SEOUL: The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) said yesterday it had completed reprocessing spent fuel rods at its Yongbyon nuclear plant and turned it into arms-grade plutonium, giving the state more material to produce atomic weapons.

The announcement comes after Pyongyang, hit with fresh United Nations sanctions to punish it for a nuclear test in May, has warmed up to the outside world in recent months and indicated it could return to stalled international nuclear talks.

"We have finished reprocessing 8,000 spent fuel rods as of August. We have made substantial achievements in weaponizing plutonium from the extraction," the official Korea Central News Agency said.