N. Korea warns of `nuclear war` on Korean Peninsula

North Korea warned Friday that another war with South Korea will involve “nuclear warfare.”

The warning carried by the North’s Web site targeted at foreign readers came just a day after the South Korean military announced another artillery drill on the frontline Yeonpyeong Island, which was shelled by the North last month.

Uriminzokkiri, an Internet site operated by the North’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland, denounced South Korean Prime Minister Kim Hwang-sik for expressing anger over the North’s attack. Kim warned that Seoul will ensure that Pyongyang will "pay the price" for another provocation.

Uriminzokkiri said Kim’s “bellicose” comments were aimed at “further intensifying the situation on the Korean Peninsula, which is on the verge of war.” Due to Seoul’s reckless maneuvers of confrontation and war, a war on the peninsula is not a matter of if but when, it added.

"If war breaks out, it will lead to nuclear warfare and not be limited to the Korean Peninsula," the Web site said.

Uriminzokkiri also blasted South Korea for allowing anti-North propaganda leaflets to be sent across the inter-Korean border. An organization of North Korean defectors in South Korea will send 200,000 such leaflets to the North Saturday.

"Such confrontational madness will only fuel the extraordinary alarm and ire of our army and people," the North Korean site said in a commentary.

will71@donga.com