US Bomber Flies over South Korea amid Standoff over North Korea Nuclear Tests

North Korea will read the fly-over of a bomber capable of delivering nuclear weapons — seen by an Associated Press photographer at Osan Air Base near Seoul — as a threat. Any hint of America’s nuclear power enrages Pyongyang, which links its own pursuit of atomic weapons to what it sees as past nuclear-backed moves by the US to topple its government.

The B-52 flight follows a victory tour by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to celebrate the country’s widely disputed claim of a hydrogen bomb test.

There was no immediate reaction from North Korea’s state media to the B-52 fly-over, which also happened after North Korea’s third nuclear test in 2013.

Kim’s first public comments about last week’s test came in a visit to the country’s military headquarters, where he called the explosion “a self-defensive step” meant to protect the region “from the danger of nuclear war caused by the US-led imperialists,” according to a dispatch on Sunday from the state-run Korean Central News Agency, the Associated Press reported.

“It is the legitimate right of a sovereign state and a fair action that nobody can criticize,” Kim was reported as saying during his tour of the People’s Armed Forces Ministry.

The comments provide insight into North Korea’s long-running argument that it is the presence of tens of thousands of US troops in South Korea and Japan, and a hostile US policy that seeks to topple the government in Pyongyang, that make North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear weapons absolutely necessary.

During his tour, Kim posed for photos with leading military officials in front of statues of the two members of his family who led the country previously – Kim Jong-il and Kim Il-sung.

World powers are looking for ways to punish the North over a nuclear test that, even if not of a hydrogen bomb, still likely pushes Pyongyang closer to its goal of a nuclear-armed missile that can reach the US mainland. Many outside governments and experts question whether the blast was in fact a powerful hydrogen test.

The two Koreas have again settled into the kind of Cold War-era standoff that has defined their relationship over the past seven decades. Since Friday, South Korea has been blasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda from huge speakers along the border, and the North is reportedly using speakers of its own in an attempt to keep its soldiers from hearing the South Korean messages.

South Korean troops, near about 10 sites where loudspeakers started blaring propaganda on Friday, were on the highest alert, but had not detected any unusual movement along the border, said an official from Seoul’s Defense Ministry, who refused to be named, citing office rules.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said Seoul had deployed missiles, artillery and other weapons systems near the border to swiftly deal with any possible North Korean provocation.

Diplomats at a UN Security Council emergency session pledged to swiftly pursue new sanctions. For current sanctions and any new penalties to work, better cooperation and stronger implementation from China is seen as key.