North Korea on Tuesday vowed to build nuclear armed forces for self-defense against possible US preemptive nuclear attack.

A signed commentary of the North Korean official newspaper Minju Joson denounced a US national security strategy report, which regards North Korea as an "outpost of tyranny."

US President George W. Bush reiterated the preemptive policy, which he first outlined in 2002, in his 49-page long national security strategy report released on March 16.

"Under such situation where the US-threatened preemptive nuclear attack was impending in actuality, North Korea had no other option but to make a bold decision to build nuclear armed forces for self-defence," said the commentary.

The paper said that the US strategy shifted its foreign policy away from decades of deterrence and containment toward a more aggressive stance of attacking enemies before they attack the United States.

"As soon as it took office, the Bush administration newly adopted its nuclear strategy focused on North Korea and started posing undisguised threat of nuclear attack against North Korea," said the Minju Joson.

In the commentary, Pyongyang was also strongly against the financial sanction imposed by the US last October before the second phase of the fourth round of six-party talks.

"At the crucial moment when both sides were to move in actuality toward the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the United States took financial sanctions against North Korea" under such unreasonable pretexts as counterfeit notes and money laundering, added the Minju Joson.

North Korea has denied the US allegations and ruled out participation in a new round of disarmament negotiations until the sanctions are lifted.

(Xinhua News Agency March 29, 2006)