• North Korea moves missile to east as nuclear crisis escalates

    Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland discusses the increase of aggressive rhetoric that is being expressed on a regular basis by the North Korean government.

    By Robert Windrem, Jim Miklaszewski and Courtney Kube, NBC News

    North Korea is moving a medium-range missile to a site in the east of the country, a U.S. intelligence official said Thursday as tensions with the nuclear-armed state continued to escalate.

    The official declined to say where the Musudan missile was headed, but the North has used a site near the Russian border on the coast for its missile tests in the past.

    In response to North Korea's announcement that they will be deploying "small, light" nuclear strikes, the Pentagon has announced it is sending an anti-ballistic missile system to Guam. NBC's Richard Engel reports.

    South Korean Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin told lawmakers Thursday that the missile had "considerable range" but not enough to hit the U.S. mainland, according to The Associated Press.

    The news came hours after North Korea's military warned that it had been authorized to attack the U.S. using "smaller, lighter and diversified" nuclear weapons -- the latest in a string of war cries against America in recent weeks.

    "The moment of explosion is approaching fast,” the military statement said.

    Tensions on the Korean Peninsula rose in December when the North test-fired a rocket and increased again when it tested a nuclear bomb in February.

    Russia joined the ranks of countries voicing concern at the escalating crisis, saying the North's disregard for United Nations’ restrictions was unacceptable.

    The U.S. is sending an advanced anti-ballistic missile system to Guam to protect American military sites, officials said Wednesday.

    The Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense system is expected to arrive at the U.S. territory in the Pacific within two weeks.

    'Real and clear danger'
    Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said the North’s provocations were "a real and clear danger and threat" to U.S. interests and stressed that Washington was taking them seriously.

    U.S. officials tell NBC News they believe North Korea does have the capability to put a nuclear weapon on a missile and that they have missile deliverable nukes. Those missiles, however, cannot go more than 1000 miles. NBC's Richard Engel reports.

    "We are doing everything we can ... to defuse that situation on the peninsula," Hagel said after a speech Wednesday at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington, D.C.

    "I hope the North will ratchet this very dangerous rhetoric down," he said, adding that there is a pathway to peace but only if Pyongyang decides to be "a responsible member of the world community."

    On Thursday, North Korea warned its military had been authorized to carry out "cutting-edge, smaller, lighter and diversified" nuclear strikes to protect itself against the United States.

    "The moment of explosion is approaching fast. No one can say a war will break out in Korea or not and whether it will break out today or tomorrow," read the statement of an unnamed military spokesman.

    The statement, which was carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), informed the White House and the Pentagon that "the merciless operation of its revolutionary armed forces in this regard has been finally examined and ratified."

    It also made reference to U.S. jet sorties over the Korean Peninsula, which Pentagon officials have said are part of routine, joint military drills with South Korea.

    If North Korea were to employ nuclear weapons, it would impact U.S. troops and pressure Japan and South Korea to also consider obtaining nuclear weapons – something that could lead to an all-out arms race.  NBC's Andrea Mitchell reports.

    "The U.S. high-handed hostile policy toward the DPRK aimed to encroach upon its sovereignty and the dignity of its supreme leadership and bring down its social system is being implemented through actual military actions without hesitation," the North’s statement read.

    Meanwhile, a former U.N. official who visited North Korea last year reported that officials there said they could restart the Yongbyon reactor in three months. That is significantly quicker than many U.S. nuclear experts believe a restart would take.

    U.S. officials said they did not believe the operation would be a huge engineering challenge.

    A restart would, however, be significant, as it would give North Korea the capability to make weapons-grade plutonium again. The reactor was shut down in 2007.

    "North Korea's assertion that it intends to bring Yongbyon back online can't be easily written off as an insurmountable hurdle," one U.S. official said.

    The Associated Press and NBC News' Marc Smith, Alastair Jamieson, Andrea Mitchell and Becky Bratu contributed to this report.

