{"id":63541,"date":"2026-06-24T15:10:37","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T15:10:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/63541\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T15:10:37","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T15:10:37","slug":"north-koreas-kim-claims-progress-on-nuclear-armed-navy-as-new-warship-is-placed-into-service-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/63541\/","title":{"rendered":"North Korea’s Kim claims progress on nuclear-armed navy as new warship is placed into service"},"content":{"rendered":"

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) \u2014 North Korea has commissioned a 5,000-ton destroyer that leader Kim Jong Un<\/a> touts as a symbol of the country’s growing naval and nuclear capabilities, state media reported Wednesday, as Pyongyang seeks to expand its ability to project military power at sea.<\/p>\n

North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency said Kim told a commissioning ceremony Tuesday at the western port of Nampo that warships such as the Choe Hyon show that the nuclear armament of his navy is progressing as planned.<\/p>\n

KCNA said the Choe Hyon was formally placed into service with North Korea’s navy after the ceremony and will be tasked with defending the country’s western coast.<\/p>\n

Since unveiling the ship in April 2025, Kim has portrayed the Choe Hyon as a major step toward expanding his military’s operational reach and preemptive strike capabilities. KCNA has said the warship is equipped with a range of systems, including anti-aircraft and anti-ship weapons as well as nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missiles.<\/p>\n

South Korean officials and experts say the vessel was likely built with Russian assistance amid deepening military ties<\/a> between the countries, but some analysts have questioned whether it’s ready for active service.<\/p>\n

North Korea has put the Choe Hyon through a series of tests<\/a> in recent months ahead of its deployment, including launches of what it described as nuclear-capable cruise missiles from the vessel.<\/p>\n

“It has clearly become a thing of the past when our navy existed as a force for defending the sea off our land,” Kim said in a speech at Tuesday’s ceremony. “It is rising into a full-fledged service equipped with strategic means as the program of equipping the Navy with nuclear weapons is following its planned course unerringly.”<\/p>\n

After years of spurring ballistic missile development, Kim has shifted his focus more toward naval capabilities, including the ongoing construction of a nuclear-powered submarine<\/a>. Naval capabilities were also a key focus when Kim outlined his five-year military goals at February’s Workers’ Party congress,<\/a> which included calls for intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of underwater launches.<\/p>\n

Kim, following a missile test aboard the Choe Hyon in March, claimed that his efforts to arm his navy with nuclear weapons would “constitute a radical change in defending our maritime sovereignty, something that we have not achieved for half a century.” State media didn’t elaborate on what Kim meant, but some analysts say North Korea may be preparing to formally declare a maritime boundary that could encroach on waters controlled by rival South Korea.<\/p>\n

As inter-Korean tensions worsen,<\/a> Kim has repeatedly said he does not recognize the Northern Limit Line in the western sea, drawn by the U.S.-led U.N. Command at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. The poorly drawn sea boundary has been the site of several deadly skirmishes in past years.<\/p>\n

North Korea unveiled in May 2025 a second destroyer in the same class as the Choe Hyon, but it was damaged during a botched launch<\/a> at the northern port of Chongjin, prompting a furious response from Kim. The country later said the ship, named Kang Kon, was relaunched in June after repairs, but outside experts have questioned whether it’s fully operational.<\/p>\n

Kim during Tuesday’s speech said Kang Kon will also be entering service soon. North Korea also has separate plans to build a larger, 10,000-ton destroyer.<\/p>\n

Since his nuclear diplomacy with U.S. President Donald Trump collapsed in 2019,<\/a> Kim has accelerated the expansion of his nuclear arsenal and deepened ties with Moscow and Beijing. While maintaining a hard-line stance toward South Korea,<\/a> he has left the door open to renewed talks with Washington, repeating Pyongyang’s demand that the United States drop denuclearization as a precondition for reviving negotiations.<\/p>\n

Separately, South Korea’s military said Wednesday it had taken into custody an unidentified North Korean soldier who crossed the heavily fortified inter-Korean border Tuesday night. The South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the soldier expressed an intent to defect and that relevant authorities were investigating the incident.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SEOUL, South Korea (AP) \u2014 North Korea has commissioned a 5,000-ton destroyer that leader Kim Jong Un touts…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63542,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[35426,1288,35130,141,31,5449,34,24768,2447,12132,33],"class_list":["post-63541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-north-korea","tag-active-service","tag-choe-hyon","tag-commissioning-ceremony","tag-kim-jong-un","tag-korea","tag-korean-central-news-agency","tag-north-korea","tag-nuclear-capabilities","tag-nuclear-weapons","tag-service","tag-south-korea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}