Trump Retweets Image Depicting ‘CNN’ Squashed Beneath His Shoe

Trump Retweets Image Depicting 'CNN' Squashed Beneath His Shoe

Donald Trump retweeted the post of doctored image of him to his 45 million followers (File)
By OP 
President Donald Trump on Christmas Eve retweeted a doctored image with the CNN logo imposed on a bloodlike splatter under his shoe, prompting an outcry – with critics deeming the picture and its timing offensive.

The image had originated from a Twitter account named “oregon4TRUMP,” as a reply to one of Trump’s tweets boasting about his first-year achievements.
“So many things accomplished by the Trump Administration, perhaps more than any other President in first year,” Trump had tweeted Saturday afternoon. “Sadly, will never be reported correctly by the Fake News Media!”

“Thank you President TRUMP!!” oregon4TRUMP replied, adding an apparently altered image of Trump in the back of a car with the crushed CNN logo on the sole of his left shoe. The image had additional text superimposed on it that read, “WINNING.”
On Sunday morning, in between tweets promoting a conspiracy theory about FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and attacking “Fake News” and “Fake Polls,” Trump retweeted the image to his more than 45 million followers.

The tweet compelled Walter M. Shaub Jr., former director of the independent Office of Government Ethics, to again break a self-imposed holiday Twitter hiatus to admonish the president. Shaub resigned from his post in July amid clashes with the White House, and he has since been an outspoken critic of Trump on social media.
“The wannabe autocrat just retweeted an image depicting CNN’s blood on the sole of his shoe,” Shaub tweeted Sunday. “These colicky tweets reveal he’s hurting this weekend. They make him (and our country) look weak.”

Joe Walsh, a conservative radio host and former Republican congressman from Illinois, also criticized Trump for attacking CNN – and the FBI – on the morning of Christmas Eve.

“Mr President, put your phone down. It’s Christmas. Quit attacking people on Twitter,” Walsh tweeted. “Grow up sir. Have you no sense of decency? Go spend time with your family.”

CNN anchor Jake Tapper noted Trump’s tweet with a simple observation: “CNN-labeled blood on the sole of his shoe. Retweeted by the President of the United States on Christmas Eve.”
In response to Tapper, Jason Osborne, a former Trump campaign adviser, defended the image and accused Tapper of “(making) everything about your network.”

The image was of a bug because it “clearly has eyes,” Osborne insisted. He also argued that Trump may not have noticed the CNN logo at the bottom of his shoe and retweeted the picture because he liked the way he looked in it.

Tapper replied: “The president retweeted an image of blood labeled ‘CNN’ on the sole of his shoe. I noted it. Trump Adviser now faults *me* for ‘making this about’ CNN. God bless us, everyone.”

Trump has had a contentious relationship with the press since his campaign, regularly lashing out at certain media outlets – even individual journalists – and accusing many publications and news stations of being “fake news.” CNN has regularly been the subject of Trump’s attacks, on Twitter and in speeches. Earlier this month, after CNN apologized for mistakenly reporting the timing of a WikiLeaks-related email, Trump used the error as an opportunity to attack the network again.
“CNN apologized just a little while ago,” Trump said at a rally in Pensacola, Florida. “They apologized. Oh, thank you, CNN. Thank you so much. You should’ve been apologizing for the last two years.”

Sunday’s tweet was not the first time that Trump has shared a doctored image on Twitter, particularly related to CNN. In July – on another Sunday morning, just before Independence Day – Trump tweeted an edited video clip that showed him slamming a man with “CNN” superimposed on his head to the ground. In the video, Trump then throws punches at the man’s head, before walking away.

Trump appended the tweet with two hashtags: “#FraudNewsCNN” and “#FNN.”

That tweet prompted a round of condemnation from mostly Democratic lawmakers, who blasted Trump for being “crude, false, and unpresidential.” A little-known Reddit user claimed credit for the doctored CNN video; the fact that the president had sent it out to his millions of followers soon reverberated across r/The_Donald, a pro-Trump Reddit subgroup, as The Washington Post’s Avi Selk reported:
“Han——-Solo: ‘Holy s—!! I wake up and have my morning coffee and who retweets my s— post but the MAGA EMPORER himself!!! I am honored!!’

“Joy echoed across r/The_Donald, which a day earlier had been more interested in conspiracy theories about the Clintons killing people and stick-figure drawings of Californians embarrassing themselves.

“‘TWEETED by the PRESIDENT,’ one of many admirers wrote. ‘Now it’s confirmed that Trump sees our memes.’

“‘We all wish for such validation.'”

In September, a few days after the racially charged unrest in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a car plowed into counterprotesters rallying against white nationalists and killed a woman, Trump retweeted an image of a train running over a CNN reporter. “Fake news can’t stop the Trump train,” the image read. It was later removed from Trump’s account.


