(Yonhap) -- North Korea on Wednesday demanded that South Korea and the U.S. cancel their annual joint military drills scheduled to begin in late February and continue through April, warning that the drills would destroy inter-Korean relations.

South Korea and U.S. forces plan to conduct command post exercise Key Resolve and joint field training exercise Foal Eagle between late February and April to enhance joint combat readiness and deter threats from the North.

The Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland, a North Korean propaganda organ, said in a spokesperson's statement that the Key Resolve and Foal Eagle drills are tantamount to a declaration of "full-scale nuclear war."

"(North Korea) sternly warns the United States and South Korea to halt any military drills that will ruin the inter-Korean relations," said the statement, released by the North's Korean Central News Agency.

"The northbound nuclear war drills, if carried out, will fatally destroy the inter-Korean relations and trigger unimaginable calamities and disasters," it said.