A senior US state department official said Friday that there will be more "defensive" steps than the recent decision to place an advanced missile defense system on the Korean Peninsula if the threat from North Korea persists.

Tony Blinken, US deputy secretary of state, also renewed Washington's commitment to protecting its allies, while expressing objection to some hawkish South Korean politicians' demand to develop nuclear weapons for fear that it could end up falling into the North's narrative and eventually spark an arms race in the region.

"Every single day that goes by, North Korea becomes more and more acute threat to South Korea, Japan, countries in the region and the US And it gets closer to the day when it can actually put a nuclear weapon and an inter-continental ballistic missile that can reach the continental US That's not acceptable for us." he said during a lecture at Seoul National University.

"We have been very clear with China and others that we will have to continue to take defensive steps to protect ourselves and protect our allies and partners. And sometimes those kinds of steps we think that China does not like even though they are not directed at China. For example the decision...  to deploy the THAAD missile defenses system," he added. (Yonhap)