SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called a U.S. push for the denuclearization of North Korea an “anachronistic dream,” saying Sunday the North will steadily expand its nuclear arsenal in the face of U.S.-led threats.The statement came a day before Chinese President Xi Jinping visits North Korea for talks with Kim Jong Un, in his first visit to the country in seven years. “The U.S. assertion to backbite the status of the DPRK as a nuclear weapons state has no legally binding force and no one will be bound by the U.S. unilateral rhetoric,” said Kim’s sister and senior official, Kim Yo Jong, using the abbreviation for North Korea’s official name.She dismissed as “false information” a U.S. announcement that President Donald Trump and Xi confirmed their shared goal to denuclearize North Korea in their summit in Beijing last month.
“Some officials in the United States have failed to wake from their escapist and anachronistic dream,” Kim Yo Jong said.North Korea has been focusing on enlarging its nuclear arsenal since Kim Jong Un’s high-stakes diplomacy with Trump collapsed in 2019. Experts say the North Korean leader wants an international recognition as a nuclear state so that he could demand lifting of international economic sanctions on North Korea.
