North Korea threatens nuclear strike on 'heart of US' if regime is threatened

North Korea threatened a nuclear strike on the “heart of the US” if it attempts to remove Kim Jong-Un as leader.

The threat was in response to comments from CIA chief Mike Pompeo, who said last week that the Trump administration needed to find a way to separate Jong-un from his growing nuclear stockpile.

He said: “As for the regime, I am hopeful we will find a way to separate that regime from this system. The North Korean people I'm sure are lovely people and would love to see him go."

North Korea responded by saying it would “annihilate any countries” directly or indirectly involved in threatening the regime, according to Pyongyang’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

"The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea legally stipulates that if the supreme dignity of the DPRK is threatened, it must pre-emptively annihilate those countries and entities that are directly or indirectly involved in it, by mobilizing all kinds of strike means including the nuclear ones," the KCNA quoted a North Korea Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying.

"Should the US dare to show even the slightest sign of attempt to remove our supreme leadership, we will strike a merciless blow at the heart of the US with our powerful nuclear hammer, honed and hardened over time.”

It comes amid reports of a new nuclear test scheduled for this week in North Korea.

A US defence official was quoted by CNN as saying that ballistic missile launching equipment was detected arriving in the city of Kusong in the central North Pyongan province last Friday.