(THIS NEWS IS NOT GEBERATES BY ME IT IS AUTOMATICALLY SYNCED NEWS) 

North Korea says latest sanctions imposed by the UN are an ‘act of war’

Kim Jong-un’s government also reminded the US that it claims it can drop a nuclear weapon on the mainland
By OP 


The UN security council unanimously agrees new sanctions for North Korea
North Korea says that the UN’s latest sanctions are an “act of war”.
The international community has agreed not to allow North Korea to import huge amounts of oil and other goods in the hope of calming the nuclear situation. But North Korea’s foreign ministry only called the new rules an act of war, and promised that it would punish those who had agreed to it.
The UN security council unanimously agreed on the new sanctions in a vote on Friday. They were introduced in response to a recent intercontinental ballistic missile test, and it was hoped that by launching an economic punishment the government would slow down its attempts to develop nuclear weapons.

LIFE IN NORTH KOREA CAPTURED WITH A MOBILE PHONE

Farmer works in a field Getty Images

But the country hit back angrily, saying that the sanctions had strengthened its resolve and that it would look to strike against the US and the other countries who had supported the vote.
The UN resolution seeks to ban nearly 90 per cent of refined petroleum exports to North Korea by capping them at 500,000 barrels a year and, in a last-minute change, demands the repatriation of North Koreans working abroad within 24 months, instead of 12 months as first proposed.
The US-drafted resolution also caps crude oil supplies to North Korea at 4 million barrels a year, and commits the Council to further reductions if it were to conduct another nuclear test or launch another ICBM.
In a statement carried by the official KCNA news agency, North Korea’s foreign ministry said the US was terrified by its nuclear force and was getting “more and more frenzied in the moves to impose the harshest-ever sanctions and pressure on our country”.
The new resolution is tantamount to a complete economic blockade of North Korea, the ministry said.
“We define this ‘sanctions resolution’, rigged up by the US and its followers, as a grave infringement upon the sovereignty of our Republic, as an act of war violating peace and stability in the Korean peninsula and the region and categorically reject the ‘resolution’.”
On 29 November, North Korea said it successfully tested a new ICBM that put the US mainland within range of its nuclear weapons.
Its foreign ministry added that North Korea’s nuclear weapons are a self-defensive deterrence not in contradiction of international law.

“We will further consolidate our self-defensive nuclear deterrence aimed at fundamentally eradicating the US nuclear threats, blackmail and hostile moves by establishing the practical balance of force with the US,” the ministry said.
“The US should not forget even a second the entity of the DPRK, which rapidly emerged as a strategic state capable of posing a substantial nuclear threat to the US mainland,” it added, using the country’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
North Korea said those who voted for the sanctions would face Pyongyang’s wrath.
“Those countries that raised their hands in favour of this ‘sanctions resolution’ shall be held completely responsible for all the consequences to be caused by the ‘resolution’ and we will make sure for ever and ever that they pay heavy price for what they have done.”
Tension has been rising over North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes, which it pursues in defiance of years of UN Security Council resolutions, with bellicose rhetoric coming from both Pyongyang and the White House.
In November, North Korea demanded a halt to what it called “brutal sanctions”, saying a round imposed after its sixth and most powerful nuclear test on 3 September constituted genocide.

Smugglers who worked North Korea-China border seeing tough times under Kim, sanctions

