Ri Pyong-chol, vice chairman of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party, made the statement, a day after Biden said the North's launch of two short-range ballistic missiles Thursday was in violation of UN Security Council resolutions, the Yonhap news agency reported.
"We express our deep apprehension over the US chief executive faulting the regular testfire, exercise of our state's right to self-defense, as the violation of UN 'resolutions' and openly revealing his deep-seated hostility toward the DPRK," Ri said.
"Such remarks from the US president are an undisguised encroachment on our state's right to self-defense and provocation to it," he said in the statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, according to Yonhap.
Ri called it "gangster-logic" for the US to "ship the strategic nuclear assets into the Korean peninsula and launch ICBMs any time it wants" and to criticize the North when it conducts "even a test of a tactical weapon."
He also said the North has no choice but to build "invincible physical power" to defend its own country at a time when Seoul and Washington continue to conduct combined military exercises and "constantly pose military threats to the Korean peninsula."
"I think that the new US administration obviously took its first step wrong. If the US continues with its thoughtless remarks without thinking of the consequences, it may be faced with something that is not good," he added.
He said the North will continue to increase its "most thoroughgoing and overwhelming military power."
KI/PR
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