North Korea ready to strike Guam 'at any moment' after Donald Trump's 'fire and fury' comments
North Korea is "carefully examining" a plan to strike the US Pacific territory of Guam with missiles, just hours after Donald Trump said a threat would be met with "fire and fury".
On Wednesday, a spokesperson for the Korean People's Army, said the strike plan would be "put into practice in a multi-current and consecutive way any moment" once leader Kim Jong Un made a decision, according to the North's state-run KCNA news agency.
In another statement citing a different military spokesman, North Korea also said it could carry out a pre-emptive operation if the US showed signs of provocation.
This comes as US analysts said North Korea has developed a nuclear weapon small enough to fit inside missiles and travel long distances.
In July, the US calculated about 60 nuclear weapons were controlled by the country's leader Kim Jong-un, but analysts said the new report has raised the estimated number of bombs in North Korea's arsenal.
Speaking in New Jersey on Tuesday, Mr Trump said: “North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States".
“He has been very threatening," Mr Trump said referring to North Korean lead Kim Jong-un.
Experts initially thought it would be years before the weapon could reach distant targets, but the new report suggests the country has already developed these missiles, the Washington Post reported.
"The IC [intelligence community] assesses North Korea has produced nuclear weapons for ballistic missile delivery, to include delivery by ICBM-class missiles," the assessment read, according to the Washington Post.
'We will make US pay': North Korea angry over stronger UN sanctions
Japan says North Korea poses 'new level of threat'
Earlier on Tuesday, Japan's Defence Ministry said "it is conceivable that North Korea's nuclear weapons program has already considerably advanced and it is possible that North Korea has already achieved the miniaturisation of nuclear weapons and has acquired nuclear warheads."
This comes after North Korea said it was ready to give the United States a "severe lesson" with its strategic nuclear force if it takes military action.
In a transcript of a statement by Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho, given to media at a regional meeting in Manila, Pyongyang called new UN sanctions "fabricated" and warned there would be "strong follow-up measures" and acts of justice.
It said the resolution showed the United Nations had abused its authority.
The statement said its intercontinental ballistic missile tests in July proved that the entire United States was in its firing range, and those missiles were a legitimate means of self-defence.
It was not immediately clear whether the statement was read to the ASEAN Regional Forum on Monday.
The US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, called the US-drafted resolution "the single largest economic sanctions package ever leveled against" North Korea.
In a statement carried by the North's state-run Korean Central News Agency, North Korea's government said the sanctions were a "violent infringement of its sovereignty" that was caused by a "heinous US plot to isolate and stifle" the country.
"We will make the US pay by a thousand-fold for all the heinous crimes it commits against the state and people of this country," the statement said.
North Korea test-launched two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) last month as part of its efforts to possess a long-range missile capable of striking anywhere in the mainland US.
