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Pyongyang slams combat drills of South Korea as ‘reckless military provocation’

The South Korean military staged a joint military drill in the hotspot waters in the West Sea of Korea with the involvement of more than twenty fighters of F-15K, KF-16, F-4E and FA-50

PYONGYANG, May 8. /TASS/. Authorities of North Korea slammed recent combat drills of South Korea as the ‘reckless military provocation,’ the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported citing a spokesperson for the North Korean Defense Ministry.

"On Wednesday, the South Korean military staged a joint military drill in the hotspot waters in the West Sea of Korea with the involvement of more than twenty fighters of F-15K, KF-16, F-4E and FA-50 belonging to the air combat command of the Air Force and storm boats under the Navy's 2nd Fleet and others," the news agency stated.

"This is a grave provocation which can never be overlooked and this situation demands a necessary reaction from us," KCNA reported. "It is no more than the deliberate pursuit of confrontation the excuse for which can never be made."

"The south Korean military did not hide the fact that the joint military drill aimed at improving its capability to cope with the north's firepower and surprise ‘provocation’ and at striking the base of the ‘enemy's provocation’ and repelling the forces supporting it."

"The reckless military provocation by the south Korean military is a total denial and an open perfidy to the north-south agreement in the military field in which both sides promised the whole Korean nation to stop all the hostile acts against the other party on the ground and in the sea and air, to turn the West Sea zone into the peaceful waters, in particular," the North Korean news agency added citing a spokesperson for the Defense Ministry.

Between April and September 2018, the leaders of South and North Korea held three summits focusing on the normalization of relations and signed a joint declaration on April 27, 2018 on ending hostilities between the neighboring countries.

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