India, March 25 -- North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has pledged to irreversibly cement his country's status as a nuclear power while maintaining a hard-line stance toward South Korea, which he called the "most hostile" state, State media said on Tuesday.

In a speech to Pyongyang's rubber-stamp parliament, Kim accused the United States of global "State terrorism and aggression," in an apparent reference to the war in West Asia, and said the North will play a more forceful role in a united front against Washington amid rising anti-American sentiment. But Kim didn't call out US President Donald Trump by name and said that whether his adversaries "choose confrontation or peaceful coexistence is up to them, and we are prepared to respond to an...