North Korea spotted moving missiles 'that could reach US'
North Korea may be preparing for another missile test, South Korea's spy agency reportedly said on Thursday, just days before US President Donald Trump visits the divided peninsula.
"There is a possibility that North Korea will launch a missile as active movements of vehicles have been detected at a missile research facility in Pyongyang," the National Intelligence Service told a closed-door parliamentary audit, the Yonhap news agency reported.
In July, Pyongyang launched two ICBMs apparently capable of reaching the US mainland - described by leader Kim Jong-Un as a gift to "American bastards" - and followed up with two missiles that passed over Japan and its sixth nuclear test, sending tensions rocketing.
Trump and Kim have engaged in a heated war of words in recent months, trading threats and personal insults and heightening global alarm.
The US President will arrive in Seoul on Tuesday as part of his Asian tour which also includes Japan, China, Vietnam and the Philippines, with all eyes on his message to Kim and the North.
Amid a flurry of diplomatic visitors to the region, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday that Pyongyang's weapons ambitions have become a "global threat", with the US mainland and Europe coming within reach of its missiles.
"I think we all understand that a war will be catastrophic and extremely dangerous not only for people living in this region but for global peace and security," Stoltenberg told reporters in Seoul.
But the 29-nation defence alliance was "always ready to respond and to counter any attack from any direction", he added. "That's the way NATO has handled ballistic threats for decades."
It was important not to dramatise the tensions and create a "more challenging situation", he said.
North Korea slams 'mentally deranged' Trump
North Korea slammed US President Donald Trump as "incurably mentally deranged" in a personal diatribe ahead of his first visit to Asia as head of state, amid high tensions over Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions.
Just days before Trump's visit, North Korea's KCNA news agency lashed out at "bellicose and irresponsible rhetoric" by the "master of invective".
"He absolutely needs medicine for curing his psychical disorder," it said.
The US has deployed key military assets including jet fighters and aircraft carriers near the peninsula following the North's sixth nuclear test in September, which also saw the United Nations impose an eighth set of sanctions on the isolated country.
KCNA described the sanctions drive as "desperate efforts" that would prove ineffective and Trump's hostile rhetoric as "hysteric spasmodic symptoms".
Trump, it said late Tuesday, "disclosed his true nature as a nuclear war maniac before the world and was diagnosed as 'incurably mentally deranged'".
