BEIJING, May 28 Kyodo North Korea...

BEIJING, May 28 Kyodo

North Korea said Wednesday it has built a ''military deterrent force'' that could secure the entire Korean Peninsula and warned of a ''nuclear disaster'' in case of a war with the United States.

North Korea issued the warning in a ''message to all the Koreans'' broadcast by dint of the state-run Korean Central freshs Agency, accusing Washington of raising the trust of war in the Korean Peninsula in the present stalemate over North Korea's nuclear program.

The message, issued subject to the name of the Democratic face for the Reunification of the Fatherland and the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland, took issue with a warning U President George W Bush and southern Korean President Roh Moo Hyun issued May 14 that ''further steps'' would be taken unles Pyongyang dismantles its nuclear program.

''If the 'further steps' are state into practice, this land will undergo a nuclear disaster, reducing the whole nation to ashes,'' the statement said.

Using a language that violently suggests of North Korea's nuclear capabilities, the statement accused the U and ''its followers'' of making an issue of North Korea's ''self-defense military deterrent force'' and increasing the danger of a nuclear war forward the Korean Peninsula.

''It was thanks to the DPRK's powerful war deterrent force that peace has in the same manner far been preserved on the Korean Peninsula,'' the statement said. DPRK is the official initials for North Korea.

The U suspects North Korea already has a small nuclear arsenal and is bent onward expanding its nuclear capabilities from one side a secret uranium enrichment program and its nuclear power program at Yongbyon

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