Month: October 2022

They reported hearing an explosion and seeing a fire overnight.

But the military, which has said there were no casualties, didn’t acknowledge the incident until seven hours later.

The launch was in response to North Korea firing a missile over Japan early on Tuesday.

This is the first time Pyongyang has flow a missile over Japan since 2017 – and it prompted a show of force from the US, Japan and South Korea who conducted military drills. Seoul and Washington also fired a volley of missiles into the East Sea – also known as the Sea of Japan – between the Korean peninsula and Japan.

The South Korean military later confirmed that one of their missiles failed soon after it was launched and crashed – this was separate to the ones launched with the US.

The military also said that the Hyunmoo-2 missile carried a warhead but that it did not explode, and apologised for causing worry.

Residents in Gangneung said they saw a bright flash and heard an explosion at around 01:00 on Wednesday (16:00 GMT Tuesday).

They were left in the dark for hours, and many of them posted on social media wondering what had happened, while sharing photos and videos of the incident. The footage showed what appeared to be a brightly burning fire, with smoke rising from a distance.

“I cant sleep because I feel anxious [after hearing] the explosion,” said one user, according to news site Kang Won Ilbo. Another wondered if a plane had crashed.

North Korea’s missile launch on Tuesday was the fifth carried out by Pyongyang in a week. Many of its missile tests are conducted on a flight path that reaches a high altitude, avoiding flights over its neighbours.

But firing over or past Japan allows North Korean scientists to test missiles under circumstances “that are more representative of the conditions they’d endure in real-world use”, analyst Ankit Panda told news agency Reuters.

In September, North Korea passed a law declaring itself to be a nuclear weapons state, with leader Kim Jong-un ruling out the possibility of talks on denuclearisation.

Former PM Boris Johnson pledged benefits would rise with inflation.

Ms Truss has refused to say she would maintain the commitment, as she faces questions over how to pay for her government’s tax-cutting plans.

The PM told the BBC a decision hadn’t yet been made, as the issue dominated Tory party conference in Birmingham.

Speaking to Times Radio, Ms Mordaunt said: “We want to make sure that people are looked after and that people can pay their bills. We are not about trying to help people with one hand and take away with another.”

Asked if she welcomed Ms Mordaunt making her views public, Ms Truss said: “I look forward to having those discussions.”

Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng said he would not “get drawn into the debate”, but stressed his attachment to “compassionate conservatism”; while Work and Pensions Secretary Chloe Smith would not be drawn.

Welsh Secretary Robert Buckland, asked by BBC Newsnight if he wanted to see benefits rise in line with inflation, said: “Every Conservative government that I’ve been part of has maintained the safety net, and I’m sure this one will do the same.”

Certain benefits, including disability benefits and carer’s allowance, must increase in line with inflation by law.

However, for working-age benefits like universal credit no decision has yet been made on whether a rise will be linked to prices or wages.

Questions about the government’s policy on benefits come during a difficult week for the prime minister.

On Monday, Ms Truss’s authority took a blow when she was forced by her own MPs to U-turn on her plan to reduce tax for higher earners.

Speaking in her first BBC interview since the U-turn, Ms Truss reiterated that the government could have laid the groundwork better for the measure.

She said the government was listening and did “reflect on where we could have done things better” but said the top income tax rate had not been a “core part” of her economic growth package.

The PM is facing opposition from some Tory MPs over how the government will pay for its growth package.

Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s tax-cutting mini-budget on 23 September saw the pound’s value plummet, borrowing costs soar, and the Bank of England bail out pension funds.

Asked about whether she would commit to increasing benefits in line with inflation, Ms Truss told the BBC: “We are going to have to make decisions about how we bring back down debt as a proportion of GDP in the medium term.”

She added that she was “very committed to supporting the most vulnerable”, including providing an extra £1,200 to the poorest households.

“So we have to look at these issues in the round. We have to be fiscally responsible.”

In May this year, then-chancellor Rishi Sunak said benefits would be uprated by this September’s Consumer Prices Index measure of inflation, which is currently 9.9%, subject to a review by the work and pensions secretary.