By OP

JIAN, CHINA – The former smuggler sits on the floor by a muted TV set, smoking cheap North Korean cigarettes one after the other. His hands are rough from years of hard work. His belt is knotted to keep his pants from slipping around his pole-thin waist.
The mountains of North Korea, his homeland not even a mile away, fill the room’s only window.
He spent nearly all his 50-some years in those mountains, sometimes earning more than $1,500 in just one trip along the secret trails and quiet river crossings of the China-North Korea border. He smuggled everything from TVs to clothes into North Korea, a nation shaped by decades of repression and isolation. He smuggled out mushrooms, ginseng and the occasional bit of gold.
“I could bring in 10 televisions at once, the same thing for refrigerators,” he says, smiling broadly. “In the past, I could bring in so much stuff.”
But no more.
North Korea is changing, quietly but powerfully, with the rise of the young ruler Kim Jong Un echoing even to those secret trails. Increasing international sanctions have left a handful of well-connected Chinese businesses now controlling much of the trade — legal and otherwise — along the frontier. That’s bad news for the small-time smugglers who long dominated the border.
“It’s the smaller traders who are feeling the heat. They’re going to lay low,” says John Park, director of the Korea Working Group at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. “But this becomes an opportunity for larger companies with North Korean clients.”
In North Korea, smuggling is far more than a crime. For two decades, smugglers have secretly knitted the isolated country to the outside world, bringing in food during a brutal famine and, later on as a small consumer class began to grow, everything from Chinese car parts to DVDs of South Korean TV shows. They ferried in TVs and ferried out families looking to escape life in the North. Smuggling became a respected profession, offering thousands of poor villagers a road to the emerging middle class.
The troubles of this underground community today reflect the immense role that the frontier plays in the country’s economy, and offer a window into a secret world that outsiders almost never see. In rare detailed interviews, nearly a dozen people tied to smuggling networks, most either former smugglers or black market traders, say their world has been thrown into turmoil in the years since Kim Jong Un came to power in late 2011.
The 870-mile (1,400-km) border is the linchpin of North Korea’s economy, with China accounting for 90 percent of its trade.
While North Korea has faced international trade sanctions for over a decade because of its nuclear and missile programs, China only began significantly ratcheting up enforcement over the past year, amid a surge in Pyongyang weapons tests. Trade has declined amid the Chinese crackdown, but analysts say a range of products, from laborers to cellphone parts, still flows across the frontier, the path smoothed by bribes and powerful politicians in both countries.
As sanctions have tightened, the trade machine has simply grown more complex.
When North Korean coal exports were forbidden, shiploads were channeled through Russia to hide their origin, U.S. officials say. When North Korea’s overseas businesses faced scrutiny or closure, they opened front companies or hired Chinese middlemen. When buyers objected to clothing made in North Korea, factories reportedly began adding “made in China” labels. Goods are sometimes transferred from one ship to another at sea, investigators say, to camouflage trade with the North.
As this peculiar form of globalization reverberated along the border, many longtime smugglers simply couldn’t keep up.
“I used to make a lot of money,” says another ex-smuggler, a gravel-voiced Chinese man in his mid-40s now working as an occasional laborer in South Korea. “But it’s not like that today.”
It’s lunchtime in Ulsan, the industrial city where he has lived since leaving the border last year, but he’s sitting in a restaurant nursing both a bad hangover and a beer. For years the smuggling process had been straightforward, he says, with North Korean border units allowing him to bring his goods across in exchange for bribes. “These guys would just let the smuggling happen.”
The man, like all those interviewed with ties to smuggling, spoke on condition of anonymity, since he was admitting to breaking numerous laws. He is Chosonjok, from China’s ethnic Korean community. Many early smugglers were either Chosonjok or Chinese residents of North Korea, known as Hwagyo.
He made his career running scrap copper into China, communicating with his North Korean partners on Chinese mobile phones, which are illegal in the North but work sporadically in border areas.
Once a shipment was arranged, cars would be dispatched carrying tons of metal to isolated stretches of the Yalu River, which marks North Korea’s northeastern border with China.
Much of the region is deeply rural, with small mountains flanking the river and very few roads. Surveillance is often light outside the handful of cities. “Don’t accommodate border trespassers,” a sign warns in a small Chinese town. Even in security-obsessed North Korea, where getting to the border requires a special permit, guard posts are still sometimes more than a half-kilometer (a quarter-mile) apart.
There’s plenty of space for illegal work.
The copper smuggler would arrange for hired North Korean soldiers to haul the metal in 50-kg (110-pound) sacks to the Chinese shoreline, carrying the bags through shallow water or floating them on rafts made from inflated inner tubes. Cars waiting in China would then whisk the copper away.
For every shipment, he would send takeout meals, bottles of beer and snacks — especially pig’s feet — for the soldiers.
“I’m a kind-hearted person so I’d bring them lots of good food,” he growls.
On his best days, he says, he could move six tons of metal across the border, earning him upward of $3,600. He could do that a few times a year.
When demand dropped for copper he switched to North Korean rabbit fur, which he could sell to Chinese clothing manufacturers. Then, about two years ago, things grew increasingly difficult. North Korean border guards grew wary. Rumors spread of harsh punishments: “Anyone caught (helping smugglers) would be killed.” Eventually, his partners refused to work with him. “They told us they were too scared to do it any longer, no matter how much we were willing to pay.”
Smuggling has been part of life here for centuries, but began growing exponentially in the mid-1990s, when North Korea’s economy broke down and famine savaged the country. As government control loosened amid the turmoil, desperate Northerners began crossing the border into China, searching for food, work or something to trade. While the famine and the turmoil eventually eased, a quietly budding market economy held on.
As did the smugglers.
“When I was young, everyone wanted to be a soldier, a doctor or a teacher,” says a refugee in her late 40s, a former North Korean radio propagandist and black market trader now living outside Seoul. “But later on, after the famine, every child began dreaming of becoming a smuggler.”
At the house overlooking the North Korean mountains, the ex-smuggler says poverty pushed him into running goods illegally. He had a government-assigned job, like nearly all North Koreans, driving a truck in a small city. But official salaries can pay as little as 1,000 North Korean won — less than $1 — a month.
“It was the kind of money that would let you eat out — once,” he says, leaning back against the wall.
He began using his employer’s truck to ferry merchandise for small traders, who would buy goods from one of the growing number of semi-underground markets, then sell them in another.
“I traveled everywhere,” he says. “Something that was sold for 10 won here could be sold for 20 won at another place.”
Eventually he began crossing into China, buying TVs, stereos, refrigerators and clothing, then arranging for boats or rafts to ferry everything back home.
In an area where the line between trading and smuggling can be almost impossible to parse, where nearly everyone pays or takes bribes, he describes his work as an “authorized business,” since he’d paid officials to let him move his merchandise.
“From the outside it doesn’t look legitimate, but to the people on the inside, that’s just how the marketplace in the border region works,” said Park, the professor with the Korea Working Group. He has studied how a handful of Chinese companies have come to dominate the border as trade sanctions tightened, acting as intermediaries for North Korean firms and profiting from the increased risks.
While U.S. law effectively forbids American trade with North Korea, China has only selectively restricted commerce with the North. Pyongyang also does business legally with countries from Pakistan to Thailand, trading in everything from textiles to seafood.
The pressure on the small-time smugglers didn’t come all at once. Some trace it to the final years of longtime dictator Kim Jong Il, who died in December 2011. Others say it began under his son and successor, Kim Jong Un.
The younger Kim has launched a series of purges since coming to power, ousting and sometimes executing a series of powerful officials. The domino effect of those purges, with ever-lower officials being pushed aside, eventually reached the border.
“When your business depends on bribing border officials and the officials are being changed every 9-to-12 months, then that makes things all the harder,” said Justin Hastings, a University of Sydney scholar who studies North Korean trade networks. The smugglers’ most recent troubles, he believes, are from Chinese officials enforcing sanctions and “cracking down in ways they hadn’t done before.”
In 2012, North Korean border officials began ordering smugglers to “regulate” their businesses, says the ex-smuggler now living in China. Eventually, as the informal rules tightened, he was limited to what he could carry. His profits plummeted.
“I was only making enough money to pay for my travel expenses and my meals,” the he says. He left for China when his business collapsed, moving in with relatives.
Life was supposed to be easier on this side of the border. But he barely speaks Chinese, can’t find work and knows almost no one.
“All my friends are there in North Korea,” he says, nodding toward the mountains. His one solace is soju, a vodka-like alcohol loved in both Koreas. “I drink here at my home. One shot with each meal, every day.”

