North Korea on Monday issued veiled threat of a nuclear strike on Japan, vowing to make the country "disappear at once" if Tokyo continues with what Pyongyang termed "war hysteria."

"Japan itself will not be safe once a war breaks out on the Korean Peninsula," the North's state-run Korean Central News Agency said in a commentary. "Everything of Japan to be involved in the war may disappear at once together with the U.S. military bases in Japan.

"Japan's crazy ride on a militarist chariot will only make it fall into a pitfall of ruin," it added.