N. Korea: May seek ‘new path’ of weapons build-up

GENEVA: Pyongyang on Tuesday warned that it could seek a “new path” and accelerate its weapons programme, after Washington imposed fresh sanctions on North Korean companies amid stalled nuclear talks.

North Korean representative Ju Yong Chol told the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva that his country’s efforts to improve relations with Washington had been met with hostility.

“Although the US is talking about the resumption of dialogue, it has no intention at all from the beginning to drop its hostile policy towards the DPRK ( Democratic Republic of Korea),” he said.

“The DPRK will steadily develop strategic weapons essential and prerequisite for national security until the US abandons its hostile policy and lasting and durable peace... is in place on the Korean peninsula,” he said.

He said the scope of the build up would depend on the “future attitude” of the US.

Pyongyang has previously fired missiles capable of reaching the entire US mainland, and has carried out six nuclear tests, the last of them 16 times more powerful than the Hiroshima blast, according to the highest estimates.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un declared in December an end to moratoriums on nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile tests, which had been a centrepiece of two years of diplomacy with US President Donald Trump.

Trump and Kim have held three meetings since a landmark summit in Singapore in June 2018, where the two men signed a vague statement on denuclearisation.

But negotiations have been deadlocked since a second summit collapsed in Hanoi last year over sanctions relief and what the North would be willing to give up in return.