Seoul: State-run media KCNA quoted North Korea's defense minister Kang Sun Nam as saying that the stationing of US weapons in South Korea, such as aircraft carriers, bombers, or missile submarines, could create the conditions for the country to use nuclear weapons.

The remarks raise the stakes as both sides increase their military showdowns in the conflict over the isolated nation's ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programs.

In addition to criticizing the first meeting of their nuclear consultative group, the defense minister's statement also charged the US and South Korea with raising regional tensions.

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"The ever-increasing visibility of the deployment of the strategic nuclear submarine and other strategic assets may fall under the conditions of the use of nuclear weapons specified in the DPRK law," the statement read.

The acronym DPRK stands for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, which is the North's official name.

The remark is directed at a US nuclear-powered submarine of the Ohio class that arrived this week at a port in the city of Busan in the south.
The KCNA report also stated that "the possibility of a military confrontation on the Korean peninsula has emerged as a dangerous reality."

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The news comes as tensions between the US and the two Koreas are at an all-time high after a US soldier crossed the border into North Korea on Tuesday.

North Korea has not yet responded to the story of the US soldier's incident.

The secretive state codified a new, comprehensive nuclear law last year that proclaimed its nuclear-armed status as "irreversible."

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North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un was quoted at the time by KCNA as saying, "The utmost significance of legislating nuclear weapons policy is to draw an irretrievable line so that there can be no bargaining over our nuclear weapons."