North Korean Leader Says Will Only Use Nuclear Weapons If Attacked

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un told a rare ruling party congress that his country was a “responsible” nuclear weapons state, with a no first-use policy and a commitment to non-proliferation, state media reported Sunday.

Speaking to thousands of delegates gathered for the first Workers’ Party congress in more than 35 years, Kim also announced a new five-year plan to boost the impoverished country’s moribund economy and “revitalise” people’s lifestyles.

His remarks on Saturday, the second day of the congress, came amid growing concerns that the North might be on the verge of conducting a fifth nuclear test.

Kim had opened the congress with a defiant defence of the nuclear weapons programme, praising the “magnificent… and thrilling” test of what Pyongyang claimed was a powerful hydrogen bomb on January 6.

But his report to the conclave on Saturday stressed that North Korea was also a “responsible nuclear weapons state” with an arsenal built for deterrence.

“Our republic will not use a nuclear weapon unless its sovereignty is encroached upon by any aggressive hostile forces with nukes,” he said, according to an English translation of his speech by the North’s official KCNA news agency.

That formula would appear to allow for the use of nuclear weapons against a conventional attack by a nuclear power, but the Korean-language version made it clear that the scenario involved an actual nuclear attack.

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