Seoul: US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said today the United States will never accept a North Korea with atomic bombs, saying the communist regime poses threats "even more lethal and destabilising" than before.
Gates arrived in Seoul today for a two-day visit for annual defence ministers` talks with South Korea after a stop in Tokyo.
"There should be no mistaking that we do not today - nor will we ever - accept a North Korea with nuclear weapons," Gates told a group of American and South Korean troops at the US military headquarters in central Seoul.
Gates said "the peril posed by the North Korean regime" has become "even more lethal and destabilising."
He said the US is firmly committed to providing South Korea with deterrence against those threats "with the full range of military might, from the nuclear umbrella to conventional strike and missile defence capabilities.
Bureau Report
