Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, has accused Ukraine of seeking nuclear weapons, the Korean Central News Agency reported on Saturday.
Kim based her accusation on a popular petition published on the website of Ukraine's presidential office on Thursday calling on Ukraine to deploy nuclear weapons on its territory or arm itself with nuclear weapons.
Kim said such a petition could be a political blueprint from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's office, but offered no evidence for the claim.
The petition was published after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced last week that Moscow planned to deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.
By Saturday afternoon, 611 people had signed the petition, far fewer than the 25,<> signatures needed for Zelenskiy's response.
Officials in Kiev have not yet commented on the petition.
North Korea has closer ties with the Kremlin amid a shared isolation imposed by the West on the two countries, and Pyongyang backed Moscow's position after Russia's war on Ukraine last year, including its subsequent annexation of parts of Ukraine in a move denounced by most U.N. member states as illegitimate.
North Korea denies supplying weapons to Moscow.