KNPC Spokesman Blasts U.S.-Japan War Drills

Pyongyang, February 22 (KCNA) -- A spokesman for the Korean National Peace Committee in a statement Thursday accused the U.S. and Japanese warmongers of staging "combined air-defence and missile-shielding drill" from Feb. 16 under the pretext of tackling "threats" from the DPRK's ballistic rocket and fighters.

The exercises which will last until Feb. 23 reportedly include the inspection of the system for joint detection, tracking and interception of the DPRK's ballistic rockets and fighters through the coordinated operation of the air-defence network of the U.S. and Japan, and also the interception drill of Patriot missile units under the Japan Air "Self-Defense Force" and the emergency sortie drill of its fighters.

The recent drill assumes greater bellicosity and danger as its scope has been expanded as never before with the involvement of the Japan Air SDF and U.S. marines and air force units as well as the Japan Maritime SDF and units of the U.S. navy.

Branding this as a ferocious gangster-like act aimed to tarnish the hard-won atmosphere for the improvement of the north-south ties and for peace on the Korean peninsula, and as a dangerous military provocation to ignite the train of a war, the statement said:

The American empire is a heinous rogue state which seeks to maintain a military edge and achieve its hegemonic ambition under the signboard of "defence of allies" in Asia-Pacific. The islanders of Japan are crafty men eyeing militarist revival and the materialization of their old dream of the "Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere" with the help of the U.S. master.

The reckless war hysteria of the U.S. and Japan proves who the chieftain standing against Korea's reconciliation and unity and harassing peace on the Korean peninsula is.

We will never remain an onlooker to the gangsters about to brandish swords.

The U.S. and Japanese reactionaries should not run wild, mindful that if they dare provoke the DPRK which has towered as a nuclear power in the East, a world-level strategic state, not properly facing up to the changed world, that will only endanger their security and existence. -0-