North Korea on Thursday threatened war in response to the latest sanctions by the U.N. Security Council (UNSC). 

"The latest UNSC 'resolution on sanctions' has created the danger of imminent war on the Korean Peninsula, as there are no judicial and institutional mechanisms to avert a war and armed conflicts and the 'resolution' is as good as a declaration of war," the North's foreign ministry said in an English-language statement released on the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

"The U.S. and other countries involved in adopting the 'resolution on sanctions' will have to be wholly responsible for the ensuing consequences," the statement added.

The ministry was referring to the UNSC Resolution 2321, adopted on Nov. 30 in response to Pyongyang's fifth nuclear test in September. The new package put a significant cap on the North's coal exports, among other restrictions aimed at choking off major sources of hard currency for the country.

The statement further denounced the resolution as "a criminal document without any legality" that violated the North's sovereignty.

It defended the nuclear test as "the exercise of the right to self-defense and a practical counteraction against the U.S. and other hostile forces' nuclear threat and reckless sanctions." (Yonhap)