The U.S. State Department has said that North Korea is ready to engage in additional provocations and its seventh nuclear test remains a possibility.

Department spokesperson Ned Price presented the assessment on Tuesday during a press briefing when asked about the potential for additional hostility by the North.

Price said that for the past few months, the U.S. has maintained that North Korea has finished technical preparations for a new nuclear test, adding that the decision is now just a political matter.

The spokesperson said that whether the next test is of an intercontinental ballistic missile or a nuclear weapon, it would be a very serious and grave act that escalates tensions.

He then warned that if the North conducts a nuclear test, the U.S. will seek additional measures against those responsible.

Price reaffirmed, however, that Washington holds no hostile intent against Pyongyang and is ready to engage in principled diplomacy to achieve the goal of advancing the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.