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North Korea says it test-fired its biggest intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) on the orders of leader Kim Jong Un to boost its defences and prepare for a “long confrontation” with the United States, state media reported on Friday, Aljazeera reported.

Kim, dressed in a black leather jacket and sunglasses, oversaw the Thursday launch of what was described as a “new-type” of ICBM, the Hwasong-17.

The first full ICBM test by nuclear-armed North Korea since 2017 drew swift condemnation from South Korea and Japan, as well as the US. United Nations chief Antonio Guterres condemned the launch as a “clear violation” of Security Council resolutions.

According to state media, the weapon was launched from Pyongyang International Airport, travelled up to a maximum altitude of 6,248 km (3,880 miles) and flew a distance of 1,090 km (680 miles) during a 67-minute flight before falling into the Sea of Japan.

Kim ordered the test because of the “daily-escalating military tension in and around the Korean peninsula” and the “inevitability of the long-standing confrontation with the US imperialists accompanied by the danger of a nuclear war,” the official news agency for North Korea, KCNA, reported, according to Aljazeera.

“The emergence of the new strategic weapon of the DPRK would make the whole world clearly aware of the power of our strategic armed forces once again,” Kim said.

“Any forces should be made to be well aware of the fact that they will have to pay a very dear price before daring to attempt to infringe upon the security of our country,” he added, according to KCNA.

North Korea has carried out nearly a dozen missile tests since the start of the year that analysts say are aimed at forcing the US to accept North Korea as a nuclear power and remove the international sanctions that had crippled the economy even before Pyongyang sealed its borders because of the coronavirus pandemic, Aljazeera reported.

“South Korea has already launched missiles in response, and the US and South Korea are expected to respond to North Korea’s provocations through military exercises,” Kim Jong-ha, a security analyst at Hannam University in South Korea, told Al Jazeera. “As a result, inter-Korea and US-North Korea relations will be strained for the time being.”

Center for Social Inclusion and Federalism organized a seminar on BRI and Nepal-China Relations at Everest Hotel in Baneshwar, Kathmandu on Thursday.

Around 80 participants including diplomats, bureaucrats, journalists and reporters, and scholars of various fields took part in the event.

The seminar comes at an opportune time of the impending visit of State Councilor and Minister for Foreign Affairs Wang Yi of the Peoples’ Republic of China.

Center for Social Inclusion and Federalism has been conducting numerous researches to understand Nepal-China cross-border relations, recent developments and its geopolitical implications.

In the course of the seminar, three major themes were discussed by three separate panels. 

The themes were BRI and Geopolitics: Risks and Opportunities, Nepal-China Cross-border Relations,

and Nepal-China Trade, Transit, and Transport, read a statement issued by the Centre for Social Inclusion and Federalism.

Ajaya Bhadra Khanal, Arpan Gelal, and Shraddha Ghimire presented their research findings on the topics respectively.

The first panel emphasized the impacts of ensuing great power rivalry on Nepal and viewed

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s visit from the same lens. Furthermore, the panel discussed

the contrasting models of diplomacy being practiced by Washington and Beijing and their averments towards one another regarding MCC and BRI, the statement read.

In the context of BRI, the panelist opined that the component of loan makes the BRI a complicated issue. Thus, the said issue may possibly reflect anxiety and caution in Nepal's negotiations with the Chinese side resulting in the delay in the implementation of the BRI project.

The panel particularly emphasized on the issue of Tibet as Nepal shares a border with Tibet, which is yet another contentious issue for China in its engagement with Nepal.

The second-panel discussion revolved around the topic of Nepal-China cross border relations. Panelists highlighted that there has been a lack of discussion on Nepal-China border issues, while most of the focus has been on the issues along the southern border.

The third session of the seminar dealt with the trade, transit and transportation relationship with

China. The presenter highlighted the TTA agreement between the two countries that was signed in

2016 which allowed Nepal for seaports and three land ports via China, the statement further read.

It has been more than five years since the agreement was signed but the pact has not been materialized yet.

Ukraine is "not alone" in its fight against Russia's invasion, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said, BBC reported.

He said the UK would not stand by while Vladimir Putin "vents his fury on Ukraine" and would work to ramp up defensive weaponry for the country.

Speaking in Brussels, he warned that, if the Russian president used chemical weapons, the consequences would be "catastrophic for him".

Earlier, the UK announced sanctions on 65 more Russian groups and individuals.

Johnson later told BBC Newsnight that Russia did not want peace, and instead wanted to intensify its attack on Ukraine, according to BBC.

