North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui said that the G-7 is only a closed group of a handful of egoistic countries that do not represent the international community but serve as a political tool for ensuring US hegemony.

Responding to the G-7’s condemnation of a recent missile test, she said that the group as a political instrument of US world dominance is viciously slandering North Korea’s legitimate exercise of sovereignty but we vow that Pyongyang won’t give up its nuclear weapons program.

Choe made her comments three days after the Group of Seven wealthy democracies issued a communique condemning North Korea’s latest missile launches and calling for the “complete, verifiable and irreversible abandonment” of its nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.

Pyongyang test-launched its newly developed Hwasong-18 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) last week, triggering air raid warnings in neighboring Japan. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un claimed that the new missile would greatly enhance the country’s “nuclear counterattack posture” and strike “extreme uneasiness and horror” in the country’s enemies.

Choe insisted that North Korea’s strategic weapons are needed to deter threats and cope with a security environment made unstable by “the reckless and provocative military actions of the United States and its allied forces.