{"id":677927,"date":"2026-03-24T08:40:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T08:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/677927\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T08:40:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T08:40:16","slug":"north-koreas-kim-vows-to-cement-nuclear-status-and-maintain-hard-line-on-seoul","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/677927\/","title":{"rendered":"North Korea\u2019s Kim vows to cement nuclear status and maintain hard line on Seoul"},"content":{"rendered":"

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) \u2014 North Korean leader Kim Jong Un<\/a> has pledged to irreversibly cement his country\u2019s status as a nuclear power while maintaining a hard-line stance toward South Korea<\/a>, which he called the \u201cmost hostile\u201d state, state media said Tuesday.<\/p>\n

In a speech Monday to Pyongyang\u2019s rubber-stamp parliament, Kim accused the United States of global \u201cstate terrorism and aggression,\u201d in an apparent reference to the war in the Middle East, and said the North will play a more forceful role in a united front against Washington amid rising anti-American sentiment. But Kim didn\u2019t call out U.S. President Donald Trump by name and said whether his adversaries \u201cchoose confrontation or peaceful coexistence is up to them, and we are prepared to respond to any choice.\u201d<\/p>\n

His comments largely aligned with his statements at last month\u2019s ruling Workers\u2019 Party Congress, where he vilified Seoul but left open the door for dialogue with the Trump administration,<\/a> urging Washington to drop its demands for the North\u2019s nuclear disarmament as a precondition for talks.<\/p>\n

State media said the Supreme People\u2019s Assembly, which concluded its two-day session Monday, passed a revised constitution but did not specify the changes. There had been expectations the revisions would codify South Korea as a permanent enemy and remove references to shared nationhood. That\u2019s in line with Kim\u2019s hard-line stance after he declared in 2024 that the North would abandon its long-term goal of a peaceful unification with the South.<\/p>\n

Analysts say Kim\u2019s vilification of South Korea reflects his view that Seoul, which helped arrange his first meetings with Trump in 2018 and 2019, is no longer a useful intermediary with Washington but an obstacle to his push for a more assertive regional role. He has also shown sensitivity to South Korean soft power, driving aggressive campaigns to block the influence of its culture and language among North Koreans as he seeks to tighten his family\u2019s authoritarian grip.<\/p>\n

In his speech, Kim expressed pride in the country\u2019s rapid expansion of nuclear weapons and missiles in recent years, calling it the \u201cright\u201d choice to counter future threats and \u201chegemonic pursuits\u201d by \u201cgangsterlike\u201d imperialists, a term the North often uses for the United States and its allies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe dignity of the nation, its national interest and its ultimate victory can only be guaranteed by the strongest of power,\u201d Kim said. \u201cThe government of our republic will continue to consolidate our absolutely irreversible status as a nuclear power and will aggressively wage a struggle against hostile forces to crush their (anti-North Korean) provocations and schemes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kim has suspended all meaningful dialogue with Washington and Seoul since the collapse of his second summit with Trump in 2019 over U.S.-led sanctions on the North. <\/p>\n

Kim has recently been prioritizing Russia<\/a> in his foreign policy, sending thousands of troops and large amounts of military equipment to support Moscow\u2019s war in Ukraine<\/a>, possibly in exchange for aid and military technology. Facing the possibility of the war winding down, analysts say Kim may try to keep his options open by taking a more measured approach toward Washington to preserve future dialogue, with the long-term aim of securing U.S. sanctions relief and tacit recognition as a nuclear state<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, some experts believe that the United States and Israel\u2019s joint attacks on Iran and the killing of Tehran\u2019s previous supreme leader may have raised Kim\u2019s bar<\/a> for reviving dialogue with Washington. <\/p>\n

Separately, North Korean state media said Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko will visit the country at Kim\u2019s invitation, but did not immediately say when the visit will take place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SEOUL, South Korea (AP) \u2014 North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has pledged to irreversibly cement his country\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":677928,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[70221,13214,84,69,10102,57,6087,24529,3097,50,24240,3659,80,41351,16816,15243,5343,370,103,107],"class_list":["post-677927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-alexander-lukashenko","tag-asia-pacific","tag-district-of-columbia","tag-donald-trump","tag-energy-industry","tag-general-news","tag-iran-war","tag-kim-jong-un","tag-middle-east","tag-news","tag-north-korea","tag-north-korea-government","tag-politics","tag-pyongyang","tag-sanctions-and-embargoes","tag-south-korea","tag-terrorism","tag-united-states-government","tag-world","tag-world-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116283259429874816","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=677927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677927\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/677928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=677927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=677927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=677927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}