    Related:

    What happens if North Korea gets out of hand? Here are some scenarios

    NBC News' Jim Maceda responds to your questions on North Korea tensions

    Full North Korea coverage from NBC News

     

    This story was originally published on Thu Apr 4, 2013 4:17 AM EDT

  • US shares same goals as Afghan leader Hamid Karzai, John Kerry says

    NBC's Andrea Mitchell reports on the news conference between Secretary of State John Kerry and Afghan President  Hamid Karzai.

    By Andrea Mitchell and Jamieson Lesko, NBC News

    Jason Reed / AP

    Secretary of State John Kerry, accompanied by U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan James Cunningham, left, meets with Afghan President Hamid Karzai at the Presidential Palace in Kabul, Monday.

    KABUL -- Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who has infuriated U.S. officials with anti-American rhetoric, on Monday denied suggesting that the U.S. was colluding with the Taliban to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed in the country beyond 2014. 

    In a joint news briefing with Secretary of State John Kerry, Karzai said the media misinterpreted comments he made during a visit by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on March 10.

    Karzai said the point he was trying to make was that by continuing to bomb and kill innocent Afghans, the Taliban is giving a reason for the U.S. to stay.

    It was the media, Karzai said, that misinterpreted that to mean collusion, a word he said he did not use.

    "If (Taliban) want the international community to leave this country, their forces, they must stop hurting Afghans or hurting the international community." Karzai said. "To the United States, I'm in full support of saying that they no longer fight the Taliban, that they will focus on fighting al Qaeda and the other terrorist networks."

    Kerry arrived in Afghanistan’s capital Monday on an unannounced visit that aims to repair fractured ties with President Hamid Karzai.

    For his part, Kerry said the United States and Afghan leaders share the same goals – bringing the Taliban into peace talks.

    "I'm confident that the president absolutely does not believe the United States has any interest except to see the Taliban come to the table to make peace," Kerry said.

    The meeting came on the same day the U.S. turned over the detention facility at the U.S.-run Bagram military base north of Kabul to Afghan control, which has been a priority for Karzai. U.S. officials say they've been assured the most dangerous prisoners will not be released.

    It is Kerry’s sixth visit to Afghanistan since President Barack Obama took office, but his first as secretary of state.

    State Department officials told reporters traveling with Kerry that he is optimistic the U.S. and Afghanistan can overcome recent differences, including the awkward moment earlier this month when Karzai accused the U.S. and the Taliban of colluding to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed beyond 2014.

    The officials said Kerry was not in Kabul to lecture or chide Karzai, adding that he acknowledged the relationship was “not always going to be easy.”

    The secretary of state arrived in Kabul this morning just a day after another unannounced visit to Baghdad. Kerry plans to meet with Afghanistan's president Hamid Karzai to discuss political and security issues. NBC's Andrea Mitchell reports.

    Kerry is optimistic the two countries can move in from Karzai’s anti-U.S. rhetoric, which the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan warned was putting the lives of Western troops in danger.

    Anja Niedringhaus / AP

    An Afghan prisoner leaves with his belongings from the Parwan Detention Facility outside Kabul after the U.S. military gave control to Afghan authorities, Monday.

    On Sunday, Kerry visited Iraq before leaving for dinner in the Jordanian capital, Amman, with Pakistan's powerful army chief of staff, Ashfaq Kayani.

    The secretary of state is not visiting Pakistan during this trip as the country is in the midst of a political transition.

    NBC News' Catherine Chomiak and Alastair Jamieson contributed to this report.

    Related:

    Kerry urges Iraq to stop arms flow to Syria on Baghdad visit

    Full Afghanistan coverage from NBC News

    This story was originally published on Mon Mar 25, 2013 8:03 AM EDT

  • New timeline of Benghazi attack notes quick response by defenders

    Esam Omran Al-fetori / Reuters

    The U.S. consulate in Benghazi is seen in flames on Sept. 11.

