3.5 million people are rising up to retaliate against the US: North Korea

This April 15, 2017 picture released from North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on April 16, 2017 shows Korean People's Army (KPA) soldiers marching through Kim Il-Sung square during a military parade in Pyongyang marking the 105th anniversary of the birth of late North Korean leader Kim Il-Sung. (Photo by AFP)

Pyongyang has claimed that at least 3.5 million people have joined the North Korean army to defend the country in the case of a war with the US.

“All the people are rising up across the country to retaliate against the US thousands of times,” said a report published by the North’s Rodong Sinmun newspaper the RT cited on Saturday.

The report states that some 3.5 million people, including retired soldiers and students, have enlisted in the army since tensions began to soar with the US over North Korea’s missile tests.

“In North Hwanghae Province, 89,000 young men pleaded to enlist or reenlist on August 9 alone. In Daedong County of South Pyongan Province, more than 20,000 students, party members and laborers filed enlistment or reenlistment requests,” the report notes.

Over the past few days, the US and North Korea have gotten into a fiery rhetoric, threatening to take military action against one another.

This file photo taken on August 25, 2016 shows a man at a railway station in Seoul watching a television screen reporting news of North Korea's latest submarine-launched ballistic missile test.

US President Donald Trump, on Tuesday, threatened to unleash “fire and fury like the world has never seen” on North Korea if Pyongyang did not retreat, while the North threatened an attack on Guam.  

Trump’s remarks triggered a collective outcry by world leaders, urging him to refrain from threats and provocations and instead take the diplomatic road to peace.

On Friday, China, Russia and Germany warned against the United States and North Korea’s escalating rhetoric and making threats against one another.  

Tensions over North Korea escalated in July, when Pyongyang twice successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of targeting the US mainland.

The US is against North Korea’s nuclear weapons but Pyongyang says it will not give up on its nuclear deterrence unless Washington ends its hostile policy toward the country and dissolves the US-led UN command in South Korea. Thousands of US soldiers are stationed in South Korea and Japan.