North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has ordered a front-line military unit to be alert as he toured the border village of Panmunjom, Pyongyang’s state media reported Sunday.

The inspection trip comes as the communist country ratcheted up threats against South Korea over its ongoing military exercises with the U.S. that Pyongyang says are rehearsals for a northward invasion.

South Korea and the U.S. regularly hold military exercises to bolster their readiness against a possible North Korean provocation. Seoul and Washington say the exercises are defensive in nature.

Kim told “the soldiers on the outpost duty at Panmunjeom to always maintain the maximum alertness as they are standing in confrontation with the enemies at all times,” the Korean Central News Agency said in a dispatch.

The border village, located inside a 4-kilometer-wide military buffer zone separating the two Koreas, is one of the key venues for inter-Korean meetings.

The young leader also “put forth the important tasks which would serve as guidelines for increasing the combat capability of the unit,” the dispatch said, without elaborating.

Kim became the supreme commander of the country’s 1.1 million-strong military as he inherited power upon the December death of his father, Kim Jong-il.

Kim Jong-un has since frequently visited military units as he is seeking to solidify his grip on power in a nation where military backing is considered the backbone of the country’s autocratic rule.

North Korean officials have repeatedly pledged loyalty to their new leader by describing him as “the brilliant commander” and “another peerless patriot.”

Last week, the North also threatened to launch a “sacred war” against South Korea over alleged defamation of its leadership by South Korea’s military. South Korea’s Defense Ministry dismissed the North’s warning as “not worthy of a response.” 

(Yonhap News)