North Korea Releases 'US Nuclear Attack' Video

North Korea's sabre rattling over its nuclear programme has taken a bizarre new turn with a video appearing to show an attack on the US.

There are reports the reclusive nation is planning to carry out a third nuclear test "imminently".

But as the world waits, video has emerged which appears to show a young North Korean man dreaming about an attack on America.

The video was released via a propaganda website linked to the North Korean state news agency.

It shows a man dreaming of being on a space shuttle - set against a backing track of Michael Jackson's We Are The World.

We can only try to second guess the thinking of a nation known as the "hermit kingdom", but the song may well be a dig at US imperialism.

However, it becomes less of a dreamy video and more of threatening overture when the space shuttle is launched into orbit by the same technology used to launch a rocket test by North Korea last December.

Then the video appears to show missiles raining down on a US city, setting fire to high-rise buildings in scenes reminiscent of 9/11.

A caption appears on screen which translates as: "Somewhere in the US black clouds of smoke are billowing. It seems that the nest of wickedness is ablaze."

North Korea has threatened a third nuclear test for some time but it is thought a fresh round of UN sanctions in response to its December rocket test may have hastened its plans.

South Korea's ambassador to the UN has said it has intelligence the nuclear test is "imminent".

The concern of the international community is that North Korea is trying to gather the knowledge and capability to put the rocket together with its nuclear testing knowledge to make a bomb.

It is thought the North does not yet have the capability of staging a military strike on the United States, although South Korea and Japan are in range of its artillery and missiles.

North Koreas KCNA state news agency has said: "The DPRK (Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea, or North Korea) has drawn a final conclusion that it will have to take a measure stronger than a nuclear test to cope with the hostile forces nuclear war moves that have become ever more undisguised."

The US and South Korea are staging military drills that North Korea says are a rehearsal for an invasion, something both Washington and Seoul deny.

The North's successful long-range rocket launch in December was in violation of UN resolutions that banned it from developing missiles or nuclear technology after its nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009.

Relatively new leader Kim Jong-Un, who took over from his father Kim Jong-Il just over a year ago, appears to have turned his back on the chance of new six-party talks and the offer of food aid for his impoverished nation by carrying out the rocket tests.

However this latest video and the long line of rhetoric may be little more than bluster and the young dictator's idea of brinkmanship.

The Unha-3 satellite was launched on board a long-range rocket on December 12 in defiance of sanctions and international warnings.

Pyongyang says the device, the size of a washing machine, is working and is beaming revolutionary songs to Earth.

But some astronomers suggest it may be tumbling, and does not yet appear to be transmitting.