N. Korea Adds Threat To Nuke Talks

North Korea threatened Thursday to use a delay in international nuclear talks to bolster its military "deterrent force," a phrase it often uses to refer to its purported nuclear weapons.

"It's not bad that the resumption of nuclear talks is delayed. During that period, we will make more deterrent force," the North's top nuclear envoy, Kim Kye Gwan, told a news conference in Tokyo.

North Korea has said it has atomic weapons, although the claim has not been verified independently.

"We will react in an ultra hardline manner if the United States continues to apply pressure and sanctions. We will never yield to pressure," Kim said.

Kim said North Korea will only return to the six-nation talks on ending its nuclear weapons program if the U.S. lifts a freeze on disputed North Korean assets in a Macau bank.

"There is no compromise and flexibility on this issue," he said. "I will go to the negotiating table the moment I seize the assets with my hands."

Washington says the sanctions are unrelated to the nuclear talks and will stay in place.

It says the assets, which total about $24 million, are linked to money laundering and counterfeiting.

Kim made the comments after several days of meetings in Japan among officials from the six nations involved in the nuclear negotiations, the U.S., China, Japan, Russia and the two Koreas, failed to win a commitment from North Korea to return to the negotiating table.

Kim left Tokyo later Thursday to return home.

Chinese chief negotiator Wu Dawei said there was no possibility of resuming the negotiations by the end of April, and that the sanction issue was the chief stumbling block.

Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi told reporters later Thursday that "our positions are still wide apart and I have a renewed awareness about the difficulty of our negotiations," Kyodo News agency said.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, who was in Tokyo for the talks, said Thursday after traveling to Seoul that Washington will continue to closely scrutinize the communist state's finances unless it gives up its pursuit of nuclear arms.

Hill again rejected North Korea's demand that the U.S. lift the financial restrictions.

North Korea "needs to understand that as long as it's going to be producing nuclear weapons, we're going to have a really close look at the finance," Hill said in a speech to a U.S. business group in Seoul.

On Saturday, North Korea's defense minister warned that a pre-emptive strike is not the monopoly of the United States, in comments carried by the North's official news agency.

"We will never sit with arms folded and watch until the U.S. attacks us," said Kim Il Chol, vice marshal of the North's Korean People's Army, according to the official Korean Central News Agency. "A pre-emptive strike is not the monopoly of the U.S.," he said.

Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe also demanded Pyongyang return to the six-party framework "unconditionally."

"The international society would not accept North Korea unless it returns to the negotiation table unconditionally and abandons its nuclear programs," Abe told reporters. "We must continue to urge (North Korea) strongly to respond to our calls sincerely, but we should also step up international pressure on them."

North Korea has denied accusations that it is involved in financial crimes and has pledged to join international efforts to fight money laundering.

The meetings in Tokyo had raised hopes of restarting the negotiations, which North Korea has refused to attend since last November.

In October, it agreed to give up its nuclear weapons program in exchange for aid and security assurances, but no progress has been made on implementing that agreement.