His comments came amid concerns in South Korea over rising tensions with the North, which was internationally condemned earlier this month for violating United Nations Security Council resolutions after launching a long-range rocket.
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In agreement signed between then South Korean President Roh Tae-woo and North Korean leader Kim Il-sung, the two sides pledged not to test, produce, receive, possess, store, deploy, or use nuclear weapons and not to possess facilities for nuclear reprocessing and uranium enrichment.
Nevertheless, a report by the US Defence Department on Friday expressed concern that the KN-08 has a range of more than 3,400 miles, which would put much of the continental US within range of North Korea’s mobile launchers.
By forcing the collapse of negotiations about the abducted Japanese – an issue to which the administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe gives top priority – North Korea meant to unsettle Japan, which has been working with the United States and South Korea to strengthen their encirclement of the North.
It could even be argued that Beijing is merely hyping up the likely effect of a limited sanctions package to convince Seoul that the anti-missile system deployment is unnecessary – and to cast Washington as the real troublemaker.
North Korea launched a rocket February 7, carrying what it said was an Earth observation satellite into space.
The industrial park, which Seoul shut last week after Pyongyang’s rocket launch, employed some 54,000 North Koreans in more than 120 South Korean companies.
The North conducted its fourth nuclear test last month.
Mr Kim on Saturday hosted a banquet for those involved in the January 7 rocket launch, according to the Korean Central News Agency, telling his guests that the project had given confidence and courage to the people at a time when “hostile forces were becoming ever-more frantic to suffocate” North Korea.
South Korea has claimed the North has used 70% of wages earned by workers at a jointly-run industrial complex for its weapons programme and luxury goods for the elite.
The South Korean government estimate did not detail how it arrived at that percentage. The project, which began during an era of relatively good relations between the Koreas, combined cheap North Korean labor with the capital and technology of wealthy South Korea.
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North Korea is also believed to have obtained six lumber transporters from China that were subsequently converted into transporter erector launchers.
