North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un, said his nation is prepared to deploy its nuclear war deterrent and counter any military conflict with the United States.
According to the official KCNA news agency, during a speech at a celebration to commemorate the 69th anniversary of the Korean War armistice on July 27, Kim criticized South Korea’s new president, saying that Seoul was edging closer to war.
Since the 1950–1953 war posed nuclear dangers, Kim claimed that the North needed to complete an “urgent historical mission” of bolstering its self-defence.
“Our nation’s nuclear war deterrence is also fully equipped to mobilize its absolute strength truthfully, accurately, and speedily to its task,” he added. “Our military forces are thoroughly prepared to respond to any crisis,” he said.
Kim claimed that Washington continues to engage in “dangerous, illegal hostile acts” with South Korea against the North and tries to defend its actions by “demonizing” the nation.
The North has long accused the United States of applying different standards to military activities and of having a hostile foreign policy towards Pyongyang. They claim that this undermines efforts to restart negotiations aimed at ending the nation’s nuclear and missile programs in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.
“The double act of the United States, which is misrepresenting all the regular acts of our armed forces as ‘provocation’ and ‘threat’, while performing huge joint military drills that significantly threaten our security, is essentially a theft,” added Kim.
Prior to the speech, the declaration that Pyongyang has finished making preparations to conduct its first nuclear test since 2017 was made by Seoul and Washington officials.
Although a military official stated there were no imminent signals for it, South Korea’s Minister of Unification in charge of inter-Korean affairs indicated on Tuesday that there was a “possibility” of the test around the anniversary of the armistice.
On Wednesday, the foreign minister of South Korea said if North Korea conducted the test, it would likely face tougher penalties, including ones that target its cyber security capabilities.
Seoul’s Defence Ministry spokesman said that in order to better counter Pyongyang’s threats, Seoul would keep bolstering its own capabilities as well as the US nuclear umbrella and extended deterrence.
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