North Korea has announced that its identity as a nuclear power is “permanently secured” in its laws and cannot be reversed, state media reported on Monday. The declaration came alongside strong criticism of the United States for continuing to push for Pyongyang’s disarmament.

 

According to a statement released through the Korean Central News Agency, North Korea’s UN mission condemned Washington’s recent remarks at a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors. The statement said the US carried out a “serious political provocation” by labeling the country’s nuclear weapons program illegal and insisting on denuclearisation.

 

“The recognition of North Korea as a nuclear-armed state has been written into the nation’s supreme law and is now irreversible,” the statement said. It also emphasized that North Korea has not maintained “official relations” with the IAEA for over three decades.

 

The government further argued that the nuclear watchdog has “neither legal authority nor moral grounds” to interfere in the domestic affairs of a state outside the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. North Korea pulled out of the IAEA in 1994, accusing it of serving US interests to undermine its sovereignty.

 

The statement added that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea would “resolutely oppose any attempt to change its current status,” stressing that it would act as a “responsible nuclear-armed country.”

 

This latest declaration comes after leader Kim Jong Un recently toured defense research facilities. During the visit, he reiterated that the country would advance both its nuclear arsenal and conventional military capabilities.