North Korea threatens to increase nuclear capacity, says South will pay 'unimaginably harsh price'

North Korea threatened to enhance its nuclear capacity. South Korea and the United States said such action would 'lead to the end of the North Korean regime.'

President Yoon Suk Yeol, right, and U.S. President Joe Biden shake hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the NATO summit on Washington on Thursday. [PRESIDENTIAL OFFICE]

Pyongyang threatened to increase its nuclear capacity in response to the recent Seoul-Washington joint nuclear deterrence guidelines.

In response, South Korea's Defense Ministry stated Sunday that any attempt to use nuclear weapons would “lead to the end of the North Korean regime from an overwhelming response from the South Korea-U.S. alliance.”

"[We] strongly denounce and reject the reckless provocative act of the United States and [South Korea] that pushes regional military tensions to extremes through extremely incendiary and malicious rhetoric and provocative action,” a spokesperson for the North Korean Ministry of National Defense said in an English-language statement carried by its state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on Saturday.

The “Guidelines for Nuclear Deterrence and Nuclear Operations on the Korean Peninsula,” adopted by South Korea's Defense Ministry and the U.S. Defense Department on the sidelines of the NATO summit on Thursday, upgrades the partnership from a conventional forces-based alliance to a nuclear-based alliance and allocates U.S. nuclear assets to the Korean Peninsula during both wartime and peacetime.

“The provocative behavior fully shown again by the U.S. and [South Korea] is the root cause of endangering regional security,” the North Korean spokesperson continued, adding that such actions “urgently require the DPRK to further improve its nuclear deterrent readiness and add important elements to the composition of the deterrent.” DPRK is the official name of North Korea.

The communist state, however, did not specify how it plans to enhance its nuclear deterrent readiness or what new elements it intends to add.

“We seriously warn the hostile states not to commit such provocative acts causing instability anymore,” the spokesperson said. “If they ignore this warning, they will have to pay an unimaginably harsh price for it.”

Seoul's Defense Ministry, on Sunday, dismissed Pyongyang's mention of increasing its nuclear capacity as “self-contradictory and fallacious rhetoric from a regime that habitually threatens with nuclear weapons.”

“We firmly warn that there is no scenario in which the North Korean regime can survive after using nuclear weapons,” the South's Defense Ministry said in a statement.

The Ministry highlighted that “the joint guidelines recently agreed upon by South Korea and the U.S. are legitimate measures by the alliance to respond to the advancing North Korean nuclear capabilities and blatant threats of nuclear use.”

It argued that if North Korea had not posed a nuclear threat in the first place, there would have been no need for the Seoul-Washington nuclear operations joint guidelines.

As North Korea deepens its ties with Russia and relations with China cool, South Korea's Foreign Minister, Cho Tae-yul, emphasized the strategic common interests between South Korea and China and underscored the importance of continued high-level exchanges and communication between the two neighboring nations.

“China has been concerned with maintaining its reputation in the international community while saying it has to prevent heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula,” Cho said in a YTN television interview on Saturday.

He mentioned that there would be opportunities for “high-level strategic communication, including several multilateral summits, in the latter half of the year,” and that he plans to use those opportunities for strategic dialogue with China.

Reiterating the government's stance, Cho noted that future responses to Russia would depend on Russia's actions while also emphasizing that “Russia is a strategic partner that can play an important role in Korean Peninsula issues.”

Meanwhile, Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, warned Sunday that South Korea would pay “a very high price” for sending anti-Pyongyang leaflets across the border, condemning the act as “dirty play.”

BY SEO JI-EUN [seo.jieun1@joongang.co.kr]