The United States has rejected North Korea's offer to temporarily suspend nuclear tests in exchange for a halt to joint military exercises between the U.S. and South Korea, dismissing the proposal as an "implicit threat."
 
State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki, who accompanied Secretary of State John Carry on his India visit, criticized the North’s offer in a meeting with reporters during a stopover in Munich, Germany.
 
Psaki said that the proposal that inappropriately links defense-oriented annual routine military exercises between the U.S. and South Korea to the possibility of a nuclear test by the North is an implicit threat.
 
She said that a new nuclear test would be a clear violation of the North's obligations under U.N. Security Council resolutions.
 
The spokeswoman added that Washington remains open to dialogue with Pyongyang, with the aim of "returning to credible and authentic negotiations on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula."
 
She also urged the North to immediately halt all threats, reduce tensions and take the steps toward denuclearization needed to resume credible negotiations.