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Keegan Elmer

North Korea on Wednesday threatened to call off the upcoming meeting between Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump over an ongoing military exercise between South Korea and the US.
Kim has consistently called for an end to joint military drills as a critical precondition to fruitful dialogue.
In recent months, however, Kim appeared to take a more consolatory stance after the drills briefly ceased in the run-up to last month’s historic meeting between North and South Korea.
Here is what he has said about the drills between South Korea and the US over the past.


March 2018
Kim said that he “understood the South’s stance” when a South Korean envoy to Pyongyang told the North Korean leader that joint military drills planned for the following month would be hard to postpone again after they were briefly halted for the Winter Olympics in February.
Kim added that he expected readjustments once the security situation on the Korean peninsula stabilises, according to South Korean news agency Yonhap.

January 2018
During his annual New Year’s address, Kim called on the South to “discontinue all the nuclear war drills they stage with outside forces as these drills will engulf this land in flames and lead to bloodshed on our sacred territory”.

August 2017
Kim warned the US not to “persist in their extremely dangerous reckless actions on the Korean peninsula”, referring to the joint military drill “Ulchi Freedom Guardian”. Kim vowed to “watch a little more the foolish and stupid conduct of the Yankees”, during the drills, though he made no further comment when drills occurred.
North Korea’s Kim Jong-un hosts banquet for Chinese diplomat as ‘flower garden’ friendship blooms once more
January 2017
Kim’s New Year’s address called on the South Korean authorities to stop their “war games at our doorstep” and “disguising them as annual events”.

June 2016
Kim called on the South to “put a complete stop to the reckless political and military provocations and war drills that they launch” while addressing the Seventh Congress of the Workers’ Party of Korea. Kim accused the South of “toeing the US line” adding that the drills were “targeted against fellow countrymen and pose a threat to peace and security on the Korean peninsula”.
Donald Trump eyes Singapore for Kim Jong-un summit as North Korea releases three US prisoners
January 2015
Kim called the annual drills the “cause of the escalating tension on the peninsula”. His New Year message went on to warn that “there can be neither trustworthy dialogue nor improved inter-Korean relations in such a gruesome atmosphere in which war drills are staged against the dialogue partner”.


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North Korea

‘You will engulf the land in flames’: Kim Jong-un’s history of attacking US-South Korean military drills

US and South Korean Marines pictured during a 2016 exercise. Phoot: Yonhap via AP

A South Korean Air Force fighter jet takes off from an air base as South Korea and the United States conduct the Max Thunder joint military exercise in Gwangju, South Korea, Wednesday, May 16, 2018. North Korea on Wednesday canceled a high-level meeting with South Korea and threatened to scrap a historic summit next month between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un over military exercises between Seoul and Washington that Pyongyang has long claimed are invasion rehearsals. A senior North Korean diplomat said Pyongyang will refuse to be pressured into abandoning its nukes.(Park Chul-hong /Yonhap via AP)

People walk past a television news screen showing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (R) and US President Donald Trump (L) at a railway station in Seoul on May 16, 2018. North Korea threatened on May 16, to cancel the forthcoming summit between leader Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump if Washington seeks to push Pyongyang into unilaterally giving up its nuclear arsenal. / AFP PHOTO / Jung Yeon-je

TOPSHOT - This picture taken on April 21, 2017 shows South Korean K-136 Kooryong 130mm 36-round multiple rocket launch system firing rockets during a media day presentation of a joint live firing drill between South Korea and the US at the Seungjin Fire Training Field in Pocheon, 65 kms northeast of Seoul. / AFP PHOTO / JUNG Yeon-Je

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The North Korean leader’s threat to cancel peace talks with Donald Trump follows a series of outbursts denouncing the joint military training exercises


‘You will engulf the land in flames’: Kim Jong-un’s history of attacking US-South Korean military drills

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The North Korean leader’s threat to cancel peace talks with Donald Trump follows a series of outbursts denouncing the joint military training exercises

The North Korean leader’s threat to cancel peace talks with Donald Trump follows a series of outbursts denouncing the joint military training exercises