http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/28/politics/north-korea-missile-test/index.html

Washington (CNN)The US detected a ballistic missile launch out of North Korea at approximately 10:45 am eastern time on Friday, the Pentagon confirmed to CNN.

They are assessing the launch and will have more soon.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told Japanese broadcaster NHK: "I have received the first report that North Korea again launched a missile and it possibly landed inside the exclusive economic zone."
Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said the missile launched by North Korea possibly flew for approximately 45 minutes.
Suga told reporters there is no damage to any vessel or aircraft -- adding that the missile is believed to have fallen in Japan's exclusive economic zone.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff have also confirmed that North Korea fired an unidentified missile.
The Pentagon is still working to assess the type of ballistic missile that was launched -- the ongoing assessment from the US intelligence community in recent months has been that North Korea has accelerated its intercontinental range ballistic missile program.

The US believes that North Korea will be able to launch a reliable nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) by early 2018, a US official familiar with the latest intelligence assessment confirmed to CNN Wednesday.
That would be an acceleration of two years from previous estimates that put Pyongyang three to five years from fully developing long-range missile capabilities.
Why North Korea still hates the United States: The legacy of the Korean War
Why North Korea still hates the United States: The legacy of the Korean War
The official clarified to CNN that while North Korea can currently get a missile "off the ground," there are still a lot of undetermined variables about guidance, re-entry and the ability to hit a specific target.
Pyongyang conducted its last ICBM test on July 4. Friday's test would mark North Korea's 12th missile test this year.
This story is breaking and will be updated.
CNN's Junko Ogura contributed to this report.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/17/world/north-korea-united-nations-envoy/index.html

United Nations (CNN)Only at a North Korean press conference at the United Nations, can you hear a diplomat say he hoped journalists had a good holiday weekend and then warn of possible thermonuclear war.

North Korea has consistently issued threats of war toward the United States in recent decades, but the Trump administration's announced end of a "strategic patience" policy with Pyongyang has upped the ante in terms of warnings and bellicose rhetoric. North Korea's UN deputy representative, Kim In Ryong, on Monday unleashed at a hastily called UN press conference a torrent of threats, war scenarios and rhetoric aimed at the United States.
The press event was held hours after US Vice President Mike Pence visited the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea. Pence warned North Korea not to test the resolve of the United States "or the strength of our military forces."
In New York, North Korea returned verbal fire. North Korea's UN ambassador condemned the US naval buildup in the waters off the Korean Peninsula, plus the US missile attacks on Syria.

Kim said, "It has created a dangerous situation in which thermonuclear war may break out at any moment on the peninsula and poses a serious threat to world peace and security."
While reporters at the United Nations have heard similar rhetoric from North Koreans before, Monday's forceful wording was on a higher level
The deputy ambassador, reading from a statement, told reporters, "The US is disturbing the global peace and stability and insisting on the gangster-like logic that its invasion of a sovereign state is 'decisive, and just, and proportionate' and contributes to 'defending' the international order in its bid to apply it to the Korean Peninsula as well."
Kim said his country is ready to react to any "mode of war" from the United States. Any missile or nuclear strike by the United States would be responded to "in kind," said the North Korea representative.
The USS Carl Vinson carrier-led Navy strike group was sent to the Korean Peninsula. North Korea's UN representative said the maneuvers show the "US reckless moves for invading the DPRK (North Korea) have reached a serious phase."
The United Nations is clearly worried. Spokesman Stephane Dujarric told journalists, "We're obviously deeply concerned about the rising tensions that we've seen in the Korean Peninsula. We call on all to redouble their diplomatic efforts. "
The North Korean deputy ambassador was asked to respond to President Donald Trump's comment that North Korea should "behave better." He declined, instead wrapping up numerous questions about US policy and Pence's visit to the DMZ into a long series of criticisms of the United States.
He denounced the United States for introducing into the Korean Peninsula -- what he called "the world's biggest hotspot" -- its "huge nuclear strategic assets, seriously threatening peace and security of the Peninsula and pushing the situation there to a brink of war."

North Korea staged a failed missile launch over the weekend. Dujarric said, "I think the latest launch that we saw over the weekend from the DPRK was troubling. We call on the DPRK to take all the steps necessary to deescalate the situation and return to a dialogue on denuclearization."
North Korea is upset that the UN Security Council will hold a meeting on the situation later this month, with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson presiding.
Pyongyang again said it has sent letters demanding its own hearing at the Security Council for alleged US abuses, but they have been ignored by a council which has seen numerous council resolutions violated by North Korean missile and nuclear tests.
To add to the list of warnings, the North Korean diplomat said his country would hold the United States accountable "for the catastrophic consequences to be entailed by its outrageous actions."
Journalists were asked to give their names on a sheet passed around by the North Koreans, but the sign-up sheet was left behind apparently when the news conference concluded.

(CNN)The United States launched a military strike Thursday on a Syrian government target in retaliation for their chemical weapons attack on civilians earlier in the week.

On President Donald Trump's orders, US warships launched between 50-60 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a Syrian government airbase where the warplanes that carried out the chemical attacks were based, US officials said.
"Tonight, I ordered a targeted military strike on the air field in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched," Trump said during short remarks to reporters at Mar-a-Lago. "It is in this vital national security of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons."
He added: "There can be no dispute that Syria used banned chemical weapons, violated its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention and ignored the urging of the UN Security Council. Years of previous attempts at changing Assad's behavior have all failed and failed very dramatically."