PHOTOS

search icon CLICK TO ENLARGE
North Korean men ride a makeshift raft made of fastened logs down the Yalu river that divides North Korea from the Chinese border town of Linjiang in northeastern China's Jilin province in August. North Korea is changing, quietly but powerfully, with the rise of the young ruler Kim Jong Un extending even to those secret trails, where business has turned bad for the small-time smugglers who long dominated the border. | APNorth Korean soldiers work on a fence along the banks of North Korea across from the Chinese border town of Jian in northeastern China's Jilin province in August. | APNorth Korean men rest near an apartment on the banks of North Korea across from the Chinese border town of Jian in northeastern China's Jilin province in August. | APA sign in Chinese and Korean warns against harboring or feeding North Koreans who cross into a village near Linjiang in northeastern China's Jilin province i August. | AP

World War 3: North Korea’s nuclear programme risks bringing world order to COLLAPSE

North Korea Kim Jong-un, Trump, Dr Lassina ZerboEXPRESS•GETTY

North Korea news: Dr Lassina Zerbo warned about not putting a stop to North Korea’s threat

NORTH KOREA must be stopped or other regimes will start to develop nuclear weapons

BY OP 
 has ramped up its nuclear and missile development over the past few months sparking huge World War 3 fears. 
President  has promised to “take care” of Kim Jong-un’s brutal regime but has not yet been successful. 
Speaking exclusively to Express.co.uk, Dr Lassina Zerbo, executive secretary for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO) said North Korea must be stopped soon, or the globe may face the dire consequences. 
He said: “This is precisely the big risk if the situation continues in the Korean peninsula. 
“We have the Non-Proliferation Treaty, that was set forward to try to reduce the proliferation of nuclear weapon and this is how the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty came into play. 
“If the Korean peninsula situation doesn’t find a suitable solution for the international community, the risk is others might come unilaterally, I’m not going to name anyone, but people might think ‘okay if the Koreans can do it why not us?’
“That is the risk to the Proliferation Treaty and to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty too.”
Mr Zerbo added that it was the only region where nuclear testing was happening and there was a “fear” over not responding. 
“There is a fear that if nothing is done, what temptation do we give to the rest of the world and to others to think, ‘if this is the way to get listened to, why don’t we start?’ 
“That’s the risk that we see, that is why we say and we repeat, that stopping testing in the Korean peninsula could be a first step for everlasting peace, not just for this region but also for the world.”
Mr Zerbo called for nuclear testing to be banned in the Korean peninsula and across the world, but the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty to ban nuclear explosions, which has been signed by 183 countries and ratified by 166 countries is yet to be passed. 
Thirteen countries including North Korea has neither signed nor ratified. Another seventeen countries including Iran, China and the US has signed but not ratified.
The warnings from Dr Zerbo come as the CTBTO monitors the globe for evidence of nuclear tests and reported when 200 North Koreans were killed when a tunnel collapsed in October caused by nuclear testing in September. 
North Korea’s most recent missile test took place on November 29, and the regime said the Hwasong-15 missile flew 590 miles during its 53-minute flight before landing in the sea new Japan.
The missile launch was a more advanced missile compared to the Hwasong-14 which North Korea tested back in July. Nuclear experts have claimed that North Korea has yet to deliver a nuclear warhead on top of an ICBM.
After the missile test  declared that the North had “finally realised the great historic cause of completing the state nuclear force”.
President Donald Trump called on both Russia and China to help extinguish the threat of North Korea
The President also said that he had “no choice” but must “take care” of the hermit kingdom’s threat.
On Monday the Trump administration unveiled its National Security Strategy which detailed the challenge posed by North Korea’s nuclear programme to the US.
The report read: “North Korea is ruled as a ruthless dictatorship without regard for human dignity. For more than 25 years, it has pursued nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles in defiance of every commitment it has made. 
“Today, these missiles and weapons threaten the United States and our allies. The longer we ignore threats from countries determined to proliferate and develop weapons of mass destruction, the worse such threats become, and the fewer defensive options we have.”
South Korean and U.S. Marines take part in a winter military drill in Pyeongchang
“); left: 17px; opacity: 1; pointer-events: all; position: absolute; top: 100.844px; transform: translateY(-50%); visibility: visible; width: 23px; z-index: 10;” tabindex=”0″>
“); opacity: 1; pointer-events: all; position: absolute; right: 17px; top: 100.844px; transform: translateY(-50%); visibility: visible; width: 23px; z-index: 10;” tabindex=”0″>
In response to the report, a foreign ministry spokesman for Kim Jong-un branded the Trump administration of being “arrogant” as it sent another fiery warning. 
The spokesman added: “The international society should remain vigilant against the manoeuvres of the gang of Trump to invade and control the DPRK by igniting a nuclear war at any cost in the Korean peninsula.
“And see through the ulterior motive behind the US’ repeated talk of dialogue, designed to cover up its evil intention and mock the world.
“As the US set its diplomatic and security policy at crushing us militarily and is publicly aiming a sword at us, we will make the US bitterly regret its strategy with our cannons.”

