NKorea calls for end to 'hostile' US policy in New Year's message

North Korea urged the United States on Tuesday to scrap its "hostile" policy, as the communist nation marked New Year's Day after failing to meet a year-end deadline to declare all its nuclear programs under an international agreement. "The source of war should be removed and lasting peace be ensured. ... An end should be put to the US policy hostile towards [North Korea] and the Armistice Agreement be replaced with a peace pact," the North said in a joint editorial by major newspapers, carried by the country's official Korean Central News Agency.