N Korea warns of nuclear test ‘at any time’

The North has carried out five nuclear tests in the last 11 years and is widely believed to be making progress towards its dream of building a missile capable of delivering a warhead to the continenta

Seoul, May 1: North Korea on Monday warned that it will carry out a nuclear test at any time and at any location set by its leadership, in the latest rhetoric to fuel jitters in the region.

Tensions on the Korean peninsula have been running high for weeks, with signs that the North might be preparing a long-range missile launch or a sixth nuclear test and with Washington refusing to rule out a military strike in response.

A spokesman for the North's foreign ministry said Pyongyang was fully ready to respond to any option taken by the US.

The regime will continue bolstering its 'pre-emptive nuclear attack' capabilities unless Washington scrapped its hostile policies, he said in a statement carried by the state-run KCNA news agency.

"The DPRK's measures for bolstering the nuclear force to the maximum will be taken in a consecutive and successive way at any moment and any place decided by its supreme leadership," the spokesman added, apparently referring to a sixth nuclear test and using the North's official name, the Democratic Republic of Korea.

It raises the tone of its warnings every spring, when Washington and Seoul carry out joint exercises it condemns as rehearsals for invasion, but this time fears of conflict have been fuelled by a cycle of threats from both sides.

The joint drills have just ended, but naval exercises are continuing in the Sea of Japan with a US strike group led by the aircraft carrier US Carl Vinson.

The Pyongyang foreign ministry spokesman said that if the North was not armed with the powerful nuclear force, Washington would have committed without hesitation the same brigandish aggression act in Korea as what it committed against other countries.

PTI