Preparing for World War 3? Russia’s submarines SWARM Med at highest rate since Cold War

RussiaGETTY

Russia does not border the Mediterranean sea, however Moscow has managed to muscle into the region

RUSSIAN submarine activity is at its highest levels since the cold war as Putin’s navy develop a stronghold in the mediterranean, it has been revealed

By OP 
Rear Admiral Andrew Lennon, Nato submarine forces commander has warned Putin’s submarine activity has been significantly boosted by “strong investment” in the Kremlin’s naval wing – which fell into disrepute in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union.
He said: “Russian submarine activity is higher now in the last three years than it has been since the cold war.
“What we have observed over the past three years are more deployments annually of Russian submarines away from their local waters than we have observed in the prior decade.”
Russia does not border the mediterranean sea, however Moscow has managed to muscle into the region after developing a naval base in Syria thanks to Putin ally Bashar-al Assad.
And NATO officials have grown increasingly concerned over the former soviet state’s activities around data cables between the US and Europe.
Admiral Lennon claimed Nato had spotted “a lot of activity” from six of the Kremlin’s new Kilo-class diesel-electric submarines in the Black Sea and the Mediterranean.
He added Russia had “clearly taking an interest in Nato nations’ undersea infrastructure” including the US-European data links.
The submarine buildup includes one converted ballistic missile submarine capable of despatching smaller research vessels.
PutinGETTY

One converted ballistic missile submarine is capable of despatching smaller research vessels

He said: “We believe they may be equipped to manipulate objects on the ocean floor, so that’s clearly a concern because our nations rely so much on the internet and communications.”
The concentration of underwater vessels also means Nato has to commit units to monitor Russian activity.
But undersea monitoring has become even trickier as Moscow’s subs get quieter and freight traffic across the mediterranean makes the sea noisier.
Earlier this month the head of Britain’s Armed Forces Sir Stuart Peach warmed  economy, trade and communications networks underwater could be snuffed out by undercover Russian operatives in a “catastrophic” sting.
SubmarineGETTY

utin’s submarine activity has been boosted by ‘strong investment’ in the Kremlin’s naval wing

He said Britain was braced for any disruption to the vital cables on the sea bed which could have a “potentially catastrophic” economic effect.
Fears are growing that Russia could target Britain’s underwater cables which link the UK’s internet cables and phone network to the international community.
Sir Stuart told an audience at the Royal United Services Institute: “There is a new risk to our life, which is the vulnerability of the cables that criss-cross the seas. 
“Imagine a scenario where those cables are cut or disrupted, which would immediately and potentially catastrophically affect both our economy and other ways of living.”
Sir Stuart added: “in addition to new ships and submarines continues to perfect both unconventional capabilities and information warfare.
“Therefore we must continue to develop our maritime forces, with our allies, to match Russian fleet modernisation.”

