North Korea yesterday reacted angrily to a US nuclear arms review, saying it had plans for using atomic weapons against seven countries, including the communist state. The official North Korean news agency warned yesterday that Washington would be "grossly mistaken" if it tried to attack North Korea with nuclear weapons.
"The Democratic People's Republic of Korea will not remain a passive onlooker to the Bush administration's inclusion of the DPRK in the seven countries, targets of US nuclear attack, (it will) take a strong counter measure against it," it said. It was not spelled out what form the counter measure might take.
The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times reported last weekend that the Pentagon had conducted a secret nuclear posture review that raised the possibility of developing new types of nuclear arms and described contingency plans for using them against Russia, China, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria and North Korea..
Senior US. officials have sought to play down reports about the policy review, saying it is simple prudent planning by Pentagon strategists. However, North Korea said a nuclear war "to be imposed by the US nuclear fanatics upon the DPRK (and it) would mean their ruin in nuclear disaster."
The news agency did not make clear in English or the original Korean whether it was implying North Korea had nuclear weapons to strike back or whether an attack on the North would cause untold damage to the South, where 37,000 US troops are based.
Pyongyang's suspected nuclear weapons programme brought it to the brink of conflict with Washington in 1994, before a diplomatic deal was struck to freeze the programme in exchange for oil supplies and Western-built nuclear reactors.
The Russian Defence Minister, Mr Sergei Ivanov, met President Bush and the US Defence Secretary, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, in Washington on Tuesday to discuss nuclear arms and seek more details on the review.
Pyongyang is already smarting from Mr Bush's description of the North as part of an "axis of evil", along with Iraq and Iran, developing weapons of mass destruction.