North Korea displayed its submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) for the first time on Saturday ahead of a massive military parade in the capital, Pyongyang.
The country also warned the United States on Saturday to end its “military hysteria” or face retaliation as a U.S. aircraft carrier group steamed towards the region and the reclusive state marked the 105th birth anniversary of its founding father.
WATCH: New weapons on display at North Korean military parade
Concern has grown since the U.S. Navy fired 59 Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airfield last week in response to a deadly gas attack. That raised questions about U.S. President Donald Trump‘s plans for North Korea, which has conducted missile and nuclear tests in defiance of U.N. and unilateral sanctions.
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The North‘s warning, carried by its KCNA news agency, came as leader Kim Jong Un arrived at Pyongyang’s main Kim Il Sung square, named after his grandfather, for a military parade marking the “Day of the Sun,” the birth anniversary of the state’s founding father.
Goose-stepping soldiers and marching bands filled the square, next to the Taedonggang River that flows through Pyongyang, in the hazy spring sunshine as tanks, multiple launch rocket systems and other weapons waited to parade.
READ MORE: White House says Trump and China will press North Korea to abandon nuclear program
North Korea, still technically at war with the South after their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce but not a treaty, has on occasion conducted missile or nuclear tests to coincide with big political events and often threatens the United States, South Korea and Japan.
“All the brigandish provocative moves of the U.S. in the political, economic and military fields pursuant to its hostile policy toward the DPRK will thoroughly be foiled through the toughest counteraction of the army and people of the DPRK,” KCNA said, citing a spokesman for the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army.
DPRK stands for the official name of North Korea, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
“Our toughest counteraction against the U.S. and its vassal forces will be taken in such a merciless manner as not to allow the aggressors to survive.”
‘Open threat’
The state news agency said the Trump administration’s “serious military hysteria” had reached a “dangerous phase which can no longer be overlooked.”
The United States has warned that a policy of “strategic patience” with North Korea is over. U.S. Vice President Mike Pence travels to South Korea on Sunday on a long-planned 10-day trip to Asia.
China, North Korea‘s sole major ally and neighbor which nevertheless opposes its weapons program, on Friday again called for talks to defuse the crisis.
WATCH: North Korea opens new residential complex that is ‘scarier’ than hundreds of nuclear bombs’
“We call on all parties to refrain from provoking and threatening each other, whether in words or actions, and not let the situation get to an irreversible and unmanageable stage,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told reporters in Beijing.
North Korea on Friday denounced the United States for bringing “huge nuclear strategic assets” to the region as the USS Carl Vinson strike group with a flag-ship nuclear-powered aircraft carrier steamed closer, and said it stood ready to strike back.
READ MORE: COMMENTARY: It’s time to confront North Korea (mind you, I said the same thing about Iraq)
“The Trump administration, which made a surprise guided cruise-missile strike on Syria on April 6, has entered the path of open threat and blackmail,” KCNA quoted the military as saying in a statement.
“The army and people of the DPRK will as ever courageously counter those who encroach upon the dignity and sovereignty of the DPRK and will always mercilessly ravage all provocative options of the U.S. with Korean-style toughest counteraction.”
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