North Korea

Deep in a military bunker outside Seoul, two air force colonels sit shoulder-to-shoulder. One is American, the other South Korean.

Together, their eyes scour satellite pictures of North Korea, played out on giant screens at the front of the dark room. The images are one of many sources of intelligence fed into the classified vault.

“We have the ability to detect the instant a North Korean missile gets off the ground,” explains Col Anthony Kuczynski, who runs the operation centre for the US side.

North Korea, despite a UN Security Council ban on its ballistic missile tests, continued to develop its nuclear and missile programs in 2021, according to a new UN report. In January 2022 alone, North Korea launched a record 11 missiles, including two hypersonic missiles and the first firing since 2017 of a Hwasong-12 mobile intermediate-range ballistic missile which is within reach of US territory with its estimated range of 4,500 kilometers. In 2017, North Korea tested the Hwasong-15, which has an estimated range of 8,500-13,000 kilometers.

Both US and South Korean officials expressed concern that the Hwasong-12 test indicated that North Korea would resume testing of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and nuclear weapons.

SEOUL (Reuters) – The nosedive in cryptocurrency markets has wiped out millions of dollars in funds stolen by North Korean hackers, four digital investigators say, threatening a key source of funding for the sanctions-stricken country and its weapons programmes.

North Korea has poured resources into stealing cryptocurrencies in recent years, making it a potent hacking threat and leading to one of the largest cryptocurrency heists on record in March, in which almost $615 million was stolen, according to the U.S. Treasury.

North Korea’s self-imposed isolation during the pandemic has made it increasingly difficult for the regime to acquire the hard currency needed to fund its weapons programs and trade deficit. Exports have withered to only tens of millions a year, while the smuggling that the regime previously used to evade United Nations (UN) sanctions has also declined. In this unfriendly environment, Kim Jong-un’s regime has increasingly turned to the theft of cryptocurrency to cover its need for “hard currency”—an issue that will require greater attention from governments and international regulators as cryptocurrency investments become more popular around the world.

North Korea has launched what is thought to be its largest intercontinental ballistic missile to date, in a dramatic return to long-range testing that marks the regime’s most serious provocation for years.

South Korea’s military fired a missile barrage into the Sea of Japan in response to the ICBM launch, which was the first full-range test of Kim Jong-un’s most powerful missiles since 2017 and suggested that the North has made significant progress in developing weapons capable of sending nuclear warheads anywhere in the US.

Biden is inspiring all the crazies.

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un should pay damages for a 1959-84 scheme that saw more than 90,000 people move there from Japan, a Tokyo court is hearing.

The repatriation campaign was later condemned by some as “state kidnapping”.

Five people who took part and later escaped the North have demanded 100m yen ($880,000; £640,000) each.

They do not expect Mr Kim either to appear or to pay up, but hope a ruling may help in future negotiations.