North Korea threatened Thursday to launch a “sacred” nuclear war against South Korea if it attacks, as Seoul staged military exercises that have raised already high tensions on the peninsula.

The remarks seemed aimed at revving patriotic spirit on the eve of the 19th anniversary of leader Kim Jong Il’s appointment as the supreme military commander.

Defense chief Kim Yong Chun said North Korea is “fully prepared to launch a sacred war” - and would use its nuclear capabilities - if attacked and warned the South against intruding even the smallest amount on its territory, according to the official Korean Central News Agency.

North Korea’s anger has been piqued this week by South Korea’s staging of live-fire drills on Yeonpyeong Island, which was shelled by the North’s artillery on Nov. 23. Four South Koreans were killed.

North Korea has said it shelled the island because South Korea fired artillery into its territorial waters first. South Korea has countered that it fired artillery away from North Korea as part of routine drills.

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Another round of shooting between a Burma Army unit under the control of Shan State South’s Mongnawng-based Military Operations Command (MOC) #2 and fighters from First Brigade of Shan State Army (SSA) ‘North’ that refused Naypyitaw’s order to disarm broke out on Saturday, 18 December, according to local sources.

The incident took place at the same site where the first clash of the two sides had taken place on 11 November, Kunkieng- Wan Lwe, 3 miles west of Wan Hsaw, a village between Wanhai, the main base of the SSA North’s First Brigade, and Monghsu, at 22:30 local time and lasted for 30 minutes, a local villager said.

“A day before the fighting, we saw them [Burma soldiers] turning up at Harng Zarng-Pangwoe villages, on the way from Mongnawng to Monghsu, in the morning,” he said. “They then disappeared into the jungle again.”

According to SSA sources, it was attacked by a 51- strong patrol from Namzang-based Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) # 516.

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Ibn-e-Amin, one of hardest commanders of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) moviment and right arm of its leader in Swat Valley, Maulana Fazlullah, has been killed on Friday in an attack by american drone of Khyber Agency in Tirah Valley, at Afghanistan border.

GEO Tv referred it. Broadcaster has specified that Ibn-e-Amin has been killed together with his six body guards by a missile that has hit the vehicle where he was at Spindrand.

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Six american soldiers were killed and more than a dozen American and Afghan soldiers were wounded on Sunday morning when a van packed with explosives detonated beside a small joint outpost in southern Afghanistan.

The soldiers were at a new strong point in a small mud-walled building near the village of Sangsar, north of the Arghandab River, when the bomber drove up to one of the building’s walls and exploded his charge at about 9 a.m.

The blast was easily audible roughly 8 miles away, and sent a dusty mushroom cloud towering over the farmland.

The explosion blasted a large hole in the thick wall, causing the roof to collapse on soldiers inside. Other soldiers quickly arrived and clawed and pulled at the waist-deep rubble to free the buried troops.

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At least nine militants were killed in clashes with security forces in the northwestern valley of Swat and in the Mohmand tribal region on Saturday, officials said.

Security forces killed five militants in an exchange of fire in Swat, government officials said.

The army says the valley has been largely cleared after a military operation launched in April, 2009.

Separately, security forces killed four militants in a clash that erupted after insurgents attacked a military check post in Mohmand, senior government official Amjad Ali Khan said.

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