Leaders from Nato, the EU, and the G7 have been holding emergency meetings in Brussels to discuss the conflict.

Speaking at a news conference following the Nato summit, Johnson defended the level of the UK's support for Ukraine, saying the government planned to send 6,000 more missiles to the country as well as an extra £25m in aid to help Ukraine pay the salaries of its armed forces.

The PM said kit would be provided to Ukraine to defend against "its bullying neighbour".

Johnson also promised a new deployment of UK troops to Bulgaria, on top of doubling troops both in Poland and in Estonia.

It follows Nato's earlier announcement that new battle groups would be created in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia.

"The message Putin can take is: Ukraine is not alone. We stand with the people of Kyiv, Mariupol, Lviv and Donetsk," Mr Johnson said.

"As President Zelensky himself has said, the people of Ukraine must prevail and Putin must fail - and he will."

Johnson added that Western nations were looking to "steadily ratchet up" the amount of military gear they are sending Ukraine, but that it was proving "difficult" to meet the country's request for warplanes and tanks, BBC reported.

In a virtual appearance at the summit earlier, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's asked Nato for "1% of all your planes, 1% of all your tanks".

Mr Johnson said: "What President Zelensky wants is to try to relieve Mariupol and to help the thousands of Ukrainian fighters in the city. To that end he does need armour, as he sees it."

"We are looking at what we can do to help. But logistically it looks very difficult both with armour and with jets." 

Johnson added that no Western power was looking to put "boots on the ground" or impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine.

He acknowledged that the Ukrainian president wanted more from Nato, saying allies felt "agony" about their "inability to do more given the constraints we face".

In a statement reported by Russia's Ria news agency, Russia's foreign ministry said Nato's decision to continue supporting Ukraine showed the military alliance wanted the conflict to continue, according to BBC.

The UK government has already given £400m in humanitarian and economic aid to Ukraine and its neighbouring nations since Russia's invasion last month.

The PM said ministers had sanctioned more than 1,000 Russian individuals and entities so far in the toughest sanctions the UK had ever imposed.

The Wagner Group, a private military firm thought to function as an arms-length unit of the Russian military, was among the 65 entities hit by the latest sanctions announced by the UK earlier.

Also targeted were Gazprombank, the country's third-largest bank and one of the main channels for payments for Russian oil and gas, and the state-run shipping firm Sovcomflot. 

The stepdaughter of Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, Polina Kovaleva, who is thought to own a London property worth an estimated £4m, was also targeted by the measures. 

Earlier, Johnson called on the West to consider measures to prevent Russia using its gold reserves to prop up its currency, the rouble.

He told the news conference the Kremlin was "trying to get around the sanctions on their gold" and the UK and others were trying to ensure there was "no leakage or no sale of bullion into markets around the world".

The prime minister said he was not "remotely anti-Russian" after the Kremlin labelled him the "most active participant in the race to be anti-Russian".

He said that, while one could be sympathetic to ordinary Russians, the way Mr Putin was leading Russia was "utterly catastrophic" and his invasion of Ukraine was "inhuman and barbaric", BBC reported.

Johnson dismissed talk about the use of nuclear weapons as a "distraction" from what was happening in Ukraine - where he said Russia's use of conventional weapons against "innocent people" had been "absolutely barbaric".

He warned that any use of chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine by Russia would be "disastrous for Putin".

"There is a visceral horror of the use of these weapons of mass destruction. I think that if Putin were to engage in anything like that the consequences would be very, very severe. 

"You have to have a bit of ambiguity about your response but I think it would be catastrophic for him if he were to do that. And I think that he understands that."

In an interview with the BBC Newsnight Johnson said Ukraine can win the war with Russia - not necessarily on the battlefield, but by making an occupation impossible, according to BBC.

"There's a sense in which Putin has already failed, or lost, because I think that he had literally no idea that the Ukrainians were going to mount the resistance that they are and he totally misunderstood what Ukraine is - and, far from extinguishing Ukraine as a nation, he's solidified it... He can't subjugate Ukraine."

The prime minister added that he was "not optimistic" the Russian president truly wanted peace, and that he had instead decided to "double down" in his assault on Ukraine which he said was a "tragic mistake."

US President Joe Biden warned any use of chemical weapons by Putin would be met with a "response", the nature of which "would depend on the nature of the use".

Biden said the Russian President had "miscalculated" in his decision to invade Ukraine, and had banked on "Nato being split".

