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‘US is responsible for defense of CNMI’
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Posted on Feb 24 2009
The Fitial administration said yesterday the CNMI relies on the United States for the defense of the islands under the Covenant agreement, following a report issued Monday by South Korea’s Defense Ministry that North Korea had deployed a new intermediate-range ballistic missile that could threaten the CNMI’s neighbor Guam.
Guam is less than 50 miles from Rota, the southernmost island of the CNMI.
The CNMI’s capital of Saipan lies about 125 miles northeast of Guam, which has American military bases.
The new missile, according to national reports quoting South Korea’s Defense Ministry, can travel about 1,900 miles or 3,000 kilometers carrying a 1,400-lb warhead, possibly putting U.S. military bases on Guam within striking distance.
“Under our Covenant agreement with the United States, the U.S. is responsible for the defense of these islands. We rely on the United States for the CNMI’s security. The CNMI is a Commonwealth of the United States,” press secretary Charles P. Reyes Jr. told Saipan Tribune yesterday when asked for comment on the defense report.
North Korea, however, insisted that what it planned to launch was a scientific satellite and not a missile theoretically capable of reaching Hawaii, Alaska and Guam.
