26-6-2023 (SEOUL) North Korea held large-scale rallies in Pyongyang on Sunday to mark the 73rd anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War. According to state media, some 120,000 working people and students participated in the rallies across the capital, shouting slogans vowing a “war of revenge” to destroy the United States. State media photos showed a stadium filled with people holding up placards declaring “The whole US mainland is within our shooting range” and “The imperialist US is the destroyer of peace.”
The anniversary comes amid concerns that North Korea may soon launch another military spy satellite to boost its monitoring of US military activities. Its first attempt ended in failure on May 31. North Korean state media claimed that the country now possesses “the strongest absolute weapon to punish the US imperialists” and that “the avengers on this land are burning with the indomitable will to revenge the enemy.”
Tensions on the Korean peninsula have escalated in recent years as North Korea has continued to test various weapons, including its largest intercontinental ballistic missile, and ramped up its nuclear program. This has led to increased tensions with South Korea, the US’s main ally in the region.
In a separate report, North Korea’s foreign ministry accused the US of “making desperate efforts to ignite a nuclear war” and sending strategic assets to the region. The Korean War ended in a truce, not a treaty, leaving the two Koreas technically still at war.
