SEOUL, 1 November (H.S.): In a defiant statement on Saturday, North Korea declared the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula to be an unrealisable pipe dream, according to its state news agency, KCNA. The announcement came just hours before a scheduled summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Gyeongju, South Korea.

The South Korean president's office had previously announced on Friday that the denuclearization of the peninsula would be a key topic of discussion during the high-level meeting between Xi and Lee.

Pyongyang's sharp rebuke was conveyed in a statement attributed to Vice Foreign Minister Pak Myong Ho. He asserted that South Korea's efforts to discuss the matter reveal a lack of common sense.

The ROK is still unaware that struggling to deny the DPRK's position as a nuclear weapons state and talking about its daydream of realizing the denuclearization just reveal its lack of common sense, the KCNA report stated, using the official acronyms for the Republic of Korea (South Korea) and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea).

The statement concluded with a resolute message: We will show with patience that denuclearization is a 'pipe dream' which can never be realized.

---------------

Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar