Report: North Korean Leader Watches 'Drone' Attack Drill

W460

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un oversaw a live fire military drill using drones and cruise missile interceptors, state media said Wednesday, amid heightened tensions on the Korean peninsula.

The official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Kim had personally guided the exercise that involved training attacks by "super-precision drone planes.”

It did not specify the timing or location of the drill, which came a week after Kim presided over a live-fire artillery exercise near the disputed sea border with South Korea.

Military tensions on the Korean peninsula are at their highest level for years, with North Korea -- angered by U.N. sanctions imposed after its nuclear test last month -- threatening a second Korean War backed by nuclear weapons.

Pyongyang has also denounced ongoing joint South Korea-U.S. military maeuvers, involving nuclear-capable B-52 bombers, calling them a provocative rehearsal for invasion.

The North Korean drones used in the exercise were assigned flight paths and timings "with targets in South Korea in mind,” KCNA quoted Kim as saying.

North Korea has no confirmed drone capability, although South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported last year that it was developing unmanned strike aircraft using old U.S. target drones imported from the Middle East.

Still photographs of the exercise broadcast on state television seemed to show what looked like a rudimentary drone being flown into a mountainside target and exploding.

The exercise also included tests of small rockets that KCNA said were capable of bringing down cruise missiles.

Last month the South Korean military released video footage of a newly deployed cruise missile that it said could carry out high precision strikes on command centers anywhere in North Korea.

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