North Korea on Sunday said the UN’s push for more sanctions following its fifth and biggest nuclear test was laughable.
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North Korea said it conducted a “higher level” nuclear test last week that will allow it to build an array of stronger, smaller and lighter nuclear weapons.
“Assessment by South Korean and U.S. intelligence is that the North is always ready for an additional nuclear test in the Punggye-ri area”, the site of the North’s five nuclear explosions, South Korean Defence Ministry spokesman Moon Sang Gyun told a news briefing. The members of the Six party talks comprised of three permanent members of the Security Council, Russia, China, along with the United States and three neighbouring countries including South Korea and Japan.
The UN Security Council denounced the test and said it would begin work immediately on a resolution.
With the recent nuclear test conducted by North Korea, it has reopened the old wounds of “nuclear outlaw” refocusing the global attention on its recklessness and hunger to achieve nuclear weapons.
Hwang said during a meeting that North Korea’s “fanatical development of nuclear arms and missiles would become the poison that would hasten the destruction of its regime rather than consolidate it”.
Obama became the first US president to make an official visit to Laos, paying tribute to survivors maimed by some 80 million unexploded bombs America dropped on the Southeast Asian country decades ago and pledging USA help to finally clean them up.
U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said China had an “important responsibility” in North Korea. It said its missile and nuclear tests are necessary to counter “a U.S. nuclear threat to its independence”.
The ministry insisted that North Korea will continue to increase its nuclear force in quality and quantity, adding that this was necessary to “safeguard the dignity” and “right to exist” of the DPRK.
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“Intelligence authorities in Seoul and Washington are keeping close tabs”, an unnamed government official was quoted as saying by South Korean news agency Yonhap. Park said Monday the “danger of war” and a possibility of North Korean provocations could loom on the Korean Peninsula. The United States has about 28,500 troops in South Korea.