North Korea in ‘hot phase’: Russia WILL act with China & India to protect Kim – WW3 threat

China and Russia could protect KimGETTY•REUTERS

China and Russia could protect Kim

RUSSIA has warned the stand-off between the US and North Korea is moving towards a “hot phase” as fears continue

By OP 
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the risks of tensions escalating were very high.
And he announced Russia, India and China were ready to intervene in the conflict.
Mr Lavrov insisted the row over Pyongyang’s missiles programme could only be solved through diplomatic means
He was speaking after a ministerial meeting between Russia, India and China.
Mr Lavrov warned: “We shared our opinions regarding the situation on the Korean Peninsula that remains extremely tense.
“We pointed to the absence of an alternative to the solution of the specified problem solely by political and diplomatic means in line with the Russian-Chinese roadmap.”
Diplomatic tensions have soared between Washington and Pyongyang again in recent weeks over Kim Jong-un’s military ambitions.
But China and Russia have vowed to stand-by the otherwise diplomatically isolated nation.
It comes after Russian armed forces chief General Valery Gerasimov warned military exercises by Japan, South Korea and the US were causing “hysteria” on the peninsula.
He said: “Carrying out military training in regions surrounding North Korea will only heighten hysteria and make the situation unstable.”
This week’s exercise by the allies will see them share information on tracking ballistic missiles.
That happened just days after large-scale drills by US and South Korean forces that North Korea said made the outbreak of war “an established fact”.
China, the North’s main trading partner, has also repeatedly called for the United States and South Korea to stop their exercises.
North Korea has continued firing missilesGETTY

North Korea has continued firing missiles

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang, asked in Beijing about the new drills, said the situation was a vicious cycle.
He said: ”All relevant parties should do is still to completely, precisely and fully implement the relevant UN Security Council resolutions toward North Korea, and do more for regional peace and stability and to get all parties back to the negotiating table. 
“Not the opposite, mutual provocation.”
China’s Defence Ministry said yesterday it had begun a joint simulated anti-missile drill with Russia in Beijing.
It said the exercise which had “important meaning” for both countries in facing the threat from missiles but claimed it was not aimed at any third party.
North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un is seen during the inspection of a potato flour factory in this undated photo released by North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang
“); left: 17px; opacity: 1; pointer-events: all; position: absolute; top: 100.844px; transform: translateY(-50%); visibility: visible; width: 23px; z-index: 10;” tabindex=”0″>
“); opacity: 1; pointer-events: all; position: absolute; right: 17px; top: 100.844px; transform: translateY(-50%); visibility: visible; width: 23px; z-index: 10;” tabindex=”0″>
The hermit state has defiantly continued its testing of ballistic missiles as angry rhetoric tyrant Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump continues.
On November 29, it test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile which it said was its most advanced yet, capable of reaching the mainland United States.
After the secretive state’s most recent missile launch, it warned it was now capable of striking any country in the world.
And experts warned this week that new submarine-launched missiles posed a severe threat to the US
China and Russia share a stance on North KoreaGETTY

China and Russia share a stance on North Korea

Mr Trump has said the US could take military action against the regime, promising “fire and fury”. 
But US UN Ambassador Nikki Haley ahs insisted the US will take the Korean situation “into our own hands” if China refuses to do more.
She told Fox News: “We’re putting as much pressure on them as we can. 
“The last time they completely cut off the oil, North Korea came to the table. 
Kim Jong-un could be protected by PutinGETTY

Kim Jong-un could be protected by Putin

“And so we’ve told China they’ve got to do more. 
“If they don’t do more, we’re going to take it into our own hands and then we’ll start to deal with secondary sanctions.”
And she said new sanctions against the North were having an effect and leaving Pyongyang “stressed out”.
She said: “What we have managed to do is the United States has led, and the international community is all with us, in isolating North Korea.
“That’s a very important move. They feel it, they are getting paranoid, they’re stressed out about it but we are going to continue to keep up the pressure.”

USA v North Korea? Will the US attack North Korea?

NORTH Korea has warned that it will defend itself against US aggression with a “powerful force of arms”. But is there a risk that the US could attack North Korea?

By OP 

Trump could start war with North Koreawarns former MI6 chief

Play Video

 
Tensions have escalated after America sent an aircraft carrier to waters off the Korean peninsula in response to several provocative missile launches by Kim Jong-un’s regime. 
North Korea’s state-owned news agency KCNA quoted the Foreign Ministry as saying Trump’s deployment showed “reckless moves for invading” that had now “reached a serious phase”.
The statement added: “We will hold the US wholly accountable for the catastrophic consequences to be entailed by its outrageous actions.”
Although the US Navy strike group has been sent towards the Korean peninsula, Washington has previously leaned towards sanctions and pressure to deter North Korea. 
The US is highly unlikely to launch an attack on North Korea because the move could possibly escalate tensions all the way to nuclear war.
But the Trump administrations is keeping all options on the table, with Donald Trump tweeting: “North Korea is looking for trouble.
“If China decides to help, that would be great. If not, we will solve the problem without them!” 
Neverthless America recognises that the importance of having a joint approach with China, which remains North Korea’s most important trading partner and ally in the region. 
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Donald Trump and Xi Jinping had “extensive discussions around the dangerous situation in North Korea” at a summit at in Florida last week. 
“President Xi clearly understands, and I think agrees, that the situation has intensified and has reached a certain level of threat that action has to be taken,” he told CBS’s Face the Nation. 
Mr Tillerson did not elaborate on what those actions might be but his comments suggest that the Trump administration’s position may be hardening on North Korea’s nuclear programme. 
Donald Trump and Xi JinpingReuters Getty

