Use of flag in US-ROK drill a 'grave action':DPRK

Pyongyang slammed the use of its flag as an "extremely serious military and political provocation" in a US-ROK joint drill, and said it will further "bolster up" its nuclear deterrent, the official Korean Central News Agency reported on Monday.

US and ROK troops on Friday staged the largest-ever joint live firing drill in the Republic of Korea and fired at the flag of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the Foreign Ministry of the DPRK said in a statement on Sunday.

"It is an extremely grave military action and politically motivated provocation to fire live bullets and shells at the flag of a sovereign state without a declaration of war," the statement said.

The one-day drill on Friday coincided with a separate two-day trilateral naval drill that began on Thursday involving destroyers, supply ships and helicopters from the United States, the ROK and Japan, off the southern ROK island of Jeju.

Tensions are high after the failure of a rocket launch by Pyongyang in April, which was seen by the US and its allies as an attempted ballistic missile test.

Monday marks the 62nd anniversary of the start of the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended in a truce.

It is also the final day of a three-day naval exercise by Washington and Seoul, which began on Saturday in the waters off the west coast of the Korean Peninsula.

Pyongyang also said the country's nuclear deterrent for self-defense is an "all-powerful treasured sword" for preventing a war and reliably protecting peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula.

The country vowed to further bolster its nuclear deterrent as long as the US "persists in its hostile policy toward the DPRK".

Analysts said Pyongyang's statement on a nuclear deterrent was made in response to the military drills, and the resumption of the Six-Party Talks is still far away.

"Both Pyongyang and Washington proposed their preconditions for the resumption of the talks, and neither has decided to make a major concession, which leaves little chance for an immediate restart right now," said Zhang Liangui, an expert on Korean Peninsula studies at the Party School of the Communist Party of China Central Committee.

Meanwhile, senior diplomats from Seoul and Moscow were to meet this week in Seoul to discuss possible ways to revive the stalled Six-Party Talks, Yonhap news agency said.

The Six-Party Talks, involving the DPRK, the ROK, China, the US, Russia and Japan, have been stalled since December 2008.

Russia's deputy chief envoy to the talks, Grigory Logvinov, is scheduled to hold talks with ROK nuclear envoy Lim Sung-nam on Tuesday, Yonhap quoted an unidentified Seoul foreign ministry official as saying.

In an editorial in the Monday issue of Pyongyang's official newspaper Rodong Sinmun urged people nationwide to "smash the provocation of war hawks", and it warned that the Korean nation is still living in the danger of a potential major war.

During a ceremony in Seoul on Monday, ROK Prime Minister Kim Hwang-sik said his country "must focus on strengthening our national defense and security awareness in order to prevent another Korean War from happening again", The Associated Press reported.

Pyongyang said it has no plans "at present" for a third test.

AFP contributed to this story.

Contact the writer at zhangyunbi@chinadaily.com.cn