South Korea will never recognize North Korea as a nuclear-weapons state, Seoul's Foreign Ministry said Tuesday, urging Pyongyang to "wake up" and take a path toward its denuclearization.

During a key congress of the North's Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) that ended Monday, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un reaffirmed that the communist state would push for its dual-track policy of simultaneously developing nuclear arms and its economy.

"Our government and the international community will never accept the North as a nuclear power," ministry spokesman Cho June-hyuck said during a regular press briefing.

"We will continue to impose sanctions and pressure on it so that it can wake up from the illusion of nuclear development and show its willingness to denuclearize through actions."

Cho also said that the North's dual-track policy will never succeed. Seoul has long said that the North's two goals of developing nuclear arms and shoring up its debilitated economy are "incompatible."

During the much-trumpeted WPK congress, the first in 36 years, the North Korean leader said it vowed not to use nuclear arms first unless its sovereignty is encroached upon. He also said that his country would strive for global denuclearization.

But Seoul dismissed such pledges as insincere, saying that Pyongyang's stance against its denuclearization remains unchanged. (Yonhap)