Pyongyang, North Korea - The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on Wednesday accused Japan of transforming "into a war state" and threatened "military options" in response.
Japan has been gradually moving away from its post-World War II pacifist status – increasing military spending, ramping up defense pacts, and deploying missile launchers to its outer islands – over recent years.
Tokyo's Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi on Tuesday said the military needs to be boosted with a "sense of urgency and crisis" as a new government assessment warned of growing threats from China, Russia, and North Korea.
In a statement carried by North Korean state media, Kim Yo Jong responded to recent moves by Japan, warning that Pyongyang's "leadership will set up additional military options which are obviously due to Japan's transformation."
"Japan, a war criminal state, is accelerating its transformation into a war state," she said in a statement published by North Korea's state-run Korean Central News Agency.
Kim cited Tokyo's recent test-firing of Tomahawk long-range cruise missiles and its May participation in US-led drills in the Philippines as evidence of Washington's support for "dangerous military moves" in the Pacific.
Tokyo is moving "to formulate the possession of the capability for preemptive attack," she said.
"We will never remain a passive onlooker to the military evolution of Japan which may pose a grave threat."
Japan's defense ministry declined to comment directly on Kim's diatribe but told the AFP the country's defense capabilities "remain bare minimum" and "are not meant to threaten other countries."
"Ours isn't the defense meant to wage wars, but to prevent new wars, strictly kept to self defense and within the scope of our Constitution and international laws," it said in a statement.