Kim Jong Un’s sister threatens response to US aircraft carrier’s deployment in South Korea

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The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un threatened the Donald Trump administration with retaliatory action for “stepping up political and military provocations” with the deployment of the USS Carl Vinson in South Korea.

Kim Yo Jong, a senior member of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea, said her country was planning a retaliatory action by bolstering its nuclear deterrence and “increasing the actions threatening the security of the enemy at the strategic level”.

The strongly worded statement came as the American aircraft carrier and its strike group arrived in the Busan port on Sunday. The nuclear-powered Carl Vinson was the first US aircraft carrier to dock in the Korean peninsula since Mr Trump took office for a second term in January.

North Korea “bitterly condemns the reckless visible actions and muscle-flexing of the US and its vassal forces disregarding and violating a sovereign state's security concern and jeopardizing the peaceful environment in the whole region”, Ms Kim said, according to state media KCNA.

She said the Trump administration was “carrying forward" the Joe Biden administration’s “hostile policy” towards North Korea with “stepped-up political and military provocations”. This was “sufficient justification” for Pyongyang to strengthen its nuclear deterrence indefinitely, she added.

Listing the alleged provocations by the Trump administration, Ms Kim noted that the US deployed strategic B-1B bombers over the Korean peninsula during joint drills with South Korea and Japan between 15 January and 20 February.

She also criticised a pledge made by the three allies at a security conference in Munich in February that called for the denuclearisation of the North.

“The enemies should not test the will and ability of the DPRK to defend the sovereignty and security interests of the state by mobilising all means in hand,” she said, referring to North Korea by its official name of Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

The renewed tension dampened hopes that Mr Trump’s return could improve US relations with North Korea, which deteriorated under the Biden administration.

In his first term from 2016 to 2020, Mr Trump held summits with Mr Kim to thaw relations and promised during his campaign to reach out again, touting their personal rapport.

South Korea reacted to Ms Kim’s statement saying it was merely deception and "sophistry" to justify the North’s nuclear and missile development.

"North Korea's nuclear weapons are never acceptable, and the only way for North Korea to survive is to abandon its obsession and delusion about nuclear weapons," the defence ministry in Seoul said in a statement on Tuesday.