hankyoreh

By Park Byong-su, staff reporter
North Korea released a foreign ministry spokesperson’s statement on June 9 saying the country has no current plans to conduct a nuclear test.
The statement said the South Korean government was “desperately trying to provoke us into currently unplanned hard-line retaliatory measures such as a nuclear test or artillery battle on Yeonpyeong Island. The US is making us out to be the belligerent ones, thus fomenting tensions in our relationship with surrounding countries and creating an atmosphere of pressure toward anti-republic sanctions.”
The remarks came amid criticisms of what the statement described as antagonistic policies by Seoul, including its denunciation of an event celebrating the 66th anniversary of the Youth League.
Analysts said the statement more clearly stated the country’s lack of plans to conduct a nuclear test than a previous foreign ministry spokesperson’s statement on May 22. That statement indirectly suggested the country did not have any such plans. The statement read, “We had always planned the peaceful launch of a science satellite, so there was never any prediction of military measures such as a nuclear test.”

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