“Assessment by South Korean and US intelligence is that the North is always ready for an additional nuclear test in the Punggye-ri area”, South Korea’s Defense Ministry spokesman Moon Sang-gyun said at a news briefing, referring to the region near the northeastern coast that has been the site of the explosions.
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One possibility is that China could try to broker a deal to freeze North Korea’s development of new missiles and warheads as part of the USA and South Korea suspending joint military exercises, Tong said.
The US will conduct a bomber flight over South Korea on Tuesday, just days after Pyongyang angered both Washington and Seoul by carrying out its fifth nuclear test, a US official told Reuters.
South Korea is pushing for more sanctions against Pyongyang to close what it says were loopholes left in the last United Nations Security Council resolution adopted in March.
“The assessment by South Korean and United States intelligence is that the North is always ready for an additional nuclear test in the Punggye-ri area (the area where it has carried out its previous tests)”, said defence ministry spokesman Moon Sang-Gyun. The United States, Britain and France – three of the five veto-wielding permanent members – pushed for the 15-member body to impose new sanctions.
China has agreed to allow sanctions at the U.N. Security Council after previous tests by Pyongyang, and says it has restricted shipments of jet fuel and imports of certain minerals from North Korea, which otherwise remains in nearly total isolation from the world.
China’s Hua said the North Korean nuclear issue can only be resolved through “dialogue and consultation”. The crux of the issue lay with the United States, not China, she added.
Since Friday, Chinese state media have repeatedly linked North Korea’s latest nuclear test to the American deployment of a high-altitude missile defense system in South Korea, which China has long opposed.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Saturday a “creative” response was needed.
“China is not capable of persuading North Korea to give up nuclear development, because China’s efforts are not supported by the others”, it said in an editorial on Monday.
Ri is reportedly expected to continue traveling to Venezuela for the Non-Aligned Movement Summit before visiting NY for the UN General Assembly later this month.
“We should discuss every plan including an independent nuclear armament program at the level of self-defense to safeguard peace”, Won Yoo-chul, a senior lawmaker for the ruling Saenuri Party, said in a statement.
Yonhap reported that a planned USA military B-1B bomber flight to the Korean peninsula had been scheduled for Monday but was delayed because of bad weather.
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“An additional test could be conducted in a tunnel that branches off from the second tunnel or in the third tunnel, where preparations have been completed”, South Koreas’s Defence Ministry spokesman Moon Sang-Gyun said.