Mr Kwarteng has declined to commit to the policy, though the government has pledged to increase state pension contributions in line with inflation.

Failing to keep benefits in line with rising prices would leave some of the poorest households facing a real-terms cut in their incomes.

Mel Stride, who chairs the Commons Treasury Committee, said he “would have to think long and hard” about whether to vote for uprating benefits in line with wages instead because of the “strong real-terms squeeze on those benefits already”.

And former work and pensions secretary Damian Green told the BBC the policy would “probably not” get through the Commons.

However, Tory MP Lee Anderson said it “does not seem fair” for those on benefits to get “inflation-busting” increases of as much as 10%, while public and private sector workers are offered pay rises of 2-4%.

Meanwhile, former home secretary Priti Patel accused the government of “spending today with no thought for tomorrow” at a fringe event at the Conservative Party Conference.

Labour’s shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves criticised the lack of commitment to the move, saying: “The idea that the government can afford to give tax cuts to the wealthiest, but not uprate benefits in line with inflation, I think is grotesque.”

Tuesday also saw confirmation the chancellor would bring forward his medium-term fiscal plan, which will outline how the government plans to cut the UK’s debt, “shortly” rather than at the end of November.

Ms Truss was asked several times whether she trusted her chancellor following the U-turn.

Sidestepping the question, she said: “I work very, very closely with my chancellor, we’re very focused on getting the economy growing.”

In his first public comments on the unrest, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said “riots” had been “engineered” by Iran’s arch-enemies and their allies.

The protests are the biggest challenge to his rule for a decade, and he urged security forces to be ready for more.

The US said it was “appalled” by the violent response to the protests.

President Joe Biden issued a statement saying he was “gravely concerned” about reports of the “intensifying violent crackdown on peaceful protesters”.

Those protesters were calling for “just and universal principles”, he said, adding that the US “stands with Iranian women” who were “inspiring the world with their bravery”.

The UK echoed the sentiment, summoning Iran’s most senior diplomat in London on Monday, to tell their leaders in Tehran that “instead of blaming external actors for the unrest, they should take responsibility for their actions and listen to the concerns of their people”.

Mahsa Amini, 22, fell into a coma hours after being detained by morality police on 13 September in Tehran for allegedly breaking the strict law requiring women to cover their hair with a hijab, or headscarf. She died three days later.

Her family has alleged that officers beat her head with a baton and banged her head against one of their vehicles. The police have said there is no evidence of any mistreatment and that she suffered “sudden heart failure”.

Women have led the protests that began after Ms Amini’s funeral, waving their headscarves in the air or setting them on fire to chants of “Woman, life, freedom” and “Death to the dictator” – a reference to Ayatollah Khamenei.

Addressing a graduation ceremony of police and armed forces cadets on Monday, the supreme leader said Ms Amini’s death “broke our hearts”.

“But what is not normal is that some people, without proof or an investigation, have made the streets dangerous, burned the Quran, removed hijabs from veiled women and set fire to mosques and cars,” he added, without mentioning any specific incidents.

The ayatollah, who has the final say on all state matters, asserted that foreign powers had planned “rioting” because they could not tolerate Iran “attaining strength in all spheres”.

“I say clearly that these riots and the insecurity were engineered by America and the occupying, false Zionist regime [Israel], as well as their paid agents, with the help of some traitorous Iranians abroad.”

He also gave his full backing to the security forces, saying that they had faced “injustice” during the unrest.

Iran Human Rights, a Norway-based group, said on Sunday that at least 133 people had been killed by security forces so far. They include 41 protesters whom ethnic Baluch activists said had died in clashes in Zahedan on Friday.

State media have reported that more than 40 people have been killed, including security personnel.

The US has already imposed sanctions on Iran’s morality police, and in his latest statement President Biden said America would this week “impose further costs” on those who perpetrate violence against peaceful protesters.

Ayatollah Khamenei’s comments came a day after security forces violently cracked down on a protest by students at Iran’s most prestigious science and engineering university, reportedly arresting dozens.

