Tokyo, Apr 27: Japan's defence chief, reacting to US reports that North Korea admitted to having a nuclear arsenal, warned today that the Stalinist state's remarks were "a big miscalculation." "North Korea's most important objective is the maintenance of its regime and socialism," defense agency director-general Shigeru Ishiba said in a television interview. But "if North Korea thinks that speaking out on its possession of nuclear weapons will help maintain the current regime, it is a big miscalculation," he said. US officials told the Japanese government that North Korea said it possessed nuclear weapons at three-way nuclear talks in Beijing with the United States and China, which ended Friday.
The current crisis stems from US revelations made last October that North Korea was pursuing a secret nuclear weapons drive in breach of international accords, including the 1994 agreed framework between Washington and Pyongyang.
North Korea has ratcheted up tensions, expelling international nuclear inspectors, testing missiles and announcing its withdrawal in January from the non-proliferation treaty.
North Korea has asserted that its very existence is threatened by US plans to launch nuclear war against the isolated and impoverished country, branded by US President George W Bush as part of an "axis of evil" along with Iran and Iraq. Bureau Report