Seoul, Sep 19 (IANS) North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called for his country’s artillery forces to have the “most concentrated and destructive” capabilities as he visited major munitions factories earlier this week, state media reported on Saturday.
Kim inspected munitions enterprises from Wednesday to Friday, accompanied by senior officials, including Pak Jong-chon, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the ruling Workers’ Party, reports Yonhap, quoting Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
“Our artillery should have the most concentrated and destructive, massive and versatile offensive capability and responsibly perform the two missions of deterring and fighting war,” the KCNA quoted Kim as saying.
Kim said the munitions industry should play a bigger role in carrying out the strategic policy of the ruling Workers’ Party to build the “most powerful army,” according to the KCNA.
He outlined policy tasks, including enhancing the level of artificial intelligence of offensive and defensive weapons, upgrading the armour and automation of artillery weapons, and improving production conditions, it said.
Kim appears to have visited factories producing 600-millimetre and 240 mm multiple rocket launchers, as well as drones, according to Shin Jong-woo, secretary-general of the Seoul-based Korea Defence and Security Forum.
Earlier, on September 14, North Korea conducted a firepower strike drill involving artillery and missile units last week, following a trilateral military exercise by South Korea, the United States and Japan.
The report came after South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) detected multiple short-range ballistic missiles launched from the North’s Wonsan area toward the East Sea on Saturday.
The drill involved subunits selected from the five artillery and missile joint units and featured new combat systems, including various types of attack drones, tactical cruise missiles, large-calibre thermal-pressure multiple rocket launchers and tactical ballistic missiles.
The North claimed that all strike weapon systems hit their targets with 100 per cent accuracy, describing the drill as demonstrating the “unity and simultaneity of firepower attack.”
–IANS
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