Calls for North Korea to denuclearize are “tantamount to demanding that it surrender sovereignty and right to existence,” the country’s deputy foreign minister said in a rare address to the U.N. General Assembly on Monday, reasserting that the DPRK will never give up its nuclear weapons.

Speaking during the General Debate, Vice Foreign Minister Kim Son Gyong defended Pyongyang’s pursuit of a nuclear deterrent as a necessary response to the “undeniable reality” of U.S.-led military activities in the region.