Kim Jong-un has accused the US of turning waters near the Korean peninsula into ‘the most unstable with the danger of a nuclear war’.

In a speech to mark Navy Day, North Korea’s supreme leader called for his military to be constantly ready for combat against his rivals, state media reported late last night.

His comments come as the US, South Korea and Japan held a joint naval exercise to deal with North Korea’s evolving nuclear threats.

In their first standalone meeting, presidents Joe Biden and Yoon Suk Yeol, and PM Fumio Kishida agreed to deepen military and economic cooperation against China and North Korea.

But Kim hit back, describing them as ‘gang bosses’, after their historic summit at Camp David, Maryland, on August 18.

He was quoted as saying: ‘Owing to the reckless confrontational moves of the US and other hostile forces, the waters off the Korean Peninsula have been reduced into the world’s biggest war hardware concentration spot, the most unstable waters with the danger of a nuclear war.’

South Korea and the US last week kicked off the Ulchi Freedom Shield summer exercises.

They are designed to enhance their joint responses to North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats, which the dictatorship has long denounced as a rehearsal for war.

Kim said North Korea requires its navy to maintain war readiness, a ‘constant combat alertness,’ and called for ‘radically’ modernising its weapons and equipment.

‘He stressed that the navy of the DPRK would become a component of the state nuclear deterrence carrying out the strategic duty,’ state media added.

North Korea typically responds to US-South Korean military drills with its own missile tests.

Since the beginning of 2022, it has carried out more than 100 such tests, many of them involving nuclear-capable weapons.

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