Amid North Korea’s sabre-rattling, US aircraft carrier enters Sea of Japan off Korean peninsula
- The USS Abraham Lincoln strike group will stay in waters off the Korean peninsula for about five days
- Its entry comes ahead of joint US-South Korean military exercises focusing on computerised war games
The US Naval Institute’s USNI News Fleet and Marine Tracker shows the Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group is in the Sea of Japan.
The USS Abraham Lincoln strike group will stay in waters off the Korean peninsula for about five days.
It is the first time a US navy aircraft carrier has entered the waters since November 2017, Yonhap news agency said, citing military sources. At the time, three US aircraft carrier strike groups entered the waters in the Sea of Japan to conduct a joint naval exercise with South Korean navy, after the North carried out nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) tests.
Sung Kim, the US special representative for North Korea, said last week that Pyongyang could conduct a missile or nuclear test to mark the 110th anniversary of the birth of its founding leader Kim Il-sung that falls on Friday.
The North will also observe the 90th founding anniversary of the North Korean People’s Revolutionary Army on April 25.
Pyongyang tends to celebrate politically significant anniversaries with military parades and weapons tests.