North Korea on Monday condemned the latest round of United Nations sanctions imposed against it over its weapons programmes, saying it would not negotiate over its nuclear arms while it was threatened by the United States.

The sanctions passed at the weekend were a "violent violation of our sovereignty", Pyongyang said in a statement carried by its official Korea Central News Agency.

"We will not put our self-defensive nuclear deterrent on the negotiating table" while it faced threats from Washington, it said, "and will never take a single step back from strengthening our nuclear might".

source: AFP