"Nato has never, never been more united. Putin is getting exactly the opposite of (what) he intended to have as a consequence of going into Ukraine."

Ukraine accused Moscow on Thursday of forcibly taking hundreds of thousands of civilians from shattered Ukrainian cities to Russia, where some may be used as “hostages” to pressure Kyiv to give up, Associated Press reported.

Lyudmyla Denisova, Ukraine’s ombudsperson, said 402,000 people, including 84,000 children, had been taken to Russia.

The Kremlin gave nearly identical numbers for those who have been relocated, but said they wanted to go to Russia. Ukraine’s rebel-controlled eastern regions are predominantly Russian-speaking, and many people there have supported close ties to Moscow.

A month into the invasion, the two sides traded heavy blows in what has become a devastating war of attrition. Ukraine’s navy said it sank a large Russian landing ship near the port city of Berdyansk that had been used to bring in armored vehicles. Russia claimed to have taken the eastern town of Izyum after fierce fighting, according to the Associated Press.

At an emergency NATO summit in Brussels, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pleaded with the Western allies via video for planes, tanks, rockets, air defense systems and other weapons, saying his country is “defending our common values.”

US President Joe Biden, in Europe for the summit and other high-level meetings, gave assurances more aid is on its way, though it appeared unlikely the West would give Zelenskyy everything he wanted, for fear of triggering a much wider war.

Around the capital, Kyiv, and other areas, Ukrainian defenders have fought Moscow’s ground troops to a near-stalemate, raising fears that a frustrated Russian President Vladimir Putin will resort to chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, Associated Press reported.

In other developments Thursday:

—Ukraine and Russia exchanged a total of 50 military and civilian prisoners, the largest swap reported yet, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.

—The pro-Moscow leader of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, warned that Poland’s proposal to deploy a Western peacekeeping force in Ukraine “will mean World War III.”

In Chernihiv, where an airstrike this week destroyed a crucial bridge, a city official, Olexander Lomako, said a “humanitarian catastrophe” is unfolding as Russian forces target food storage places. He said about 130,000 people are left in the besieged city, about half its prewar population.

—Russia said it will offer safe passage starting Friday to 67 ships from 15 foreign countries that are stranded in Ukrainian ports because of the danger of shelling and mines.

Kyiv and Moscow gave conflicting accounts, meanwhile, about the people being relocated to Russia and whether they were going willingly — as Russia claimed — or were being coerced or lied to.

Russian Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev said the roughly 400,000 people evacuated to Russia since the start of the military action were from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Moscow separatists have been fighting for control for nearly eight years.

Russian authorities said they are providing accommodations and dispensing payments to the evacuees.

But Donetsk Region Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko said that “people are being forcibly moved into the territory of the aggressor state.” Denisova said those removed by Russian troops included a 92-year-old woman in Mariupol who was forced to go to Taganrog in southern Russia, according to the Associated Press.

Ukrainian officials said that the Russians are taking people’s passports and moving them to “filtration camps” in Ukraine’s separatist-controlled east before sending them to various distant, economically depressed areas in Russia. 

Among those taken, Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry charged, were 6,000 residents of Mariupol, the devastated port city in the country’s east. Moscow’s troops are confiscating identity documents from an additional 15,000 people in a section of Mariupol under Russian control, the ministry said.

Some could be sent as far as the Pacific island of Sakhalin, Ukrainian intelligence said, and are being offered jobs on condition they don’t leave for two years. The ministry said the Russians intend to “use them as hostages and put more political pressure on Ukraine.”

Kyrylenko said that Mariupol’s residents have been long deprived of information and that the Russians feed them false claims about Ukraine’s defeats to persuade them to move to Russia, Associated Press reported.

“Russian lies may influence those who have been under the siege,” he said.

As for the naval attack in Berdyansk, Ukraine claimed two more ships were damaged and a 3,000-ton fuel tank was destroyed when the Russian ship Orsk was sunk, causing a fire that spread to ammunition supplies.

Zelenskyy rallied the country to keep up its military defense in hopes it would lead to peace.

“With every day of our defense, we are getting closer to the peace that we need so much. We are getting closer to victory. … We can’t stop even for a minute, for every minute determines our fate, our future, whether we will live,” he said late Thursday in his nightly video address to the nation.

Zelenskyy said thousands of people, including 128 children, have died in the first month of the war. Across the country, 230 schools and 155 kindergartens have been destroyed. Cities and villages “lie in ashes,” he said, according To The Associated Press.