They termed the DPRK's measure as a sort of "provocation" and "violation of a resolution of the UN Security Council" and "red light to the south-north relations." They went lengths of making such threatening remarks that in case "the north makes a provocation", "it will entail consequences" and it will face "strong counteraction of the international community".

Rodong Sinmun Monday in a commentary says this is an intolerable encroachment upon the dignity and sovereignty of the DPRK and a shameless hostile act against the dialogue partner.

The DPRK's development of space for peaceful purposes is a legitimate right of a sovereign state and the south Korean authorities are not entitled to say this or that about it, the commentary notes, and goes on:

It is quite natural and just for the DPRK to react to the U.S. and its followers' ever more undisguised moves to stifle the DPRK accompanied by a nuclear threat with measures for bolstering the nuclear deterrence for self-defence.

What should be called into question before the international community and what should come under fire by the unbiased public opinion which loves justice and peace is not the exercise of the right to self-defense by a sovereign state but the hostile acts of the U.S. and its followers making a mockery of the right with sheer sophism and seriously threatening peace and security on the Korean Peninsula and in the rest of Northeast Asia.

The south Korean authorities should bear in mind before groundlessly slandering the DPRK that their acts of kicking up an anti-DPRK confrontation racket in the international arena in league with outsiders in defiance of the independent right of their dialogue partner will bring irrevocable disaster to the north-south relations.