SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea threatened Thursday to resume insults of U.S. President Donald Trump and consider him a "dotard" if he keeps using provocative language, such as referring to its leader as "rocket man."
Choe Son Hui, the first vice foreign minister, issued the warning on state media outlets days after Trump spoke of possible military action toward the North and revived his "rocket man" nickname for ruler Kim Jong Un.
The comments came as prospects dim for a resumption of nuclear diplomacy between the two countries. In recent months, North Korea has hinted at lifting its moratorium on nuclear and long-range missile tests if the Trump administration fails to make substantial concessions in nuclear diplomacy before the end of the year.
Choe said Trump's remarks "prompted the waves of hatred of our people against the U.S." because they showed "no courtesy when referring to the supreme leadership of dignity" of North Korea.
The U.S. president "has lost politeness to the highest dignity of our republic and dared to use metaphors," she said.
She said North Korea will respond with its own harsh language if Trump again uses similar phrases and shows that he is intentionally provoking North Korea.
"If any language and expressions stoking the atmosphere of confrontation are used once again ... that must really be diagnosed as the relapse of the dotage of a dotard," Choe said. A dotard is an old person, particularly one who has become physically and mentally weak.
Trump also said this week that the United States was prepared to use its military against North Korea if it had to, which has also angered Pyongyang.
Choe said the Foreign Ministry "cannot contain its displeasure towards President Trump's remark that was blurted out in an inappropriate manner at a highly sensitive time." It would be fortunate, she said, if the threat to use force "and the metaphor was a spontaneous slip of the tongue, but the problem would be different if it was a deliberate provocation."
On Wednesday, the North's military chief, Pak Jong Chon, also warned that the use of force against the North would cause a "horrible" consequence for the U.S. He said North Korea would take unspecified "prompt corresponding actions at any level" if the U.S. takes any military action.
During a visit to London on Tuesday, Trump said his relationship with Kim was "really good" but also called for Kim to follow up on a commitment to denuclearize.
"We have the most powerful military we ever had, and we are by far the most powerful country in the world and hopefully we don't have to use it. But if we do, we will use it," Trump said.
Kim, Trump added, "likes sending rockets up, doesn't he? That's why I call him rocket man."
In his U.N. speech in September 2017, Trump threatened to "totally destroy" North Korea and famously called Kim a "rocket man" on "a suicide mission."
Trump issued his 2017 threat after North Korea flight-tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles and detonated what it called a hydrogen bomb in its sixth and most powerful underground nuclear test.
Kim delivered an equally famous rejoinder.
"A frightened dog barks louder," Kim said, referring to Trump. "I will surely and definitely tame the mentally deranged U.S. dotard with fire."
Two months later, North Korea launched its most powerful intercontinental ballistic missile, the Hwasong-15, which demonstrated the potential to reach the mainland United States.
In a dramatic shift, however, Kim and Trump started engaging in diplomacy in 2018, with Trump going so far as to say that he and Kim "fell in love."
In June 2018, they held their first summit meeting in Singapore, during which Kim promised to "work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula" in return for "new" relations and security guarantees from Washington.
But subsequent negotiations have stalled over how to implement the broadly worded agreement, and North Korea has sounded increasingly frustrated about negotiating with Washington in recent months.
It has resumed short-range missile tests this year, warning that it would formally end diplomacy unless the United States makes more concessions.
Trump's national security adviser Robert O'Brien said Thursday night in Washington that the U.S. remains hopeful that a deal can be reached with North Korea.
"Kim Jong Un has promised to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula. We hope that he sticks to that promise, and we're going to keep at the negotiations and keep at the diplomacy as long as we think that there's hope there. And we do," O'Brien said on Fox News Channel's Special Report with Bret Baier.
"I don't want to say we're optimistic, but we have some hope that the Koreans will come to the table ... and we can get a deal."
Information for this article was contributed by Hyung-Jin Kim of The Associated Press; by Choe Sang-Hun of The New York Times; and by Simon Denyer of The Washington Post.
A Section on 12/06/2019