This marked the North’s fifth nuclear test following the last one in January that drew condemnation from the worldwide community and led the United Nations Security Council to adopt the toughest-ever resolution in March.
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Two months ago, US -based 38 North, a North Korea monitoring project, said satellite images showed a high level of activity at North Korea’s nuclear test site, called Punggye-ri.
Pyongyang announced a successful test of its first hydrogen bomb, or its fourth nuclear test, on January 6.
The secretive nation’s state media announced they had tested a newly-developed nuclear warhead, saying they could now mount a nuclear device on ballistic rockets.
“This (nuclear test) is a clear violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions and a grave challenge to the worldwide community”, President Park Geun-hye said during an emergency meeting with her aides in Laos, the last leg of her three-nation trip that also included China and Russian Federation. North Korea stands out as the only country to have tested nuclear weapons this century.
While officials have warned that the North’s submarine-launched missiles could be be fully operational before 2017.
President Park Geun-hye called Kim Jong Un’s regime “fanatically reckless”.
The president said her government will push for additional harsher sanctions, both bilateral and multilateral in UN Security Council, in cooperation with the global society, vowing to strengthen pressures on Pyongyang with all available measures to make it give up its nuclear program. “This kind of provocation will only quicken its eventual self-destruction”.
The Defense Department will “continue to monitor the situation, and Secretary Carter will remain in close contact with our South Korean allies as well as others friends and allies in the region”, Cook said.
“If confirmed as a nuclear test, this act constitutes yet another breach of the universally accepted norm against nuclear testing; a norm that has been respected by 183 countries since 1996”, she said.
The emergency meeting of the UN Security Council is expected to take place later on Friday.
This was the first test carried out under new North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un. Everyone is against North Korea’s nuclear threat.
“Amid the escalating gravity of the situation, we will seek to impose further pressure on North Korea and induce them to change course when the United Nations agrees to hand down more sanctions”, Kim also said.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in a photo released by the state-run KCNA on August 25.
That test was recorded with a magnitude of 5.1, according to the US Geological Survey.
“The President reiterated the unbreakable USA commitment to the security of our allies in Asia and around the world”.
China’s Foreign Ministry also expressed “firm opposition to the nuclear test”, according to the official Xinhua news agency. The spokesman says Obama indicated he would continue to consult America’s allies and partners in the days ahead “to ensure provocative actions from North Korea are met with serious consequences”.
The White House said National Security Adviser Susan Rice briefed President Obama on the incident.
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A South Korean military official said officials detected a 10-kiloton explosive yield from the test.
