JAKARTA (Dispatches) -- The United States, South Korea and Japan vowed Tuesday to consider all options against North Korea, including counterstrikes, in the wake of an unprecedented blitz of missile tests by Pyongyang.
The flurry of North Korean launches include last month’s test of its most advanced intercontinental ballistic missile and a missile that flew across the de facto maritime border and landed near South Korean waters for the first time since the Korean War.
U.S. special representative for North Korea Sung Kim held talks with South Korean counterpart Kim Gunn and senior Japanese foreign ministry official Takehiro Funakoshi in Indonesia’s capital Jakarta.
The envoys’ pledge comes after their nations slapped sanctions on North Korean officials and groups this month to punish Pyongyang for the wave of weapons tests.
Gunn said Pyongyang had become more aggressive in threatening nuclear action and that the three allies would harmonize sanctions despite Chinese and Russian vetoes of a U.S.-led bid to tighten them at the UN earlier this year.
Washington, Seoul and Tokyo have escalated their military cooperation to new highs as a result of the heightened missile activity, according to Funakoshi.
Seoul and Washington have spent months warning that Pyongyang is gearing up to conduct what would be the country’s seventh nuclear test.
After overseeing the launch of the Hwasong-17 “monster” missile in November, Kim declared he wanted North Korea to have the world’s most powerful nuclear force.
At a politburo meeting last month, Kim said 2023 would be a “historic year”, marking 75 years since the country’s founding, according to the official Korean Central News Agency.
North Korea has criticized the United States for expanding joint military exercises with South Korea that it says are practice for a potential invasion, and warned of “more powerful follow-up measures” in response.
Last month, the U.S. and South Korea conducted aerial drills involving more than 200 warplanes, including their advanced F-35 fighter jets, as they resumed large-scale military drills this year after downsizing or suspending them in past years.
The military drills, North Korea has said, exposed the United States as the “chief culprit in destroying peace and security.”
North Korea has also said its testing activities are meant as a warning amid the joint military drills.