North Korea fired a long-range rocket allegedly carrying an Earth observation satellite Sunday.
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The Unha-3 rocket used for the launch is said to have a range of more than 10,000km and has the ability to reach the western parts of North America or to put a miniature satellite into orbit.
The three leaders agreed to rapidly adopt new UN Security Council resolutions against Pyongyang, involving strong and effective measures, sharing another view that the DPRK should pay a harsh price corresponding to its repeated provocations of significance.
“We condemn today’s launch and North Korea’s determination to prioritise its missile and nuclear weapons programmes over the well-being of its people”, National Security Adviser Susan Rice said in a statement.
Likewise, Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said that on top of Canberra’s ban on trade in luxury and military products and services with the DPRK, the country is considering adding more unilateral action against North Korea.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest also said that THAAD deployment is “geared exclusively at the risk that is posed by North Korea”.
Additionally, the nation also confirmed that it tested a submarine-launched ballistic missile.
“The members of the Security Council strongly condemned this launch”, Venezuelan Ambassador Rafael Dario Ramirez Carreno, president of the council this month, told reporters on Sunday.
The satellite was launched aboard a “carrier rocket Kwangmyongsong” that blasted off from the Sohae Space Center in Cholsan County.
Since its January 6 nuclear test, which the North claimed was a powerful hydrogen bomb but experts believe was not, China and the USA have been negotiating the text of a new Security Council sanctions resolution. “We’re committed to the security of South Korea and that is exactly what this technology is meant to address, which is the threat that emanates from North Korea”.
U.S. defence officials on Monday said Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, would meet his Japanese and South Korean counterparts in Hawaii this week to discuss Pyongyang’s launch, Xinhua reported.
Ken Todorov, a retired brigadier general and former deputy director of the US Missile Defence Agency, told Reuters that North Korea had advanced its capabilities with the latest launch.
The United States and South Korea said they would begin formal talks about deploying the sophisticated Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, to the Korean peninsula “at the earliest possible date”. They said Japan has no diplomatic ties with North Korea, and virtually no trade or other exchanges with the reclusive country, so any additional sanctions would have little impact.
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China fears that pushing Pyongyang too far could trigger instability that unleashes a wave of refugees flooding across its border.
