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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw a test of strategic cruise missiles, state news agency KCNA said on Monday, as South Korea and the United States kicked off annual military drills that Pyongyang sees as a rehearsal for war.

Kim visited a navy fleet stationed on the east coast to oversee the test aboard a warship, KCNA said, without specifying the date of his trip.

The launch aimed to verify the "combat function of the ship and the feature of its missile system", while improving sailors' capability to carry out an "attack mission in actual war", KCNA said, adding that the ship's missile hit its target.

Kim said the ship would maintain "high mobility and mighty striking power and constant preparedness for combat to cope with sudden situations," KCNA said.

South Korea's defence ministry said it had detected signs of the launch, but that the KCNA claims were "exaggerated" and "different from the facts", but did not elaborate.

The latest missile test came as South Korea and the United States began the Ulchi Freedom Shield summer exercises on Monday, designed to enhance their joint responses to North Korea's nuclear and missile threats.

Pyongyang has denounced the allies' military drills as a rehearsal for nuclear war.

South Korea's military has said this year's exercises will be held on the "largest scale ever", involving tens of thousands of troops from both sides, as well as some member states of the U.N. Command.

President Yoon Suk Yeol said the drills would feature several contingency scenarios, such as cyber, terror and drone attacks, and a disinformation campaign by the North.

"True peace is preserved only by overwhelming force, not by one-sided begging or goodwill," Yoon told a meeting of the National Security Council.

"North Korea talks about preemptive nuclear strikes and preparations for an offensive war, but we will immediately and overwhelmingly retaliate for any provocations."

South Korean lawmakers have said the North could test-fire an intercontinental ballistic missile or take other military action to protest the allies' drills or last week's summit of South Korea, the United States and Japan.

Over the past two years, North Korea has been testing what it calls "strategic cruise missiles," which some analysts have said could be tipped with nuclear warheads. While modernising and bolstering its naval power, North Korea showcased a new, nuclear-capable underwater attack drone in March.

Choi Il, a former navy officer who runs a think tank focusing on naval power, said the missiles can fly more than 1,000 km (621 miles) and hit land-based targets, and the new ship appears to be a corvette-class vessel, designed to minimise radar detection.

Aboard the ship, Kim vowed to reinforce the navy with improved combat efficiency and modern means of surface and underwater offensive and defensive capabilities, KCNA said.

"We would put spurs to the modernisation of naval weapons and equipment, including the building of powerful warships and the development of shipboard and underwater weapon systems," it quoted the leader as saying. (Reuters)

China is investigating a Chinese national accused of spying for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the country's state security ministry said on Monday.

The 39-year-old Chinese national, surnamed Hao, was a cadre at a ministry and had gone to Japan for studies, which was where the spying recruitment occurred, the ministry said. Hao's gender was not revealed.

The statement came less than two weeks after the ministry said it uncovered another national also suspected of spying for the CIA after being recruited in Italy. The U.S. embassy in Beijing did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment, while the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo referred questions to the CIA, which was not immediately able to respond outside business hours.

The ministry said Hao had become acquainted with a U.S. embassy official known as "Ted" while sorting out a visa application. He invited Hao for dinners, presented gifts and sought Hao's help with writing a paper that Ted promised to pay for, the ministry said.

Ted introduced Hao to a colleague named Li Jun before his term at the embassy in Japan ended, the ministry said; Li and Hao then maintained a "cooperative relationship".

Before Hao completed studying, Li revealed being Tokyo-based CIA personnel and "instigated Hao into rebelling", telling Hao to return to China to work for a "core and critical unit".

Hao signed an espionage agreement, accepting assessment and training from the United States, according to the statement.

The ministry said Hao worked in a national department upon returning, "according to the requirements of the CIA", and provided the CIA with intelligence while collecting U.S. pay.

Relations between the United States and China have soured in recent years over a range of issues, including national security. Washington has accused Beijing of espionage and cyberattacks, charges China has rejected. China has also declared it is under threat from spies.

China called on its citizens this month to participate in counter-espionage work, after expanding its anti-spying law in July, alarming the United States. (Reuters)

Taiwan Vice President William Lai managed to walk a fine line on his sensitive trip to the United States if China's drills in response are anything to go by, but Beijing's ire may not be allayed for long by a person it deeply dislikes.

China, which claims Taiwan as its own territory and has repeatedly denounced Lai as a separatist, held exercises around Taiwan on Saturday, the day after he returned, but on a far lower scale than previous war games in April and last August in protest at Taiwan-U.S. engagement.

