SEOUL \u2014 North Korea\u2019s leader Kim Jong Un vowed to beef up the country\u2019s defense capabilities, citing military modernization efforts by South Korea and the United States pushing the region “to the brink of a nuclear war,” state media reported on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Pyongyang is under multiple sets of sanctions over its nuclear program, and the two Koreas remain technically at war because their 1950\u201353 conflict ended in an armistice rather than a peace treaty.<\/p>\n
Kim, “in his concluding speech, reaffirmed the steadfast policy stand of our Party and state to beef up the national defense capabilities faster,” the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) quoted the leader as saying.<\/p>\n
The speech was delivered as Kim presided over a three-day meeting of the Workers’ Party of Korea that wrapped up on Monday, during which senior officials reviewed policy initiatives, the KCNA said.<\/p>\n
It quoted Kim as saying “the US and the ROK are pushing forward with the ROK’s possession of a nuclear submarine while getting evermore undisguised in their moves toward the reinforcement and modernization of armed forces in the region,” referring to South Korea by the acronym of its official name, the Republic of Korea.<\/p>\n
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By signing up with an email address, I acknowledge that I have read and agree to the Terms of Service<\/a> and Privacy Policy<\/a>.<\/p>\n Kim also said such moves were “pushing the situation in the Korean peninsula to the brink of a nuclear war.”<\/p>\n In the face of such developments, it was the “steadfast stand” of the North to “further expand and strengthen the powerful and absolutely reliable deterrent for self-defense,” he added.<\/p>\n Kim’s rhetoric can be seen as “a narrative that justifies strengthening its nuclear capabilities in line with movements from South Korea and the US,” analyst Hong Min at Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification told Agence France-Presse (AFP).<\/p>\n ‘Line of no retreat’<\/p>\n The KCNA said the meeting “unanimously recognized that to steadily expand and strengthen the nuclear forces… is the most correct and unique way to actively and confidently cope with the unpredictable international military and political situation.”<\/p>\n It added that the North’s development of a war deterrent “with nuclear technology as a basis” would proceed “at increasing speed.”<\/p>\n The wording “effectively shuts down any room for denuclearization talks and treats the irreversibility of its nuclear status as a fait accompli,” analyst Hong said.<\/p>\n It also indicates Pyongyang’s intention to “use nuclear weapons as a standing diplomatic and strategic lever,” he added.<\/p>\n Pyongyang has repeatedly declared itself an “irreversible” nuclear state since a 2019 summit between Kim and Trump in Vietnam\u2019s capital Hanoi collapsed over the scope of denuclearization and sanctions relief.<\/p>\n Kim’s powerful sister Yo Jong said this month the North’s nuclear policy was a “line of no retreat,” reiterating the regime’s position that it has no intention of giving up its nuclear arsenal.<\/p>\n South Korean President Lee Jae Myung said last week that his US counterpart Donald Trump had told him it was time to “pay attention to the North Korea issue.”<\/p>\n He told reporters he had told Trump at a meeting of the Group of Seven advanced economies in France that sanctions on the North were “ineffective.”<\/p>\n “I also said that we can no longer deal with the North Korean nuclear issue in the same way we deal with other countries, and President Trump agreed,” Lee said.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SEOUL \u2014 North Korea\u2019s leader Kim Jong Un vowed to beef up the country\u2019s defense capabilities, citing 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