North fired rockets during Hegseth visit, says S Korea; US Defence Secy vows to fulfil Trump's nuke submarine pledge to Seoul

Seoul [South Korea], November 4 : North Korea fired multiple artillery rockets less than an hour prior to the visit by US defence chief Pete Hegseth to the Demilitarized Zone, separating it from South Korea, Seoul's military said on Tuesday.

South Korean media Yonhap cited its Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) as saying that Pyongyang launched the rockets toward waters off the northern part of Yellow Sea also known as West Sea at around 4 pm on November 3 and that analysis of the weapons is being done.

The news agency further said, North Korea had also fired "another 10 artillery rocket shells" at around 3 pm on November 1 when South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and Chinese President Xi Jinping held summit talks in Gyeongju during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit.

Meanwhile, Hegseth, while addressing a press conference today alongside his South Korean counterpart Ahn Gyu-back, said that Washington will make interagency efforts "in a deliberate manner" to help fulfill a pledge by US President Donald Trump for South Korea to build nuclear-powered submarines in a US shipyard.

When asked about the possibility of the US forces stationed in South Korea being deployed in the event of a contingency in the Taiwan Strait, the Pentagon chief said the US will look at "flexibility" for US troops for regional contingencies and stressed the focus will remain on deterring North Korea.

"We are focused on standing by our allies here in ensuring the threat of the DPRK is not a threat to the Republic of Korea and certainly continue to extend nuclear deterrence as we have before," he said, referring to North Korea by the acronym of its formal name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Yonhap reported.

Hegseth and Ahn held their annual security talks- Security Consultative Meeting (SCM) today.

South Korean President Lee Jae Myung had asked US President Trump during their APEC summit meeting last week to allow Seoul to secure nuclear fuel supplies for conventionally armed submarines to track North Korean and Chinese vessels better, saying it would ease the operational burden for US forces.

Yonhap reported that Trump, in a social media post, said that he has given South Korea approval to build a nuclear-powered submarine (SSN)at a Philadelphia shipyard, run by South Korea's Hanwha Ocean.

In a social media post on October 29, Trump declared that the South Korea-US alliance "is stronger than ever before and, based on that, I have given them approval to build a nuclear-powered submarine."

In a separate post, Trump said, "South Korea will be building its Nuclear Powered Submarine in the Philadelphia Shipyards, right here in the good ol' U.S.A."

Meanwhile, Yonhap reported today that Pyongynag had in October fired multiple short-range ballistic missiles, just about a week before US President Donald Trump was set to visit South Korea for the APEC gathering.

Hegseth had accompanied by South Korea's Defence minister Ahn Gyu-back had visited Camp Bonifas within the DMZ yesterday.

Seoul state media cited the JCS as saying, "Our military is closely monitoring North Korea's various activities under a steadfast South Korea-US combined defence posture and maintains capabilities and a posture capable of overwhelmingly responding to any threat."

After his visit to the heavily fortified border separating the two Koreas, Hegseth had taken to X to post, "I visited the DMZ with my ROK counterpart, Minister Ahn, to meet the brave troops of the U.S., ROK, and UN Command that maintain the military armistice on the Peninsula. Our forces remain ready to support President Trump's efforts to bring lasting peace through strength."

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