U.S. President Barack Obama said after speaking by telephone with South Korean President Park Geun-hye and with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday that they had agreed to work with the Security Council and other powers to vigorously enforce existing measures against North Korea and to take “additional significant steps, including new sanctions”.
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Ahead of the meeting US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power said: “This is more than brazen defiance”.
Estimates of the explosive yield have varied with South Korea’s military claiming it was about 10 kilotonnes, while other experts have said that it may have been 20kt or more.
North Korea conducted its fourth nuclear test in January, resulting in tough new United Nations sanctions. In fact, the South Korean and American authorities have not managed to detect these radioactive nuclides after any of North Korea’s tests except the first one.
A press statement agreed on by all 15 UN Security Council members said diplomats will draft a new resolution in response to its earlier promise to take “further significant measures” if the North continues to defy the worldwide community.
“The worldwide community needs to deal with North Korea firmly and make Pyongyang understand the costs of taking such provocative action”, Mr. Abe told Mr. Obama in a 10-minute telephone conversation, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Lassina Zerbo, the head of world monitoring agency the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organisation, said the seismic activity registered on Friday was larger than that triggered by the North’s test in January.
“In a short period of time, we will be carrying out a nuclear warhead detonation test and a test launch of a ballistic missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead”, Kim said on March 15, six days later.
Pyongyang’s state media said on Friday the nuclear test had realized the country’s goal of being able to fit a miniaturized warhead on a rocket.
If a nuclear test is confirmed, it could have been timed by North Korea to coincide with the anniversary of its 1948 foundation as a republic.
“It also a violation of the United Nations (UN) resolutions”, the Indonesian foreign affairs ministry said in a statement released on Saturday.
“We are opposed to testing and we believe that it is more urgent than ever to work together to ensure denuclearization of the Korean peninsula”, Liu said.
The RAND National Defense Research Institute, a federally funded US think tank, said in a 2010 report that the detonation of a 10-kilton nuclear weapon in the South Korean capital of Seoul could cause more than 200,000 deaths and would easily overwhelm doctors and beds in hospitals throughout the country. Another is that North Korea will carry through with its threats to use a nuclear weapon, inviting retaliation that would devastate China’s neighbor more thoroughly than any regime change.
Yet Beijing, despite its condemnations, remains a trading partner with North Korea and a source of aid.
U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter called for further pressure on North Korea, but said China bore responsibility for tackling the problem.
“Now, I am full of confidence that if the enemies make any little provocations we will make a counter attack and we will surely win”, said Rim Jong Su, 42.
“We will be seeking China’s response to this”.
“This nuclear test certainly places a burden on China, but I don’t think it will be [a] tipping point”, said Kim, the think tank fellow.
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But there are worse possibilities, all of them becoming more likely as North Korea improves its bomb-making and missile-launching capabilities.