Donald Trump and Xi Jinping discussed North Korea at a summit in Florida last week

On Monday China and South Korea agreed to slap tougher sanctions on North Korea if the country carries out nuclear or long-range missile tests, according to an official in Seoul
International tensions have been heightened after the US President ordered missile strikes on a Syrian airbase in response to a deadly chemical attack by the Assad regime in Syria. 
Iran and Russia – key allies of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad – have indicated that the US strike on Friday crossed ‘red lines’ and they would respond to any new aggression. 
North Korea is still struggling to develop nuclear-headed airborne missiles, it is fast increasing its underwater military power.
The country possesses numerous submarines, which it has used with devastating effect in the past, with fears they are now being adapted to fire nuclear weapons. 
Even more worrying is the submarines’ ability to ‘disappear’ and avoid detection. In 2015 around 50 went missing, setting alarm bells ringing in Seoul and Tokyo.

Rex Tillerson announces aggressiveapproach towards North Korea

Play Video

 
Former MI6 head Sir John Sawers has warned that tensions with North Korea were actually a much bigger threat to world peace than the war in Syria. 
“If you are looking for a world crisis which could bring about the dangers of a clash between great powers then North Korea is a bigger concern than Syria,” he told BBC Four’s Today programme. 
“I think what the Chinese are beginning to understand is that if this can’t be solved peaceably through negotiations, through pressure, then there is serious risk that the US will have only one option left, which is the military option.”
He said that the Americans have strengthened forces in the Korean Peninsula, deployed a battle group and demonstrated that the “US was willing to use force against another state to uphold international order”. 

Inside North Korea: The pictures Kim Jong-un doesn’t want you to see

Mon, November 27, 2017

Photographer Eric Lafforgue ventured to North Korea six times. Thanks to digital memory cards, he was able to save photos that was forbidden to take inside the segregated state

  • Taking pictures in the DMZ is easy, but if you come too close to the soldiers, they stop you [Eric Lafforgue/Exclusivepix Medi]
    ERIC LAFFORGUE/EXCLUSIVEPIX MEDI
    1 of 69
    Taking pictures in the DMZ is easy, but if you come too close to the soldiers, they stop you [Eric Lafforgue/Exclusivepix Medi]
Taking pictures in the DMZ is easy, but if you come too close to the soldiers, they stop youA child watching a screen showing a pistol at the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA general view of the entrance to the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA child playing a tank-themed computer game at the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA general view of the entrance to a computer library of the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA general view of a hall inside the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA guide standing before a model of a power station at the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA girl sits before an interactive exhibit at the 'Sci-Tech complex' in PyongyangA rare example of an undisciplined kid in North Korea. The bus was driving in the small roads of Samijyon in the north, when this kid stood in the middle of the roadIn the art center of Pyongyang, we experienced a power outage, a daily event the North Koreans hate to show. When it happens, they tell you it's because of the american embargoOn the highways, you can see trucks loaded with coal, since North Korea has big problem getting oil like during WW2
He added: “This is all part of a move, part of a calculation by the Trump administration that North Korea has to be treated very seriously, a very high priority.
“And ultimately it needs a joint US Chinese approach to deal with this if we are to avoid a further conflict on that peninsula.”

World War 3 fears as INDIA wades into North Korea row – relations at breaking point

THE North Korea nuclear crisis took another turn today when India refused to cut ties with despot Kim Jong-un despite pressure from the United States.

BY OP

US General: We are poised to dosomething to North Korea

Play Video

 is on relatively friendly terms with India, with both states maintaining embassies in their respective capital cities. 
While India is a critic of North Korea’s aim of becoming a nuclear power, the country still exports tens of millions of pounds worth of goods to the hermit state every year. 
And a BBC survey in 2014 revealed almost one-quarter of all Indians believe North Korea is having a positive impact on the world. 
In recent months the US has been pushing for India to cut ties with North Korea, a request which was slapped down today. 

Inside Kim’s secret army: North Korean military laid bare in smuggled-out pictures

Mon, October 23, 2017

The true face of Kim Jong un’s army has been laid bare in shocking new images smuggled out of North Korea

  • [Pen News]
    PEN NEWS
    1 of 21
    A female soldier on duty in high heels [Pen News]
India’s Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj said India only conducted “minimal” trade with North Korea and its embassy staff had already been pared down in recent years. 
And in April, in line with UN sanctions due to North Korea’s nuclear tests, India banned almost all trade with the rogue state. 
But today India refused to shut downits embassy, which is located in Pyongyang, a move which angered the US.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said this showed India was not serious about alienating putting pressure on North Korea to end its reckless nuclear war programme. 
He said: “I think they just indicated they think that office has a value as a conduit for communications.”
Mr Tillerson said he was working towards better relations with India in spite of this issue. 
North Korea USA IndiaGETTY

