This undated picture, released from North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency on October 21, 2009 shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il inspecting the newly-built apartment houses in Mansudae Street in Pyongyang. The United States will never accept a nuclear-armed North Korea, Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned on October 21, saying its atomic and missile programmes pose a 'lethal and destabilising' threat. Getty Images logo Getty Images 28 months ago

This undated picture, released from North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency on October 21, 2009 shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il inspecting the newly-built apartment houses in Mansudae Street in Pyongyang. The United States will never accept a nuclear-armed North Korea, Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned on October 21, saying its atomic and missile programmes pose a 'lethal and destabilising' threat.