North Korea warned that confrontation with the United States was inevitable as tensions escalated over its decision to expel United Nations monitors from a controversial nuclear site.

"Inevitable is the confrontation with the imperialists as long as they do not abandon the aggressive and predatory nature," said a commentary in Sunday's edition of the Rodong Sinmun newspaper -- the mouthpiece of the ruling communist party.

"The imperialist reactionaries are seriously mistaken if they think they would bring the Korean people who regard independence as their life and soul to their knees with pressure," it added.

The latest salvo in the war of rhetoric came after the North Korean government organization in charge of Korean affairs said in a statement that the United States was "desperate to bar the Korean nation from achieving reconciliation and cooperation by itself."

"Timed to coincide with its futile 'nuclear racket', the US is deepening the crisis on the Korean peninsula by shamelessly meddling in the issues related to the inter-Korean relations and hamstringing the process to warm them," said the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland in a statement Saturday.

The accusation coincided with an anti-US rally in Pyongyang by some 10,000 people who called for "sacred anti-US resistance".

North Korea has come under widespread international condemnation for taking a series of steps to restart a nuclear power plant that could be used to produce weapons-grade plutonium.

The energy-poor country has disabled UN monitoring equipment and removed seals from nuclear facilities frozen under the Agreed Framework it signed with the United States in 1994.

The crisis escalated rapidly at the weekend when North Korea ordered inspectors from the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to leave the country's nuclear complex in Yongbyon by Tuesday.

The deadline came after North Korea refused to respond to a letter sent by IAEA director Mohamed ElBaradei asking for the expulsion to be reversed and asking for monitors to be allowed to remain at Yongbyon.

North Korea said on December 12 it it is restarting a five-megawatt facility at Yongbyon because it needs electricity after the United States cut off oil shipments last month.

But the IAEA accuses North Korea of moving fresh nuclear fuel rods to the research reactor, which is said to be capable of producing plutonium.

The 1994 deal has fallen apart since US revelations in October that North Korea is running a separate weapons program based on enriched uranium technology.

Analysts said the North's nuclear brinkmanship was a case of its leadership exploiting Washington's preoccupation with Iraq to force it back to the negotiating table and win concessions.

Beijing, considered Pyongyang's main ally, expressed deep concern, and Britain warned its year-old diplomatic relations with North Korea would be harmed by the move.

Washington said it would not bow to Pyongyang's "threats and broken commitments".

The Bush administration has prepared a comprehensive plan to increase financial and political pressure on North Korea, the New York Times reported Sunday.

As part of Bush's policy called "tailored containment" US officials are willing to negotiate with North Korea but only if it first dismantles its nuclear weapons program.

The UN Security Council could threaten economic sanctions against Pyongyang, while the US military might intercept missile shipments to deprive North Korea of money from weapon sales.

If North Korea refuses to change course it will face increasing hardship and could be confronted by the prospect of economic collapse.

© 2002 AFP

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