The chief of the Public Information Office of the Ministry of National Defence of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea on September 5 issued a press statement titled "Provocateurs can never evade the heavy responsibility for escalating tension", which said:

The US and the ROK are staging provocative joint military drills one after another, maximizing the military tension on the Korean peninsula.

The hostile forces staged the largest-ever joint military exercises Ulji Freedom Shield from August 19 to 29 by mobilizing more than 200 fighters of various kinds, the US Army unit coping with chemical, biological, radioactive and nuclear attacks and even troops of satellite countries under the "UN Command". And they have been frantically staging the joint landing drill Ssangyong from August 26.

Ssangyong drill with the involvement of division-level forces, 40-odd warships and various kinds of 80-odd military planes and armoured vehicles is an extremely reckless and dangerous military racket presupposing an open invasion upon the sacred territory of the DPRK.

Meanwhile, the ROK military gangsters early in August deployed tanks and other offensive military hardware in the area five kilometres away from the southern border of the DPRK and committed a grave provocation by staging a brigade-level field mobile drill.

For the past two months the US and the ROK military gangsters have desperately staged all sorts of provocative war exercises targeting the DPRK in the ground, sea and air, including a special operation drill aimed at the infiltration into the rear of the DPRK and "small-unit mobile live firing drill" involving the US 1st Armoured Division and the 1st Armoured Brigade of the puppet ROK Army.

The provocative anti-DPRK military drills being staged by the US and the ROK under the eyes of the DPRK without a time gap from the outset of this year clearly show what the source of escalating tension on the Korean peninsula is and where the dark clouds of security instability are coming from.

No such area as the Korean peninsula can be found on earth, where the joint military exercises targeting a sovereign state under different codenames such as Freedom Shield, combined joint formation drill, joint airborne infiltration drill, Iron Mace are being staged in succession.

It is a well-known fact that the accumulation of such threatening actions on the Korean peninsula, the world’s hottest spot and in the state of armistice, will only spark off military tension and drive the security environment in the region into an irreversibly catastrophic situation.

The US and its followers are seriously threatening regional peace and stability while getting hell-bent on unilateral military provocations. Their rash acts make clearer the origin of the provocation in a striking contrast to the peace-loving desire of the independent and sovereign states in the region.

As long as there exist the US and the ROK, confrontational entities and peace breakers, the provocative military drills will continue, exposing the Korean peninsula to constant instability.

The present situation proves once again that the ceaseless building of the defence capabilities and their offensive application by the DPRK are the only way to neutralize the danger of war drills pursued by the US and the ROK and to control the instability in the region.

The more frequently the US and the ROK stage joint military drills, the more the DPRK hardens its will to defend the security and territorial integrity of the state by dint of powerful self-defensive strength, and this will lead to the strong deterrence, which will make the hostile forces seeking aggression fear and hesitate.

The Korean People’s Army will never tolerate the US and ROK's military moves threatening the security environment on the Korean peninsula but firmly guarantee the security of the state and the peace in the region by dint of strength and action.

The hostile forces can never evade the heavy responsibility for escalating tension and will have to pay a dear price.

KCNA