International News

WASHINGTON, Sept 22, (APP/AFP): An escalating war
of words between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-Un ratcheted up a notch on Friday as the US president dubbed North Korea’s leader a “madman,” a day after the reclusive regime hinted it may explode a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific Ocean.
Hours earlier, in a rare personal attack, Kim took aim at Trump, branding him “mentally deranged” and a “dotard”, and warning he would “pay dearly” for his threat to destroy North Korea if challenged, uttered before the United Nations General Assembly.
The verbal clash came a day after Washington announced tougher sanctions aimed at curbing North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile program, on the heels of a Trump speech in which he which he nicknamed Kim “Rocket Man” and declared him to be on a “suicide mission.”
“Kim Jong Un of North Korea, who is obviously a madman who doesn’t mind starving or killing his people, will be tested like never before!” Trump posted early Friday in the first of a barrage of unrelated tweets.
Kim had delivered a tongue-lashing of his own — vowing to “surely and definitely tame the mentally deranged US dotard with fire,” in an address read out on state television by a star news anchor before a still image of Kim at his desk.
Trump “insulted me and my country in front of the eyes of the world and made the most ferocious declaration of a war in history”, Kim said, according to the official Korean Central News Agency.
“I will make the man holding the prerogative of the supreme command in the US pay dearly for his speech.”