North Korea ratcheted up its provocative rhetoric against South Korea and the U.S. over the weekend, warning of “ruthless punishments” for their role in establishing a U.N. field office in central Seoul to monitor its human rights situation.

Mobilizing all state media outlets, the communist state berated Seoul and Washington for “bringing inter-Korean ties to the brink of a collapse,” and attempting to further isolate it and undermine its national dignity.

“The inter-Korean relationship has been brought to the brink of a collapse as the human rights office was built in Seoul,” reported the Rodong Sinmun, the daily of the North’s ruling Workers’ Party on Sunday. “Bear in mind that the ‘human rights’ commotion would result in self-destruction.”

Last Saturday, the Rodong Sinmun warned of “unsparing punishments.”

“It is our firm, unwavering position that we will launch ruthless punishments for those who revealed their impure ambitions that would undermine our national pride and political system,” the newspaper said.

Last Tuesday, the U.N. opened a field office in Seoul to systematically monitor and record North Korea’s human rights situation -- a culmination of the international efforts to shed light on the North’s deep-seated inhumane practices and stop them.

Since then, the North has responded angrily to the establishment of the office. It has accused South Korea, the U.S. and other supporters of the office of seeking to overthrow the regime by politicizing the human rights issues and meddling in its domestic affairs.

Meanwhile, Pyongyang angrily responded to the U.S.’ publication last Thursday of an annual human rights report, arguing that Washington was trying to “isolate and pressure the North to death” with its hostile policy.

In its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2014, the U.S. State Department said that the North’s human rights record “remained among the worst in the world” last year with public executions, political prison camps and other forms of abuses.

“The U.S. is sticking to its hostile policy without thinking at all of how to change its fixed perception (of North Korea),” an unnamed spokesperson of the North’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency.

“The U.S.’ dream (to change the North) would prove to be futile and would not be realized,” the spokesperson said.

Amid growing calls for the North to stamp out any inhuman practices, the European Parliament plans to hold a hearing on the reclusive state’s human rights situation Thursday, according to the U.S.-funded Radio Free Asia.

The hearing will be attended by activists, scholars and Chung Gwang-il, a defector who once lived in a prison camp.

By Song Sang-ho (sshluck@heraldcorp.com)