North Korea warned that recent South Korea-U.S. discussions on countering weapons of mass destruction "could be regarded as a grave security challenge that calls for invoking the state nuclear force policy law."
A spokesperson for North Korea's Ministry of National Defense made the remarks in a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency on the 16th, saying that South Korea and the United States "have further laid bare their attempt at military confrontation targeting North Korea while talking about responding to threats from weapons of mass destruction."
Earlier, the defense authorities of the two countries held a meeting of the Counter-WMD Committee at the Defense Ministry compound in Seoul's Yongsan district on the 10th, where they discussed ways to strengthen responses to North Korea's weapons of mass destruction. The spokesperson said the two sides "trumpeted the strengthening of a combined defense posture premised on the use of military force against North Korea, putting the 'WMD threat' front and center," adding that this "cannot be overlooked."
The statement continued that the move is "a blatant declaration of confrontation that treats the use of nuclear and chemical and biological weapons against our state in a contingency on the Korean Peninsula as a foregone conclusion and seeks to accelerate practical preparations for carrying it out, and a grave maneuver to escalate the situation by maximizing the risk of the use of weapons of mass destruction in the region."
The spokesperson said in particular that "such threats of attack and use of weapons of mass destruction by the enemies against our state could be regarded as a grave security challenge that calls for invoking the relevant clause of the state nuclear force policy law," and recommended that the two countries "properly interpret what the invocation of that clause means and take it as a stern warning." The spokesperson did not specify which clause was meant, but it is interpreted as referring to the provision governing a preemptive nuclear strike.
