Kim Jong Un vows to accelerate North Korea’s military buildup, citing US–South Korea drills and reaffirming Pyongyang’s nuclear stance
SEOUL: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un vowed to accelerate the country’s military buildup at a party meeting, state media reported Tuesday, citing military modernisation efforts by South Korea and the United States in the region.
Pyongyang is under multiple sets of sanctions over its nuclear programme, and the two Koreas remain technically at war because their 1950-53 conflict ended in an armistice rather than a peace treaty.
“In his concluding speech, Kim reaffirmed the steadfast policy position of our party and state to further accelerate the strengthening of the country’s defence capabilities,” the official Korean Central News Agency quoted him as saying in a dispatch.
The speech was delivered as Kim presided over a three-day party plenary meeting that wrapped up on Monday, during which senior officials reviewed policy initiatives, KCNA said.
It went on to quote Kim as saying “the United States and South Korea have increasingly stepped up and publicised their efforts to expand and modernise military capabilities in the region, even pursuing the acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines by South Korea”.
In the face of such developments, it was the “unwavering position” of the North to accelerate efforts to “expand and strengthen a powerful and absolutely reliable self-defensive deterrent”, Kim said.
On the nuclear arsenal, KCNA said the plenary meeting “unanimously agreed” that the “country’s nuclear forces… and fully exercising its status as a nuclear weapons state constitute the most accurate and only way” to respond to geopolitical challenges.
Pyongyang has repeatedly declared itself an “irreversible” nuclear state since a 2019 summit between Kim and Trump in Hanoi collapsed over the scope of denuclearisation and sanctions relief.
Kim’s powerful sister, Yo Jong, said earlier this month that the North’s nuclear policy was a “line of no retreat”, reiterating the regime’s position that it has no intention of giving up its nuclear arsenal.