    By Catherine Chomiak and Andrea Mitchell, NBC News

    WASHINGTON -- A senior intelligence official has issued a new timeline for the events surrounding the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, indicating a series of tragic miscalculations that left CIA officers exposed at an annex near the consulate -- but no evidence of interference from Washington or of the CIA witholding aid from the State Department, as Republican critics have alleged.


    According to the timeline, CIA officials in Libya sent a security team to the consulate within 25 minutes of the report of the attack, and the U.S. military sent an unarmed drone to provide intelligence information.

    Four Americans, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens, information management officer Sean Smith and security personnel Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty, were killed in the attack Sept. 11-12.

    Questions have been raised about whether the consulate had adequate security and whether the State Department responded appropriately to requests for more protection.

    Also, immediately after the Benghazi attack, U.S. spy agencies produced conflicting reports on who was behind them, U.S. officials have said. Most said extremists with possible al-Qaida ties were involved. But a few reports, which the Obama administration emphasized in public statements, said the attacks could have been spontaneous protests against an anti-Muslim video made in the U.S.

    According to the senior intelligence official:

    • The officers on the ground in Benghazi responded quickly to the attack, risking their lives in an attempt to rescue those at the consulate.
    • There was no second-guessing of decisions made on the ground and no order to anybody to stand down in providing support. "At every level in the chain of command, from the senior officers in Libya to the most senior officials in Washington, everyone was fully engaged in trying to provide whatever help they could," the official said. 
    • The U.S. military provided essential support, including sending an unarmed drone and medical evacuation.
    • Two U.S. security teams were involved -- one that was sent from the annex to the consulate and a tactical support team that was sent from Tripoli, each composed of approximately half a dozen security officers. Two U.S. military officers were on the team from Tripoli.

    The chain of events described in the timeline:

    -- Around 9:40 p.m. local time, the first call comes in to the annex that the consulate is under attack.

    -- Fewer than 25 minutes later, a security team of about half a dozen leaves the annex for the consulate.

    -- Over the next 25 minutes, team members approach the compound, attempt to secure heavy weapons from Libyan allies and make their way into the compound under fire.

    -- At 11:11 p.m., an unarmed drone that had been requested from the U.S. military arrives over the compound.

    -- By 11:30 p.m., all U.S. personnel, except for the missing ambassador, depart the compound in vehicles under fire.

    -- Over the next roughly 90 minutes, the annex receives sporadic small-arms fire and rounds from rocket-propelled grenades; the security team returns fire, and the attackers disperse about 1 a.m.

    -- At about the same time, the second team of security personnel lands at the Benghazi airport and tries to negotiate for transport into town. Upon learning Stevens was missing and that the situation at the annex had calmed, their focus becomes locating him, perhaps at a local hospital.

    -- Still before dawn, the team at the airport secures transportation and armed escort and -- having learned that the ambassador was almost certainly dead -- heads to the annex to assist with the evacuation.

    -- The second team arrives with Libyan support at the annex at 5:15 a.m., just before the mortar rounds begin to hit the annex. The two security officers were killed when they took direct mortar fire as they engaged the enemy. That attack lasted only 11 minutes then also dissipated.

    -- Less than an hour later, a heavily armed Libyan military unit arrived to help evacuate all U.S. personnel.

    Earlier Thursday, State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell said a review board has been set up to examine the Benghazi attack and the government's response before and after the assault.

    Catherine Chomiak is an NBC News producer. Andrea Mitchell is NBC News' senior foreign affairs correspondent.

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  • Blind Chinese activist is under US protection, sources tell NBC News

    Friends of Chen Guangcheng say they drove him 300 miles from his village to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. NBC's Ian Williams reports.

    By NBC News, msnbc.com and news services

    Updated at 11:15 a.m. ET: Blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng is under U.S. protection after a bold escape from 19 months under house arrest, sources told NBC News on Monday, a revelation that looked sure to complicate Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's looming trip to Beijing.

    "My sources tell me that Chen is, indeed, under U.S. protection in Beijing.  Now we don't know whether that means he's actually within the walls of the American Embassy compound, or in a diplomatic safe house, but he's definitely in U.S. hands there," NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell said on TODAY Monday.

