North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, with whom U.S. President Donald Trump says he has good relations, has blamed the United States, Japan and South Korea for the escalation of tensions in the region, saying military cooperation with allies has destabilized the security environment, the nuclear-armed country's state media has said. In his speech during his visit to the Ministry of National Defense of North Korea, Kim mentioned some new plans to strengthen all resistances and reaffirmed the uncompromising policy of further developing the country's nuclear forces.
In addition, reports from Japanese news outlet Kyodo quoted KCNA as saying that the North Korean leader criticized the United States for standing at the center behind the war machine. U.S. nuclear strategic assets deployed on the Korean Peninsula, U.S.-led nuclear war simulation exercises, and U.S.-Japan-South Korea military cooperation are "inviting military imbalances" on the peninsula and in Northeast Asia, creating "a new contradictory structure" and posing a serious challenge to North Korea, Kim was quoted as saying.
The Korean news agency further said that while stressing the need for vigilance against the trilateral military alliance, Kim also expressed concern that their cooperation could lead to the formation of the Asian version of NATO. The development came after the first face-to-face summit between Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba in Washington on February 7.
Kim blamed the U.S. for the Russia-Ukraine war and expressed serious concern that the U.S. and Western countries are prolonging the war with an unrealistic dream of delivering a strategic blow to Russia. North Korea in particular is an active participant in the war in Ukraine, which has deployed more than 11,000 troops to assist Russian President Vladimir Putin's war efforts.