North Korea has turned the enriched uranium from 8,000 spent nuclear-fuel rods into weapons to serve as a deterrent against a possible nuclear strike by the United States, a North Korean minister said Monday.
Warning that the danger of war on the Korean Peninsula “is snowballing,” Vice Foreign Minister Choe Su Hon blamed the U.S. for intensifying threats to attack the communist nation and destroying the basis for talks to resolve the dispute over Pyongyang’s nuclear program.
Without specifying what kinds or the number of weapons it has, Choe said North Korea has been left with “no other option but to possess a nuclear deterrent” because of U.S. policies that he claimed were designed to obliterate his country.
In Washington, a State Department official noted that the administration has long believed North Korea has at least one or two nuclear weapons. The official, who asked not to be identified, also said the North Koreans have made conflicting statements about how far along their weapons development programs have come.
