Periods of tension with North Korea come and go, but the situation on the Korean peninsula right now is the most volatile it has been in five years and it looks likely to get worse.

Over the past month the North has fired a missile over Japan, forcing residents to seek shelter; a hostile and provocative act. It has launched several other ballistic missiles, flown warplanes close to its border with South Korea and fired hundreds of shells of artillery into the sea, which have landed in a military buffer zone, created by the two Koreas in 2018 to keep peace. The two countries are technically still at war.

On Monday a North Korean merchant ship crossed the countries’ sea border, causing both sides to fire warning shots. South Korea says the incursion was intentional.

So, what is Kim Jong-un up to? There are three reasons North Korea tends to launch missiles – to test and improve its weapons technology, to send a political message to the world (primarily the US), and to impress its people at home and shore up loyalty to the regime.

It can be hard to decipher which of these ends Pyongyang’s actions serve, but this time Mr Kim has been explicit. State media has reported several times that the recent launches and drills are in response to military exercises being run by the US, South Korea and Japan. The North has blamed its enemies for escalating tensions and says its launches are a clear warning they should stop.

Washington, Seoul and Tokyo have been holding large-scale military exercises, separately and together, for the past two months, to show they are ready for a North Korean nuclear attack. There is little doubt these have antagonised Mr Kim, who has always viewed such exercises as his enemies rehearsing for an invasion. The reason North Korea started developing nuclear weapons in the first place was to stop itself from being invaded.

But there is a less explicit reason he could be upping the pressure now. Some believe may be preparing the ground for a more provocative test – the detonation of a nuclear weapon for the first time in five years, or even a small-scale attack on South Korea.

Last year he laid out a five-year plan, detailing all the new weapons he planned to develop. It included smaller battlefield nuclear bombs and the short-range missiles to carry them. The recent tests are evidence Mr Kim is not only working his way through this weapons wish list, but that he is training his troops to use them. He used some of the recent drills, he said, to simulate a nuclear attack on South Korea.

Now Mr Kim needs attention. He needs the world to notice the progress he has made, if he is one day to get harsh international sanctions on his country lifted. Sanctions haven’t stopped North Korea developing weapons, as they were designed to, but they are hurting its economy.

Talks aimed at reducing those sanctions have long stalled and North Korea is slipping down the global agenda. The world is far more concerned with the war in Ukraine, and the rise of an authoritarian China. President Biden’s position is that sanctions on North Korea can only be eased when it agrees to give up all its nuclear weapons.

In the meantime, Washington and Seoul have agreed to strengthen their defence of the Peninsula by holding the military exercises Pyongyang hates so much, and responding to its provocations with force. Following the North’s latest round of missile launches and drills, South Korea sent up warplanes and shot artillery of its own.

If Mr Kim is to get the US to negotiate on terms more favourable to him, he must prove how dangerous his country has become. Last month he declared North Korea to be a nuclear weapons state, a position he said was irreversible.

We should be worried about how assertive it seems to have become, said Kim Jong-dae, a former advisor in South Korea’s Defence Ministry. He pointed out how in the past North Korea has waited until US forces have finished their military exercises before retaliating. This time they fired artillery into the sea while exercises were ongoing.

“We have never seen this audacity and aggression before, it is different. It is the North acting like a nuclear state,” he said.

The US and South Korean governments believe preparations for North Korea’s seventh nuclear weapon test are complete and the North is waiting for the opportune political moment to act. An attractive window is opening, with China’s Communist Party Conference now over and the US midterm elections approaching.

Meanwhile South Korea is in the midst of yet another round of war games, with the US scheduled to join in. These may well provide Kim Jong-un with the pretext he has been waiting for.

World Opinions – BBC News

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North Korean cyber-attacks have stolen millions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency to fund the country’s missile programmes, a UN report briefed to media says.

Between 2020 and mid-2021 cyber-attackers stole more than $50m (£37m) of digital assets, investigators found.

Such attacks are an “important revenue source” for Pyongyang’s nuclear and ballistic missile programme, they said.

The findings were reportedly handed to the UN’s sanctions committee on Friday.

The cyber-attacks targeted at least three cryptocurrency exchanges in North America, Europe and Asia.

