Russian embassy staff in the North Korean capital of pyongyang has been told by officials in that city that they should consider evacuating their people. This because of the continuing rising tensions according to Embassy official Denis Samsonov.
The official said that Russia is looking at the request, but does not have any immediate plans to do so. North Korea has asked that wish if they to evacuate their staff to notify Pyongyang by April 10th.
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The other two dozen embassies in the city have been given simailar messages by North Korean officials.
The Russian foreign Ministry is perplexed why North Korea would issue such a recommendation to Russia and other countries that maintain embassies there. Minister Sergey Lavrov stated on Russia’s state news agency that “We are very perturbed about the supercharged tensions, which for now are verbal. We want to understand the causes of this proposal.” Lavrov has been in contact with all the members of the now stalled six-party talks looking for a reason for North Korea’s recommendation.
Britain’s foreign Ministry surmises that “they have taken this step as part of their continuing rhetoric that the U.S. poses a threat to them.”
While North Korea has announced that it has given its military the final go ahead for a nuclear attack on the U.S. on Thursday, most believe that Pyongyang is not capable of carrying out such a threat.
South Korea is expecting the North to carry out another missile launch in the coming days however after learning of the transfer of two additional missiles to the east coast of their northern neighbor.
Calling North Korea’s pattern a familiar one, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army General Martin Dempsey called the recent events part of a cycle.
“There’s been a pattern throughout the last 25 or 30 years of provocation to accommodation to provocation back to accommodation,” Dempsey told reporters.
“There’s been some speculation that our activities have been provocative,” Dempsey said, “but our activities have been largely defensive and exclusively intended to reassure our allies.” North Korea’s rhetoric, on the other hand, has been reckless, he added.
More eyes were on the Korean Peninsula earllier today after USGS recorded a 6.2 seismic event at two seconds after midnight early this morning. Further investigation found that the quake occured just a few short miles of the Russia’s ten-mile border from North Korea. It was of sufficient distance within Russian territory and at a depth far enough to rule out any type of nuclear event. The quake was generated at a depth of approximately 350 miles.