An increasingly isolated North Korea said on Tuesday it would conduct its first-ever nuclear test, blaming a U.S. "threat of nuclear war and sanctions" for forcing its hand.
The statement by North Korea's foreign ministry, carried on the official KCNA news agency, was condemned by neighboring Japan as "unacceptable" and caused South Korea to increase its security alert.
The announcement confirms weeks of rumors the communist state was planning a test and came amid increasingly sour relations with the outside world after it test-fired missiles in July.
"The U.S. extreme threat of a nuclear war and sanctions and pressure compel the DPRK (North Korea) to conduct a nuclear test, an essential process for bolstering nuclear deterrent, as a corresponding measure for defense," the statement said.
But it added that North Korea would never use nuclear weapons first and would "do its utmost to realize the denuclearization of the peninsula and give impetus to the world-wide nuclear disarmament and the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons."
"Pyongyang has been increasingly controlled by hardliners in the past months and its policies and words have become more and more extreme. The situation is really dangerous," said Shi Yinhong, professor of International Relations at Renmin University in Beijing
"North Korea thinks it has no other option but to press the United States to have bilateral negotiations with them. North Korea has nothing to lose by conducting a nuclear test," Chang Myung-soon, an expert on North Korea's military, said.
