GENEVA (Reuters) -- North Korea said Tuesday it had a "powerful and reliable" nuclear deterrent to thwart any attack and accused the United States of deploying military assets nearby under the pretext of ensuring the security of the Winter Olympics.
"This is dangerous act of throwing a wet blanket over the current positive atmosphere of inter-Korean relations ... which could drive again into an extreme phase of confrontation," Han Tae Song, North Korea's ambassador to the UN in Geneva, told a Conference on Disarmament.
U.S. disarmament ambassador Robert Wood retorted: "The United States will not recognize North Korea as a nuclear weapon state. If the North wishes to return and be in the good graces of the international community, it knows what it has to do, it has to take steps toward denuclearization of the Korean peninsula."
Meanwhile, a senior United Nations disarmament official welcomed an easing of tensions between North and South Korea, but called for further steps towards removing nuclear weapons from the divided peninsula.
Izumi Nakamitsu, Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, told the UN-sponsored Conference on Disarmament (CD): "Such engagement must still be translated into the resumption of sincere dialogue leading to sustainable peace and denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula."
There was no immediate reaction from North Korea's delegation at the Geneva forum, which has begun its 2018 session.