The secretive communist state was also said to be stepping up military drills near the border with the South, which is on heightened alert for a possible repeat of the deadly naval clashes seen in 1999 and 2002.

Pyongyang has warned it would take "self-defence measures" in response to any tougher international sanctions over its May 25 nuclear test and South Korea said Monday that a long-range missile launch appeared possible.

"We have detected signs that North Korea is preparing to fire an ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile)," a South Korean defence ministry spokesman told AFP.

The North has moved a long-range missile to a new base in Dongchang-ri along its northwestern coast and a launch could take place in one or two weeks, South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted an unnamed intelligence official as saying.

The North has another site on the east coast at Musudan-ri, from where it fired a Taepodong-2 rocket over Japan in April. It said the launch was to put a satellite in orbit but other nations saw it as a disguised missile test.

Two US defence officials also confirmed to AFP in Washington that Pyongyang appeared to have moved a long-range missile to Dongchang-ri.

But any launch would likely be weeks away given North Korea's technical capacity, said one of the officials, who asked to remain anonymous.

"It'll take a while for North Korea to put anything together," he said.

Tensions have been running high for the past week after Kim Jong-Il's regime tested a nuclear bomb for the second time and then launched a series of short-range missiles and threatened possible attacks on South Korea.

"Along with new facilities, Dongchang-ri has a geographical advantage. It's close to Pyongyang as well as (the nuclear facilities at) Yongbyon," said Professor Kim Yong-Hyun, a North Korea expert at Seoul's Dongguk University.

"It's also hard for US spy planes to get easy access. I'm not sure whether North Korea will fire a missile towards the Pacific or southwards," he said.

South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak warned Monday that Seoul would "never tolerate" the North taking a "path of military threats and provocation."

"We sincerely hope for peace, but will sternly deal with any threats," he said in a regular radio address.

Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Mitoji Yabunaka, speaking after a meeting with visiting US Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg, said Tokyo "would never accept" a North Korea with nuclear weapons.

Steinberg for his part said that the North, after its nuclear and missile tests, needs to understand that "this is a very bad path to go down."

At the United Nations, US envoy Susan Rice said there had been movement in talks with her counterparts from Britain, China, France, Russia, Japan and South Korea when they met Monday to thrash out a draft resolution imposing tougher sanctions on the isolated regime.

"I think we are making progress and I am hopeful that in due course we will be producing a very worthy and strong resolution," she said.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the General Assembly it was regrettable that North Korea was choosing "to go in a negative direction" that "runs counter to the ongoing efforts of the international community to curb nuclear proliferation and promote nuclear disarmament."

But Pyongyang remained defiant.

The North "will further strengthen its nuclear deterrent in order to safeguard its ideology and system," the official KCNA news agency said Monday.

South Korean and US forces on the peninsula are on heightened alert after the North warned of a possible attack in response to Seoul's decision to join a US-led initiative to stop the spread of weapons of mass destruction.

"North Korean troops have been conducting more drills, especially along the west coast," another South Korean defence ministry spokesman told AFP.

The growing tensions cast a shadow over a major summit bringing together the leaders of South Korea and Southeast Asian nations on the southern resort island of Jeju.

Seoul has imposed tight security for the June 1-2 meetings with 5,000 police deployed in Jeju, a surface-to-air missile unit set up close to the convention centre and navy ships are patrolling the coast.

earlier related report
US warns NKorea amid reports of rocket launch preparations
Unfazed by international anger at its second nuclear bomb test, a defiant North Korea was said Saturday to be preparing to launch a long-range missile.

The United States stressed it would not accept the North as a nuclear-armed state and warned that more atomic tests could spark an arms race in East Asia.

"A train carrying a long-range missile has been spotted at the weapons research centre near Pyongyang," South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted an intelligence source as saying.

The source said it may be a modified version of a Taepodong-2, which the North tested in 2006 and in April and which is theoretically capable of reaching Alaska.

"It usually takes about two months to set up a launch pad, but the process could be done in as little as two weeks, which means the North could launch a long-range missile as early as mid-June," the source said.

Yonhap quoted a presidential official as saying the North may schedule a launch to coincide with a June 16 summit between South Korean President Lee Mying-Bak and US President Barack Obama in Washington.

Two defence officials in Washington told AFP US satellite photos had shown vehicle activity at two launch sites, one in the west and one in the east.

Diplomats at the United Nations Security Council are discussing a new resolution which could impose new sanctions to punish the North for Monday's nuclear test -- its second since 2006.

In a telephone conversation Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Japan's Prime Minister Taro Aso agreed "that one has to seriously respond (to the tests), which represent a challenge to international security," a Kremlin statement said.

Pyongyang says it will take "additional self-defence measures" in response to any sanctions.

The North has further fuelled tensions in the past week by launching six short-range missiles, renouncing the armistice that ended the Korean War in 1953 and threatening possible attacks on South Korea.

Analysts believe ailing leader Kim Jong-Il is trying to bolster his authority with the test to prepare for an eventual succession.

Meetings were held in five provinces to hail the event, the country's official news agency reported.

Speakers stressed it "greatly encouraged the Korean people in their dynamic drive for effecting a new great revolutionary surge and dealt telling blows at the US imperialists and their followers keen to stifle the DPRK (North Korea)," it said.

Analysts believe the North is not interested in further disarmament negotiations unless it is accepted as a nuclear-armed state.

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates insisted that will not happen.

"The policy of the United States has not changed. Our goal is complete and verifiable denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula, and we will not accept North Korea as a nuclear state," he told a Singapore security conference.

"North Korea's nuclear programme and actions constitute a threat to regional peace and security," Gates said, adding they pose "the potential for some kind of an arms race here in this region."

Gates said Washington "will not stand idly by as North Korea builds the capability to wreak destruction on any target in Asia -- or on us," but stressed there was no immediate military threat to the United States.

South Korean and US forces on the peninsula are on heightened alert for any border clashes.

South Korean Defence Minister Lee Sang-Hee, who met Gates on the sidelines of the conference, said their patience with North Korea was running out.

"A strong response has been agreed on by the US and South Korea against any active military provocation," Lee said.

The North walked out of six-nation nuclear disarmament talks after the Security Council condemned its April 5 rocket launch and tightened existing sanctions.

The United States is sending two diplomats to consult the other nations who were negotiating with the North -- China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.

Stephen Bosworth, the special envoy on North Korea, and Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg will head Sunday to Tokyo and later visit China, South Korea and Russia, the State Department said.

Kim Jong-Il "is determined to go out with a bang and not a whimper," US analyst Marcus Noland wrote in The National newspaper in Abu Dhabi.

"Severely weakened by a stroke last year, the emaciated Kim has been frenetically delivering 'on-the-spot guidance,' as if to reassure himself and his country that he is still in control," Noland wrote.

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