An official said President Biden had made “a big blunder” by characterizing the North’s nuclear arsenal as a threat to the United States.

By Choe Sang-Hun

SEOUL — North Korea said on Sunday that President Biden had made “a big blunder” by calling its nuclear arsenal a threat last week, and it warned that the United States would face “a very grave situation” if it maintained what it called a “hostile policy” toward Pyongyang.

The statement, attributed to a senior official, was one of three that the North released on Sunday directed at the United States and its ally South Korea. They included warnings that the North might respond to the Biden administration’s recent statements about the country with unspecified “corresponding measures.”

Mr. Biden made a brief reference to North Korea in his speech before a joint session of Congress on Wednesday, saying that its nuclear program and Iran’s presented “serious threats to American security and the security of the world.” He said the United States and its allies would deal with them “through diplomacy as well as stern deterrence.”

“It is certain that the U.S. chief executive made a big blunder,” Kwon Jong-gun, a senior official at North Korea’s Foreign Ministry​, said in a statement published by the North’s state news media. He said Mr. Biden’s remark “clearly reflects his intent to keep enforcing the hostile policy toward” North Korea.

“We will be compelled to press for corresponding measures, and with time the U.S. will find itself in a very grave situation,” ​he said.

North Korea has long said that ​it will not give up its nuclear arsenal​​ until the United States changes its “hostile” policy. It has doubled down on that insistence since direct talks between its leader, Kim Jong-un, and President Donald J. Trump ended in 2019 with no agreement on dismantling the North’s nuclear weapons facilities or easing American-led sanctions imposed on the North.

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