North Korea’s Kim Jong Un calls for enhanced military capabilities for war

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un urged the country’s military to improve the capacity to fight a war in a speech last week, state media KCNA said Monday, after Pyongyang sent thousands of troops to Russia.

Addressing a conference of battalion commanders and political instructors in Pyongyang on Friday, Kim called for building political and military strength and combat effectiveness to ensure the armed forces can handle a war.

Threats from the United States and its allies, including South Korea and its military confrontation with North Korea, have brought tensions to “the worst stage in history,” he said, calling the Korean Peninsula “the world’s biggest hotspot.”

“He strongly urged all the participants to go all out to make significant and fundamental improvements in improving their capabilities to fight an actual war,” KCNA said.

The report came amid international criticism over rapidly developing military cooperation between North Korea and Russia.

Washington, Seoul and Kyiv have said there are more than 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia to support the country’s war against Ukraine, and some of them have engaged in combat in Kursk, near the Ukrainian border.

KCNA said a workshop for military officers was given over the weekend as part of the conference, which aimed to strengthen the battalions, strengthen their combat effectiveness and “round out war preparations as required by the prevailing situation and modern warfare.”

In a separate broadcast, KCNA said a Russian delegation led by National Resources and Ecology Minister Alexander Kozlov arrived in Pyongyang on Sunday for trade and economic talks.

Last week, Kim guided a test of attack drones and ordered their mass production, citing intensifying competition to adopt such weapons around the world.

President Joe Biden, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba condemned North Korea and Russia’s decision to “dangerously expand” the Ukraine war as they held a summit on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit ) in Peru.

The Biden administration has authorized Ukraine to use American-made weapons to strike deep into Russia, sources told NBC News, marking a significant policy shift and a response to Russia’s deployment of North Korean ground troops.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that North Korean troops had suffered casualties in battle with his country’s forces and the first clashes between them “open a new page in instability.”