 2 1/2 years. U.S. officials have repeatedly expressed hopes for further talks but have also made it clear the long-term sanctions imposed on North Korea will stay in place until the North takes concrete steps toward denuclearization.
While North Korea has tested short-range weapons and vowed to continue building its nuclear arsenal, Kim Jong Un has maintained a moratorium on testing longer-range weapons capable of reaching the American homeland, an indication he wants to keep the chances for future diplomacy with the U.S. alive.
------
Associated Press writers Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul, Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.
India's envoy to Canada insists relations between the two countries are positive overall, despite what he describes as 'a lot of noise.'
Footage from dozens of security cameras in the area of Drake’s Bridle Path mansion could be the key to identifying the suspect responsible for shooting and seriously injuring a security guard outside the rapper’s sprawling home early Tuesday morning, a former Toronto homicide detective says.
With Donald Trump sitting just feet away, Stormy Daniels testified Tuesday at the former president's hush money trial about a sexual encounter the porn actor says they had in 2006 that resulted in her being paid to keep silent during the presidential race 10 years later.
Two Nova Scotia men are dead after a boat they were travelling in sank in the Annapolis River in Granville Centre, N.S., on Monday.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
Susan Buckner, best known for playing peppy Rydell High School cheerleader Patty Simcox in the 1978 classic movie musical 'Grease,' has died. She was 72.
Accused killer Jeremy Skibicki could have a challenging time convincing a judge that he is not criminally responsible for the deaths of four Indigenous women, a legal analyst says.
A Calgary bylaw requiring businesses to charge a minimum bag fee and only provide single-use items when requested has officially been tossed.
The CFL suspended Toronto Argonauts quarterback Chad Kelly for at least nine regular-season games Tuesday following its investigation into a lawsuit filed by a former strength-and-conditioning coach against both the player and club.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.