A North Korean state-run newspaper has dismissed scenarios about the communist state's collapse, quoting its leader Kim Jong-il as saying his country unites to become stronger in tougher times.

The Rodong Sinmun, the organ of the North Korean Workers' Party, said that rumors in the U.S. of the North's collapse had caused Kim to declare that Washington hardly knows his country. He said the North Korean people may not eat well but fight hard and have united around the Workers' Party with faith in victory.

But the paper did not say when, where or for what purpose Kim made the remarks.

Since the death of Kim's father and state founder Kim Il-sung in 1994, some experts in South Korean and the United States had forecast that North Korea would collapse within five years.