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N Korea says interception of US plane self-defence: Xinhua
Beijing, March 10: North Korea today sought to justify its interception of an American spyplane by four fighter jets in international airspace as a defensive act.
Beijing, March 10: North Korea today sought to justify its interception of an American spyplane by four fighter jets in international airspace as a defensive act.
"We can not stand by and watch the aggressive attempts by the US army," said a commentary in the government mouthpiece Rodong Sinmun newspaper, China's Xinhua news agency reported from the North Korean capital Pyongyang.
Pyongyang's defence of its actions came on the day it raised the stakes in the nuclear standoff with the United States still further by lobbing an anti-ship missile into the sea of Japan, according to Japan's defence agency.
The firing followed the testing of a similar anti-ship missile on February 24, as the hermit state presses for direct dialogue with Washington to resolve the five-month-old stalemate, ignoring calls for restraint by Beijing.
The Rodong Sinmun charged that the US was paying lip service to negotiations and diplomacy on the one hand whileB "strengthening the aggressive forces around the Korean peninsula and staging military exercises against the DPRK (North Korea)," Xinhua reported.
Over the weekend, almost 5,000 US and South Korean troops conducted two-day joint maneuvers near the demilitarized zone that has divided the Korean peninsula since the 1950-53 Korean war.
Top US officials said on Sunday that Washington would eventually talk to North Korea but only as part of a "broader dialogue" involving other nations in the region.
Bureau Report
Pyongyang's defence of its actions came on the day it raised the stakes in the nuclear standoff with the United States still further by lobbing an anti-ship missile into the sea of Japan, according to Japan's defence agency.
The firing followed the testing of a similar anti-ship missile on February 24, as the hermit state presses for direct dialogue with Washington to resolve the five-month-old stalemate, ignoring calls for restraint by Beijing.
The Rodong Sinmun charged that the US was paying lip service to negotiations and diplomacy on the one hand whileB "strengthening the aggressive forces around the Korean peninsula and staging military exercises against the DPRK (North Korea)," Xinhua reported.
Over the weekend, almost 5,000 US and South Korean troops conducted two-day joint maneuvers near the demilitarized zone that has divided the Korean peninsula since the 1950-53 Korean war.
Top US officials said on Sunday that Washington would eventually talk to North Korea but only as part of a "broader dialogue" involving other nations in the region.
Bureau Report