Published on 6/24/2026
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said that his country is continuing to supply its naval forces with nuclear weapons, during the inauguration of a new warship, according to what the official Korean Central News Agency reported on Wednesday.
Kim’s statements came during the launching ceremony of the destroyer “Choi Hyun” in the coastal city of Nampo, which is one of two 5,000-ton warships that Pyongyang unveiled last year.
He stressed that the Navy’s nuclear arming program “is proceeding according to the specified plan,” considering that this step represents a strategic path to enhance the readiness of the nuclear force and diversify its operational capabilities.
Kim also revealed plans to expand the naval fleet, noting that the destroyer “Kang Kun” will be put into service soon, in addition to the development of strategic warships with a tonnage of up to 10,000 tons, at a rate of two ships per year of advanced classes, including heavy cruisers.
Kim stressed that the traditional role of the North Korean Navy has ended, and that it is moving towards becoming an integrated force with strategic capabilities, saying, “The era in which our naval forces were merely a force charged with defending the waters off our coasts is over and has become part of the past.”
At the conclusion of a three-day general meeting of the party’s Central Committee that ended on Monday, Kim pledged to strengthen the country’s defense capabilities, noting that the military modernization efforts made by South Korea and the United States of America are pushing the region “to the brink of nuclear war.”
Pyongyang asserts that it possesses nuclear capabilities “irreversibly”, despite the continued international sanctions imposed on it, while the two Koreas are still practically in a state of war, as their conflict ended in 1953 with a truce and not a peace treaty.
