Tokyo: North Korean leader Kim Jong-un warned that his country is "fully prepared" for any military conflict with the US, while denouncing South Korea's military policy on the North, state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Thursday.
The North's armed forces "are fully prepared to respond to any crisis, and our country's nuclear war deterrent is also ready to mobilize its absolute power faithfully, accurately and swiftly" in accordance with its mission, Kim said in his speech on the 69th anniversary of the end of the 1950-53 Korean War Wednesday, according to the KCNA.
"The double standard of the US, which misleadingly labels all our daily actions as provocations and threats while holding large-scale joint exercises that seriously threaten our national security, is literally thug-like behavior that pushes North Korea-US relations to conflict and to a point that is irreversible," he said.
Kim also accused South Korea's Yoon Suk-yeol government and its "military gangsters" of Seoul's military policy on Pyongyang, which includes a preemptive strike strategy. "If you think you can counter us militarily and preemptively neutralize or destroy part of our military power," he said.
"Such a dangerous attempt will be immediately punished by our powerful forces, and the Yoon Seok-yeol administration and his military will be annihilated," Kim noted.