The report also referenced a study published last month by the security firm Chainalysis that suggested North Korean cyberattacks could have netted as much as $400m worth of digital assets last year.

And in 2019, the UN reported that North Korea had accumulated an estimated $2bn for its weapons of mass destruction programmes by using sophisticated cyber-attacks.

North Korea has been banned by the UN Security Council from carrying out nuclear tests and launching ballistic missiles.

However the UN report says that despite crippling sanctions, North Korea has been able to continue developing its nuclear and ballistic missile infrastructure.

It has also continued to seek material, technology and knowhow overseas, including through cyber means and joint scientific research.

The sanctions monitors said there had been a “marked acceleration” of missile testing by Pyongyang.

The US said on Friday that North Korea – formally known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) – carried out nine missile tests last month alone. .

“DPRK demonstrated increased capabilities for rapid deployment, wide mobility (including at sea), and improved resilience of its missile forces,” the sanctions monitors said.

On Friday, China and Russia refused to sign onto a statement condemning the proliferation of North Korea’s missile launches.

On Sunday, the US announced that its special representative for North Korea would meet with Japanese and South Korean officials later this week to discuss the situation.

The UN report also found that the humanitarian situation in North Korea was continuing to worsen. It said this was likely to be the result of the country’s decision to close its borders during the pandemic.

A lack of information from North Korea meant it was hard to determine how much suffering was being caused by international sanctions, it said.

World Opinions + BBC News

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North Korea has unveiled a new type of submarine-launched ballistic missile, described by state media as “the world’s most powerful weapon”.

Several of the missiles were displayed at a parade overseen by leader Kim Jong-un, reported state media.

The weapon’s actual capabilities remain unclear, as it is not known to have been tested.

The show of military strength comes days before the inauguration of Joe Biden as US president.

It also follows a rare political meeting where Mr Kim decried the US as his country’s “biggest enemy”.

Images released by North Korean state media showed at least four large black-and-white missiles being driven past flag-waving crowds.

Analysts noted it was a previously unseen weapon. “New year, new Pukguksong,” tweeted North Korea expert Ankit Panda, using the North Korean name for their submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).

Clad in a leather coat and fur hat, Mr Kim is pictured smiling and waving as he watched the display in Pyongyang’s Kim Il Sung Square, which also included infantry troops, artillery and tanks.

“The world’s most powerful weapon, submarine-launch ballistic missile, entered the square one after another, powerfully demonstrating the might of the revolutionary armed forces,” the official Korean Central News Agency said.

The event on Thursday did not showcase North Korea’s largest intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), which was unveiled at a much larger military parade in October. That colossal weapon is believed to be able to deliver a nuclear warhead to anywhere in the US, and its size had surprised even seasoned analysts when it was put on show last year.

The country’s latest display of its arsenal comes at the end of a five-yearly congress of the ruling Workers’ Party.

In his address to members last week, Mr Kim had pledged to expand North Korea’s nuclear weapons and military potential, outlining a list of desired weapons including long-range ballistic missiles capable of being launched from land or sea and “super-large warheads”.

He also said that the US was Pyongyang’s “biggest obstacle for our revolution and our biggest enemy… no matter who is in power, the true nature of its policy against North Korea will never change”.

Under Mr Kim’s leadership North Korea has made rapid progress in its weapons programme, which it says is necessary to defend itself against a possible US invasion.

The unveiling of the new missiles appears designed to send the incoming Biden administration a message of the North’s growing military prowess, say experts.

“They’d like us to notice that they’re getting more proficient with larger solid rocket boosters,” Mr Panda tweeted, noting what appeared to be new solid-fuel short-range ballistic missiles on display too. These missiles can be launched more quickly than liquid-fuelled varieties.

Over the last four years, Pyongyang has had an erratic relationship with the US under President Donald Trump’s administration. Mr Kim and Mr Trump engaged in mutual insults and threats of war before an unprecedented summit in Singapore in 2018 and declarations of love by the outgoing US leader.

Despite the apparent warming of relations, little concrete progress was made on negotiations over North Korea’s nuclear programme and a second summit in Hanoi in 2019 broke down after the US refused Pyongyang’s demands for sanctions relief.

World Opinions News – bbc.com

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