‘Red line’ warning to China in nuclear rocket row

NORTH Korea has warned China of “grave consequences” in a rare media rebuke which exposes growing divisions between the two historically close allies.

Beijing has shown increasing concern over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programme because of fears that it is prompting the US, Japan and South Korea to build up military capabilities in the region.

The North’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) took aim at “a string of absurd and reckless remarks” from Chinese media towards the regime’s nuclear ambitions.

“The DPRK will never beg for the maintenance of friendship with China, risking its nuclear programme which is as precious as its own life, no matter how valuable the friendship is,” the hard-hitting editorial said, referring to the country’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

“China should no longer try to test the limits of the DPRK’s patience...(and) had better ponder over the grave consequences to be entailed by its reckless act of chopping down the pillar of the DPRK-China relations.”

The commentary is the first to be published by Pyongyang’s official media that openly criticises Beijing in the same language that it commonly uses for South Korea and the US.

It comes after KCNA published two editorials which vented anger at a “neighbouring country” for “dancing to the tune of others”, warning the nation that it would suffer “catastrophic consequences”. Those commentaries were widely believed to be in response to China declaring in February that it would ban all coal imports from North Korea, cutting off a major source of finance.

China is North Korea’s only diplomatic ally.

Ties between the two countries were cemented on the battlefield during the 1950-53 Korean War, but relations have become strained in recent years.

An editorial published on the website of China’s ‘Global Times’ newspaper hit back at KCNA’s commentary, describing it as “nothing more than a hyper-aggressive piece completely filled with nationalistic passion”.

The daily tabloid added: “Pyongyang obviously is grappling with some form of irrational logic over its nuclear programme.”

Tensions have been escalating amid fears that North Korea is planning to carry out a nuclear test that may prompt an angry response from US President Donald Trump. (©Daily Telegraph London)