The BBC’s Kasra Naji says the gunfire heard around the campus of Sharif University of Technology in Tehran on Sunday night spread fear among many Iranians that authorities had decided to make an example of the students.

Security forces tried to enter the campus, but the students drove them back and closed all the entrance gates.

But, our correspondent adds, a siege developed and the students who tried to leave through an adjacent car park were picked up one by one and beaten, blindfolded and taken away.

In one video posted on social media, a large number of people are seen running inside a car park while being pursued by men on motorbikes.

The siege was lifted later in the night following the intervention of professors and a government minister.

On Monday, students at the university announced that they would not go back to classes until all of their fellow students had been released from detention. The university meanwhile said it had moved classes online, citing “the need to protect students”.

Protests were also reported at other universities in Tehran and elsewhere in the country, including Mashhad, Isfahan, Shiraz, Tabriz and Kermanshah.

In Karaj and Shiraz, schoolgirls were filmed waving their headscarves in the air and chanting “death to the dictator”.

The ballistic missile travelled about 4,500km (2,800 miles) before falling into the Pacific Ocean – far enough to hit the US island of Guam if it took another trajectory.

It is the first North Korean missile launch over Japan since 2017.

The launch saw Japan issue a rare alert to some citizens to take cover.

The UN prohibits North Korea from testing ballistic and nuclear weapons. Flying missiles towards or over other countries without any pre-warning or consultation also contravenes international norms.

Most countries avoid doing it completely as it can easily be mistaken for an attack. While it is not as big as a nuclear test – which could be next – it can be considered hugely provocative.

People in the north of Japan, including Hokkaido island, reportedly woke up to the noise of blaring sirens and text alerts which read: “North Korea appears to have launched a missile. Please evacuate into buildings or underground.”

As the missile flew overhead, they were warned to look out for falling debris.

Officials later said the intermediate-range ballistic missile fell into the Pacific Ocean far from Japan, and there were no reported injuries.

It had covered the longest distance ever travelled by a North Korean missile, and reached a height of around 1000km – higher than the International Space Station.

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida described the launch as “violent behaviour”, while defence minister Yasukazu Hamada said Japan would not rule out any options to strengthen its defences including “counterattack capabilities”.

The US National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson called it a “dangerous and reckless decision” that was “destabilising” to the region.

The launch comes as Japan, the US and South Korea have been working together to strengthen their defences, in response to the growing threat posed by the North.

Last week, the three countries conducted naval exercises together for the first time since 2017. Such drills have long antagonised Pyongyang leader Kim Jong-un, who views them as proof that his enemies are preparing for war.

Following the combined exercises in 2017, North Korea fired two missiles over Japan in response. A week later, it conducted a nuclear test.

Recent intelligence has suggested that North Korea is getting ready to test another nuclear weapon.

Many expected that North Korea would only do so until after China – its main ally – holds its Communist party congress later this month.

But experts believe Tuesday’s launch shows that North Korea is now preparing the ground for a nuclear test, with some asking if it could come sooner than expected.

The missile launch is the fifth carried out by Pyongyang in a week. On Saturday, two rockets came down in waters outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

Many of North Korea’s missile tests are conducted on a high, lofted flight path – reaching a high altitude, avoiding flights over its neighbours.

But firing over or past Japan allows North Korean scientists to test missiles under circumstances “that are more representative of the conditions they’d endure in real-world use”, analyst Ankit Panda told news agency Reuters.

These actions have contributed to enduring tensions between North Korea and Japan, rooted in Japan’s previous colonisation of Korea from 1910 to 1945 and the North’s abduction of Japanese citizens in the past.

Earlier this month, North Korea passed a law declaring itself to be a nuclear weapons state, with leader Kim Jong-un ruling out the possibility of talks on denuclearisation.

Pyongyang conducted six nuclear tests between 2006 and 2017, incurring widespread sanctions.

The East Asian state regularly defies the ban on nuclear and missile tests, saying it needs to bolster its defences.