A US defense official said the strike was targeted on runway, aircraft and fuel points. The missiles were launched from warships in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Strikes are over "until another decision is made," the official said.
The strikes are the first direct military action the US has taken against the leadership of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in the country's six-year civil war and represent a substantial escalation of the US' military campaign in the region, which could be interpreted by the Syrian government as an act of war.
There were Russians at the base that the US struck Thursday night, a US defense official. It was not said what the Russians' role was at the base. In addition, according to the official, the US had multiple conversations with the Russians today to warn them of the coming attack.
Separately, in an effort to tie the US strike to the chemical attack, the US military showed reporters an image of the radar track of a Syrian airplane leaving the airfield and headed to chemical strike area on Tuesday. A second image of bomb damage craters at the airbase was also shown to reporters at the Pentagon.
Lawmakers generally supported Trump's decision to strike back against Assad Thursday night, but cautioned the President against unilaterally starting a war without first consulting Congress.
A pair of defense hawks -- Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham -- who have frequently been critical of Trump, roundly praised his decision Thursday night.
"Acting on the orders of their commander-in-chief, they have sent an important message the United States will no longer stand idly by as Assad, aided and abetted by Putin's Russia, slaughters innocent Syrians with chemical weapons and barrel bombs," McCain and Graham said in a joint statement.
But Sen. Rand Paul called on Trump to consult on Congress.
"While we all condemn the atrocities in Syria, the US was not attacked," Paul said.
The US began launching airstrikes in Syria in September 2014 under President Barack Obama as part of its coalition campaign against ISIS, but has only targeted the terrorist group and not Syrian government forces.
Trump met with his national security team before his dinner with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Mar-a-Lago Thursday, where he made the decision to pull the trigger on the biggest military action of his presidency, an administration official says.
He sat through dinner with the President Xi as action was under way.

Defense Secretary James Mattis has been updating Trump about the missile strikes in Syria following his dinner with Xi, according to a US official.
Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Trump's national security adviser Gen. H.R. McMaster were with Trump at Mar-a-Lago at the time. Vice President Mike Pence remained in Washington, where he returned to the White House after dinner.
Trump's order to strike the Syrian government targets came a day after he said the chemical attacks -- whose grisly effects were broadcast worldwide where videos captured in the immediate aftermath -- "crossed a lot of lines for me" and said he felt a "responsibility" to respond.

"I will tell you it's already happened that my attitude toward Syria and Assad has changed very much," Trump said.
"When you kill innocent children -- innocent babies -- babies -- little babies with a chemical gas that is so lethal, people were shocked to hear what gas it was, that crosses many, many lines. Beyond a red line, many, many lines," Trump said.
Trump's decision to launch the strikes, the most significant military action of his young presidency, came nearly four years after the US first concluded that Syrian forces had used chemical weapons in Syria. The Obama administration concluded that Syria had violated the "red line" Obama had set a year earlier in discussing the use of chemical weapons, but ultimately decided against military action against Syria in favor of a Russian-brokered deal to extricate the country's chemical weapons stockpile.
Trump at the time said the US should "stay the hell out of Syria" and urged Obama on Twitter to "not attack Syria" in the wake of the 2013 chemical attack.

"There is no upside and tremendous downside. Save your 'powder' for another (and more important) day," he tweeted in September 2013.
Trump repeatedly criticized Obama during his presidential campaign for not acting on his "red line" threat, but the real estate mogul also argued against deepening the US' military involvement in Syria, particularly as it related to Assad.
Trump argued last May in a TV interview that he would "go after ISIS big league," but said he did not support targeting Assad's regime, arguing the US has "bigger problems than Assad."
Syria's six-year civil war has claimed the lives of at least 400,000, according to a United Nations estimate released a year ago. More than 5 million Syrians have fled the country and more than 6 million more have been displaced internally, according to UN agencies.
But guided by his "America First" ideology and rejection of the US' propensity for "nation-building," Trump did not argue in favor of stepped-up US intervention during his campaign for president.
Instead, he signaled the opposite: He argued that the US should remain laser-focused on defeating ISIS and vowed to try and partner with Russia, which has heartily backed Assad's regime, in order to defeat ISIS and bring the conflict to an end.
Those views appeared steeped in his longstanding criticism of the Iraq War, which he called a "stupid" decision, lamenting the billions of dollars funneled toward that war effort instead of on domestic programs, like infrastructure spending.
While Trump rejected the isolationist label some placed on him during the campaign, he made clear that his preference was for limiting the US footprint around the world and refocusing US foreign policy around core national security interests.

London (CNN)Three people died and and at least 20 were injured when an attacker rammed a car into crowds of people before stabbing a police officer in the grounds of the UK Parliament in London.

The assault, which came on the one-year anniversary of the Isis bomb attacks in Brussels, brought carnage to Westminster, the heart of political life in Britain.
Among the dead were a police officer and the assailant, police said, announcing a "full counter-terrorism investigation." A woman was pulled from the River Thames alive, but with serious injuries.

Parliament was placed on lockdown and lawmakers were forced to remain in the main debating chamber of the House of Commons as firearms officers rushed to the scene outside.
Pictures showed scenes of carnage in the aftermath of the attack, which happened as Parliament was in session. One member of the British government gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to one of those injured.
"This is a day that we had planned for -- that we all hoped would never happen -- but sadly it is now a reality, said Mark Rowley, Britain's most senior counter-terror police officer.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/22/europe/uk-parliament-firearms-incident/index.html

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