North Korea rejects talks with US, says sovereignty can 'never be negotiated'

ANKARA

North Korea on Thursday rejected the US dialogue offer, saying sovereignty "can never be negotiated."

Kim Yo Jong, the sister of the North Korean leader, said that the sovereignty of an independent state "can never be an agenda item for negotiations."

"We make it clear once again to the US which asked the DPRK to fix the time and agenda for resuming the DPRK-US dialogue," Kim said, according to Pyongyang-based KCNA.

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

Earlier, the US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, had said that Washington continues to call for dialogue with Pyongyang on any topic.

During the UN Security Council meeting earlier this week, Thomas-Greenfield said Pyongyang "can choose the timing and topic."

"It is the consistent stand of the DPRK against the US that the former should be ready for both dialogue and confrontation and, in particular, more thoroughly ready for confrontation if the 'peace by power' favored by the latter is to rely on muscle-flexing behind the rhetoric about dialogue," Kim said.

*Writing by Islamuddin Sajid