    The United States has not given any public confirmation of reports that Chen, who reportedly slipped away from under the noses of guards and surveillance equipment around his village home in Shandong province on April 22, fled to the U.S. Embassy.

    Rights group: China, US in talks over blind activist Chen Guangcheng

    Chen, a self-schooled legal advocate who campaigned against abortions forced under China's "one child" policy, was held under extra-legal detention in his village home in Linyi from September 2010, when he was released from jail for charges he said were spurious. 

    Reuters

    Chen's wife, Yuan Weijing, and child did not escape with him, and human rights activists have voiced worry that they and Chen's other relatives might have suffered abuse at the hands of police and officials angry about his escape. 

    The questions surrounding the activist are casting a pall over the upcoming high-level meeting in Beijing, which would have been challenging for Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner even without a human rights dispute.

    Read more China coverage on our Behind The Wall blog

    "There are very delicate negotiations under way ... in advance of Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's annual talks this week," Mitchell said.

    The May 3-4 Strategic & Economic Dialogue is the last of such annual consultations before political seasons heat up in the United States and China, giving leaders in both countries less flexibility over contentious economic and security issues.

    The United States goes into full campaign mode for the November presidential election, while China's ruling Communist Party enters a leadership transition in the fall that has been complicated by a scandal that toppled senior leader Bo Xilai.

    Corruption may be widespread in China, but one official crossed a line when he wiretapped President Hu Jin Tau. Now that official's wife is a murder suspect. NBC's Andrea Mitchell reports.

    Bob Fu, whose religious and political rights advocacy group ChinaAid who has been the chief source of information about Chen, said he had confirmed "intensive talks" between the United States and China began right after the activist took shelter in the embassy.

    "I was told the Chinese top leaders have been deliberating a decision to be made very soon," Fu said on Sunday by telephone from Texas. A "Chinese official response (is) expected in the next day or so," he added.

    Who is Fu? Chinese exile is 'God's double agent'

    The European Union, meanwhile, urged China show "utmost restraint" over Chen.

    "We call on the Chinese authorities to exercise utmost restraint in dealing with the matter, including avoiding harassment of his family members or any person associated with him," the Delegation of the European Union to China said in a statement. "Human rights defenders should be treated in full compliance with Chinese laws and constitution." 

    China has declined direct public comment on Chen's reported escape.

    NBC News, msnbc.com staff and Reuters contributed to this report.

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  • American in Cuban prison: 'Get me the hell out of here'

    The U.S. government contractor, who was imprisoned two years ago for bringing communications equipment into Cuba for a U.S. government democracy project, called NBC's Andrea Mitchell from jail in Havana.

    By Andrea Mitchell, NBC News correspondent

    A U.S. government contractor sentenced to 15 years prison reached out from prison in Havana to plead for help on Friday.

    "Get me the hell out of here," Brian Gross said, using his one phone call for the week to reach out to a reporter rather than his family.

    The Maryland native, who has served two and a half years, was convicted of crimes against the state for bringing satellite and other communications equipment onto the island as part of a USAID-funded democracy-building program. Cuba considers such programs an attempt to destabilize the government.

    Gross has been pleading for parole to visit his 90-year-old mother before she dies of lung cancer.

    "It is no longer about Cuban-U.S. relations," Gross said. "It's about my family and me."

    Gross gets one call a week, and usually he reserves that for his wife, Judy, but this week he called a reporter instead because he wanted to get the word out about his plight.

    Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., was allowed to visit Gross at the prison on Feb. 24, and he later met with Cuban President Raul Castro to seek his release.

    Leahy said Castro agreed that Gross "was no spy" The Associated Press reported.

    Gross spoke virtually no Spanish and traveled to Cuba five times under his own name before his arrest in December 2009, according to AP.

    But Leahy came home with little optimism for Gross' release.

    The Gross affair has chilled relations between the U.S. and Cuba, diminishing chances for near-term rapprochement.

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