Japan's defence ministry also reported the launch of what it said could be a ballistic missile by North Korea, US News reported.
The reports come amid heightened tensions on the Korean peninsula as South Korea and the United States take steps to boost military readiness against North Korea with the deployment of US strategic military assets.
North Korea has reacted angrily, saying such deployment could meet the criteria for its use of nuclear weapons.
North Korea conducted ballistic missile tests last week, hours after a US nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarine arrived at a South Korean port for the first time since the 1980s.
Ahead of the submarine's arrival, a North Korean defense ministry spokesperson had warned that the deployment of nuclear assets to the Korean Peninsula "may incite the worst crisis of nuclear conflict in practice."
On Thursday, North Korea's defense minister Kang Sun Nam said the Ohio-class submarine's deployment may have fallen "under the conditions of the use of nuclear weapons specified in the DPRK law on the nuclear force policy," using an acronym for North Korea's official name of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
And on Friday, South Korea's defense ministry said any use of nuclear weapons by the North would prompt an "immediate and decisive response" resulting in the "end" of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's rule.
On Monday, another nuclear-powered US submarine arrived in South Korea.
SKH/PR
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