North Korea and India are on relatively friendly terms

He said: “The US has had positive relations with India for 70 years but it is never quite moved to that next level, and I think that is in part due to actions on both sides.
“I had a very comprehensive discussion on economic and security links with Prime Minister Modi, National Security Advisor Doval, and Foreign Affairs Minister Swaraj
North Korea USA IndiaGETTY

Kim Jong-un has refused to bow to international pressure and cancel his nuclear programme

“It is essential that our two democracies work together to address the challenges facing our people.”
It comes after Russia put Western powers on alert with a series of missile tests – four of which were launched by Vladimir Putin himself. 
Amid an ever-tightening spiral of threat and counter-threat on the Korean peninsula, Russia’s war games are being seen as a deliberately provocative show of force to Washington

REVEALED: Kim Jong-Un plans SHOCK ‘mass destruction’ Christmas blast amid World War 3 fear

KIM JONG-UN is planning a shock missile launch just before Christmas according to leading experts – amid escalating fears of an outbreak of war on the Korean peninsula.

By OP 

Kim Jong-Un plans SHOCK Christmaswar threat

Play Video

 
A leading US thinktank has revealed the exact date for the next North Korean ballistic missile test – and it looks set to come just before Christmas.
Kim Jong-Un will send a terrifying message if he goes ahead with the planned Christmas blast in just over three weeks time.
According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the next “provocation” will take place on December 17.
Kim Jong-Un GETTY

Kim Jong-Un may be planning a shock Christmas missile blast

North KoreaGETTY

Speculation has been rising over when the next missile launch will take place in North KoreaThe shock prediction followed an unprecedented data analysis which showed there was “elevated chances of provocations over the next 14 to 30 days”.

Speculation has been mounting over when North Korea will next conduct a missile test after the communist regime has remained quiet for over two months now.
An international expert from the Washington DC-based thinktank said the planned test means a “ballistic missile test expected on 17th of December”.
This date coincides with the death of Kim Jong-Un’s father, Kim Jong-Il, who passed away nearly six years ago. 
The launch will involve a “demonstration of a weapon of mass destruction”, which will follow an annual military exercise in the country that month.
North Korean ballistic missile testGETTY
A leading US thinktank has revealed the exact date for the next North Korean ballistic missile tes
hinktank institute claims December has usually seen a period of “high missile test activity” by the regime in the past five years. 
The absence of any recent missile tests has left international monitors puzzled after no warning was issued following this month’s South Korean-US military drills. 
To the surprise of outside commentators, North Korea has also not yet responded to the US re-designation of the regime as sponsors of terror. 
TRUMPGETTY

North Korea has not yet responded to the US re-designation of the regime as sponsors of terror

An official from the hermit kingdom has, however, claimed that  and other countries “should not fear”. 
Ri Jong-hyok, the deputy of North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly and director of the National Reunification Institute, attempted to calm World War 3 fears by stating that the rogue nation only has a problem with the United States.
He said: “It’s the Korean people’s resolute decision that North Korea should face off with the US only with nuclear weapons to achieve the balance of power.
“Our nuclear deterrence is a sword of justice aimed at fighting US nuke and Asia and any country in the world need not worry about our threats as long as they do not join invasion and provocations toward us.”

World War 3: US to shell out MILLIONS building air bases to counter ‘Russian AGGRESSION’

THE US will spend £160 million building air bases in Europe in order to counter “Russian aggression”, it has been revealed.

By OP

Jens Stoltenberg: NATO is at an‘unprecedented level’

Play Video

 
Airfields, training sites ranges and other military installations are to be built across Eastern Europe close to Russian borders as well as in Iceland and Norway.
It is part of the £3.4 billion European Deterrence Initiative (EDI) aimed at “reassuring” NATO’s European allies.
An EDI report says: “As we continue to address the dynamic security environment in Europe, EDI funding increases our capabilities to deter and defend against Russian aggression.
“Additionally, these significant investments will further galvanise US support to the collective defence of our NATO Allies, as well as bolster the security and capacity of our US partners.”
World-War-3-US-RussiaGETTY
Airfields, training sites ranges and other military installations are to be built
Nine bases will be modernised including bases in Latvia, Estonia, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Luxembourg.
These bases will temporarily house high-tech stealth fighters like the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Strike Fighter and reconnaissance assets to hunt down Russian subs.
A Spokesman for US European Command, Major Juan Martinez said: “While we can’t provide specific details on future operations and locations, we continuously look for opportunities for our fifth-generation aircraft to conduct interoperability training with our allies and partners in the European theatre.”
The naval air station Keflavik in Iceland is set to undergo a £10 million modernisation.
This will see new hangers being added to host P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol planes.
The aircraft dubbed the “submarine killer,” is equipped with torpedoes, depth charges, Harpoon anti-ship missiles and other weaponry.
Mr Martinez added that large-scale infrastructure upgrades across Europe do not mean US troops will be stationed there permanently but stick to rotations, as they have done in the past.
Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started