North Korea's Kim calls U.S. 'our biggest enemy' in challenge to Biden
Shafaq News/ Washington’s hostile policies would not change regardless of who occupies the White House but dropping those policies would be key to North Korea-U.S. relations, Kim said, according to state news agency KCNA.
“Our foreign political activities should be focused and redirected on subduing the U.S., our biggest enemy and main obstacle to our innovated development,” Kim said during nine hours of remarks over several days at a rare party congress in Pyongyang.
“No matter who is in power in the U.S., the true nature of the U.S. and its fundamental policies towards North Korea never change,” Kim said, vowing to expand ties with “anti-imperialist, independent forces.”
North Korea would not “misuse” its nuclear weapons, Kim said but the country is expanding its nuclear arsenal, including “preemptive” and “retaliatory” strike capabilities and warheads of varying sizes.
Kim called for developing equipment including hypersonic weapons, solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), spy satellites, and drones.
North Korea is preparing for the test and production of various new weapons, including a “multi-warhead rocket” and “supersonic gliding flight warheads for new type ballistic rockets,” while research on a nuclear submarine is nearly complete, he said.
Kim’s remarks were one of the most ambitious outlines of North Korean national defence and nuclear matters in some time, said Ankit Panda, a senior fellow at the U.S.-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“It could presage a return to nuclear testing, which is now on the table given that Kim renounced his April 2018 moratorium,” he said.
There was no immediate comment from the U.S. State Department. A spokesman for the Biden campaign declined to comment.
Kim criticized South Korea for offering cooperation in “non-fundamental” areas such as coronavirus aid and tourism, and said Seoul should stop buying arms from and conducting military drills with the United States.
Biden, who was vice president under President Barack Obama, called Kim a “thug” during the election campaign. In 2019 North Korea called Biden a “rabid dog” that needed to be “beaten to death with a stick.”
Kim had three unprecedented meetings with President Donald Trump and the two corresponded in a series of letters, but those efforts failed to lead to a denuclearization deal or official change in the countries’ relations.
Biden said in October that he would meet Kim only on the condition that North Korea agreed to draw down its nuclear capacity.
Source: Reuters + KCNA
