Pyongyang declares South Korea its ‘primary’ foe as Iran launches missiles

(Originally published Jan. 17 in “What in the World“) The strikes targeted four anti-ship ballistic missiles and came as one of the Iran-backed rebels’ missiles struck an empty Greek-owned cargo ship headed through the Red Sea towards the Suez Canal.

The U.S. Navy also seized a boat in the Gulf of Aden carrying Iranian-made missiles and cruise missile parts to Yemen. Iran’s role in the escalating regional war is becoming more overt after its missile attack Monday against what it said were Israeli targets in Iraq’s Kurdistan and Islamic State remnants in Syria.

Iran also struck targets in a remote, mountainous part of Pakistan. Tehran said both attacks were retaliation for terrorist attacks in Iran, including the suicide attack earlier this month claimed by ISIS. The U.S., which has been striking Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria, condemned Iran’s missile attacks in Kurdistan as “reckless and imprecise.”

Former U.S. Ambassador and Ukraine negotiator Kurt Volker predicts in a piece for the Center for European Policy Analysis that Congress will soon approve $61 billion in military aid for Kyiv: “Because the vast majority of Republicans and Democrats in both Houses of Congress support it,” he writes, “and nobody wants to vote on this again during a Presidential election year.”

North Korea stepped up its rhetoric against South Korea, with its leader Kim Jong-un on Tuesday dropping Pyongyang’s goal of peaceful reunification and instead naming South Korea neighbor as the North’s principal enemy, one that must be vanquished by whatever means necessary.