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North Korea said Japan’s ambition to possess nuclear weapons should be “prevented at any cost”, Pyongyang state media KCNA said on Sunday, citing the country’s foreign ministry.
“Japan’s attempt to go nuclear must be prevented at any cost as it will bring mankind a great disaster,” the director of the Institute for Japan Studies under the North’s foreign ministry said in a statement carried by state-owned KCNA.
The statement comes after an official at Japan’s prime minister’s office said Tokyo should “possess nuclear weapons”.
“I think we should possess nuclear weapons,” Japan’s Kyodo News reported the official as saying.
North Korea said Tokyo was explicitly showing an intention to possess nuclear weapons by saying it needs to review its non-nuclear principles.
“This is not a misstatement or a reckless assertion, but clearly reflects Japan’s long-cherished ambition for nuclear weaponisation,” the Pyongyang official was quoted as saying by the outlet.
These remarks showed Tokyo was “openly revealing its ambition to possess nuclear weapons, going beyond the red line”, the official said.
North Korean state media alleged that Japan began making such comments shortly after the United States approved a request from South Korea to build a nuclear submarine in October.
US president Donald Trump gave Seoul approval to build a nuclear-powered submarine after visiting the Asian ally for a summit on trade deals with South Korean president Lee Jae Myung.
File. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un delivering a speech (KCNA VIA KNS/AFP via Getty Image)
The North Korean official reportedly said: “Asian countries will suffer a horrible nuclear disaster, and mankind will face a great disaster” if Japan acquired nuclear weapons.
However, the report did not address Pyongyang’s own nuclear program.
North Korea is widely believed to possess a growing arsenal of nuclear warheads and has repeatedly vowed to maintain and expand its nuclear capabilities despite international sanctions and global calls for denuclearisation.
“We will never give up nuclear, which is our state law, national policy and sovereign power as well as the right to existence,” Pyongyang’s vice foreign minister Kim Son Gyong said in an address to the UN in September.
“Under any circumstances, we will never walk away from this position,” Mr Gyong said.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has also said that his communication channel with Washington remains open, provided Pyongyang is allowed to retain its nuclear weapons.
AloJapan.com