China has a particular dislike of Lai, the frontrunner in polls ahead of January's presidential election, due to his previous comments about being a "worker for Taiwan independence".

But Lai did not meet any senior U.S. officials or lawmakers during the visit, aside from the head of the unofficial U.S. body that deals with the country's Taiwan ties. In his public events he talked about peace and dialogue, though he also said that Taiwan would not back down in the face of threats.

"The People's Liberation Army could not find an excuse to make a big fuss," said Ma Chen-kun, a Chinese military expert at Taiwan's National Defence University. "These drills were a lot of thunder, but less rain."

There was no live fire component, unlike last August when China fired missiles over Taiwan, the drill lasted only one day, and was not given a name, unlike the April one, though Chinese state media did launch a series of personal attacks on Lai on Saturday, including calling him a "liar".

Taiwan's defence ministry, in its daily report on Chinese movements over the previous 24 hours, said on Monday morning that it had spotted no Chinese military aircraft entering the Taiwan Strait over that period.

Both Taiwan and the United States had sought to keep Lai's U.S. visit low key, officially describing it as stopovers on his way to and from Paraguay and saying it was a decades-long routine for Taiwan presidents to transit in the United States during trips overseas therefore China shouldn't use the visit as a "pretext" for military drills.

China, in the long run, is unlikely to be ameliorated, believing as it still does that Lai is a dangerous separatist who may go back to pushing for Taiwan independence when he wins election, said Shen Dingli, a Shanghai-based International Relations Scholar.

"If Lai Ching-te becomes president and returns to his original stance or even strengthens it, he could force the mainland to deal with Taiwan using non-peaceful means," he said, using Lai's Chinese language name.

'NO SURPRISES'

Lo Chih-cheng, a senior lawmaker for the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, said Lai's trip was also about the broader process of showing him to the United States as a steady and trustworthy leader.

"Maybe you think the transits were a bit boring or simple, but also there were no surprises," Lo said.

An opinion poll published on Monday by the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation showed Lai extending his lead and pulling well ahead of his nearest competitor to be Taiwan's next president, the former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je.

China's reaction could also have been muted since the visit came against the backdrop of both Beijing and Washington trying to improve relations, which could include a visit to the United States later in the year by President Xi Jinping for an Asia Pacific summit.

China's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but a ministry spokesman told reporters on Monday that it was hard for Lai to hide his "evil intent" to seek independence.

China could take other, trade-related, steps to punish Taiwan, having previously stopped Taiwanese fruit and fish imports. On Monday, China suspended Taiwanese mango imports citing a pest problem.

But China has its own domestic problems as well, not least economic ones like a property market crisis, and threat of war with Taiwan is not going to help that, said Fan Shih-ping, a professor at National Taiwan Normal University's Graduate Institute of Political Science.

"Noise about achieving unification through force is a negative for Chinese consumers. Who wants to spend if there's going to be a war?" he said. (Reuters)

VOINews, Jakarta - The National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are collaborating for holding a meeting to discuss increasing the capacity of human resources (HR) in implementing the Non-Destructive Test (NDT).

"This is a one-framework regional cooperation project within the IAEA. The theme is specifically related to applications in nuclear engineering in the industrial sector, especially in non-destructive testing," Nuclear Technology Developer Main Expert of the Research Center for Radiation Process Technology of BRIN Roziq Himawan stated when met in Jakarta, Monday.

Himawan remarked that an NDT is a test conducted on a research object involving atoms, such as a petrochemical factory, or a power plant without damaging the object.

In simple terms, he said, conducting NDT is akin to carrying out an x-ray radiographic test at a hospital that examines human internal organs without damaging them.

"Similar to (tests for) the product industry, non-destructive testing is also carried out," he noted.

Himawan stated that NDT was conducted in several industries, such as heavy equipment manufacturers, small components manufacturers, and cellphone manufacturers, by examining the conditions inside without disassembling it and can be viewed in two-dimensional and three-dimensional forms using nuclear-based technology.

He noted that cooperation with the IAEA had been carried out since a long time, but the meeting, held on August 21-25, 2023, emphasized the existence of cooperation between two parties.

He drew attention to two important aspects in NDT, with the first being the standard in the testing process while the second pertained to how the process is conducted.

"Whoever is the person (who conducts the trials), of course, must be a certified person. There is such a thing as certification and qualification," he emphasized.

The meeting was attended by delegations from 17 countries in the Asia-Pacific region: Indonesia, Bangladesh, China, Fiji, South Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam.

In addition, the meeting was attended by IAEA representatives, who are technical officers in the field of NDT. (Antaranews)