The majority of the world’s population is facing huge hunger and misery. It’s not justified to spend huge sums of money on lethal arms arsenal to show the mighty muscle to the world (“North Korea says it fired ICBM as warning to US, Seoul,” Feb.19, Gulf Today website).

It’s time to show some grace, the powerful countries should work together on how to deal with poverty in the world. Poor nations who sacrifice their health, wealth and lives always remain in the midst of misery. According to the report, North Korea said on Sunday it had test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile as a warning to Washington and Seoul, saying the successful “surprise” drill demonstrated Pyongyang’s “capacity of fatal nuclear counterattack”.

Leader Kim Jong Un ordered the “sudden launching drill” at 8am on Saturday (2300 GMT) and a Hwasong-15 missile — a weapon first tested by the North in 2017 — was fired from Pyongyang airport that afternoon, the official KCNA reported.

South Korea’s military said it detected an ICBM launch at 17:22 (0822 GMT) on Saturday, which Japan said flew for 66 minutes before splashing down in its Exclusive Economic Zone, with their analysis indicating it was capable of hitting the mainland United States.

The world needs peace instead of war. I don’t think that showing mighty muscle will solve any problems. Countries in conflict should negotiate with each other and solve their outstanding issues for the sake of their own people. Spending a huge budget on defence will not solve any problems but leads to deadly wars.

The United States of America is a superpower in the world. Showing mighty muscle to a superpower is insane. I believe that nothing is important in this world. With an honest approach any conflict can be resolved through meaningful dialogue.

I hope the sense of peace will prevail. The world is in dire need of peace and love, so instead of making rivals the world should work on how to make friends not enemies.

Jameel Akhound,
By email