WASHINGTON — A North Korean nuclear test — labeled by experts as the pariah state’s most powerful ever — drew rebuke from around the globe, including from North Korea’s strongest ally, with several nations joining forces to come up with an appropriate response.<\/b>
\nNorth Korea’s regime has \u00ab\u00a0succeeded in making a more developed nuke, \u00a0\u00bb according to state news agency KCNA. During a visit to the country’s Nuclear Weapons Institute \u00ab\u00a0he watched an H-bomb to be loaded into new ICBM, \u00a0\u00bb KCNA added.
WASHINGTON \u2014 A North Korean nuclear test \u2014 labeled by experts as the pariah state\u2019s most powerful ever \u2014 drew rebuke from around the globe, including from North Korea\u2019s strongest ally, with several nations joining forces to come up with an appropriate response.
The United States, Japan, France, the United Kingdom and South Korea quickly requested an emergency session of the UN Security Council after the test, which North Korea\u2019s leaders said demonstrated the country was capable of putting an advanced hydrogen bomb atop an intercontinental ballistic missile.
The meeting, now scheduled for Monday at 10 a.m. ET, was announced as UN Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres condemned the North Korean test as \u201cprofoundly destabilizing for regional security.\u201d
The power of the blast was not immediately clear. While the seismic tremors it created led a Norwegian group to say it was eight times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, South Korean experts said the yield was less than half the Norwegian group\u2019s estimate.
It\u2019s nearly impossible to verify Pyongyang\u2019s claim that it detonated a hydrogen bomb, experts say, or whether North Korea has the capability to deploy such a weapon on a missile.
Still, the test drew sharp admonitions from several nations, including the United States, which made it clear military action remained among its options.
Sunday\u2019s test \u2014 North Korea\u2019s sixth-ever \u2014 was 10 times more powerful than its test a year ago, Japanese officials said, and North Korea claims to have developed projectiles with increasingly frightening ranges. If that is true, North Korea may be a step closer to being able to reach the US mainland with one of its warheads, as it has threatened.
While North Korea has ratcheted up its ballistic missile testing this year, amid an exchange of threatening rhetoric with US President Donald Trump, this marks the isolated nation\u2019s first nuclear test of Trump\u2019s presidency.
Trump tweeted that he was meeting with military leaders about North Korea, while also entertaining nonmilitary options, such as \u201cstopping all trade with any country doing business with North Korea.\u201d That\u2019s a relatively short list topped by China, the hermit kingdom\u2019s No. 1 ally, and to a lesser degree, India and Russia, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity.
In other tweets, Trump said China \u201cis trying to help but with little success, \u201d and \u201cSouth Korea is finding, as I have told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work, they only understand one thing!\u201d
Defense Secretary James Mattis said Sunday that any North Korean threats toward the US or its territories or allies \u2014 specifically Guam, Japan and South Korea \u2014 would be met with an \u201ceffective and overwhelming\u201d response. He further urged leader Kim Jong Un to \u201ctake heed of the United Nation\u2019s Security Council unified voice.\u201d
\u201cAll members unanimously agreed on the threat North Korea poses and they remain unanimous in their commitment to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula because we are not looking to the total annihilation of a country, namely North Korea, but as I said, we have many options to do so, \u201d Mattis said.
Asked by a reporter Sunday whether the US would attack North Korea, Trump responded: \u201cWe\u2019 ll see.\u201d
North Korea\u2019s test came hours after state-run media released images of leader Kim Jong Un inspecting what it said was a hydrogen bomb ready to top an ICBM, which the country would need to deliver a nuclear warhead to far-away locations.
State news anchor Ri Chun Hee hailed the test as a \u201cperfect success\u201d and the final step in attaining a \u201cstate nuclear force.\u201d
The device was about eight times more powerful than the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, according to NORSAR, a Norway-based group that monitors nuclear tests.
Based on the tremors following the test, NORSAR estimated it had an explosive yield of 120 kilotons. Hiroshima\u2019s had 15 kilotons.
South Korean officials gave a more modest estimate of 50 kilotons.
Whatever the yield, the device was powerful, and the test offers the first hint that North Korea could be more developed in its nuclear program than previously thought.
The country has for years worked on nuclear miniaturization so that it can create a warhead small enough to be fired long distances.
In addition to drawing White House and UN Security Council condemnation, North Korea\u2019s test also upset many of its neighbors.
A text message to reporters from South Korean President Moon Jae-in\u2019s office said the republic was working with the international community to \u201censure maximum sanctions and pressures against North Korea\u2019s continued provocations.\u201d It added that the US and South Korea \u201cagree on using sanctions and pressures to have North Korea come to the table for talks.\u201d
The text message concluded, \u201cKorea is a country that has experienced war.\u2026 We can\u2019 t let this experience be repeated again on this land. We will pursue the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula through peace with our allies.\u201d
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he spoke with Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday about North Korea\u2019s \u201creckless act.\u201d
Abe said the US and Japan \u201cstand together 100 percent.\u201d He plans to meet with Putin in Vladivostok, Russia, and the two \u201chave completely agreed to have a close coordination, \u201d Abe told reporters.
Abe demanded \u201cunprecedented strong pressure\u201d on North Korea and said stopping its hostile actions \u201cdepends on the solidarity and coordination with the international community.\u201d
In a high-level national security meeting, Moon called the test \u201can absurd strategic mistake\u201d that would lead Pyongyang to further isolation.
Sanctions designed to isolate the country have in many ways failed. The Kim regime has developed its weapons and nuclear program despite measures that have crippled the economy and exacerbated periods of mass starvation.
The White House, meanwhile, has been accused of sending mixed messages on the issue and lacking a clear strategy.
Trump\u2019s administration is now pursuing what it calls a strategy of \u201cpeaceful pressure\u201d to get North Korea to bring its nuclear weapons program to the negotiating table. But the President\u2019s tweets regularly suggest he is not interested in dialogue.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Sunday he is drafting tough sanctions against North Korea, saying, \u201cThis isn\u2019 t the time for just talk.\u201d
China is also under pressure to do more to deter North Korea\u2019s provocations. Beijing condemned the test.
\u201cWe strongly urge (the) North Korea side to face up to the firm will of the international community on the denuclearization of the peninsula, abide by relevant resolutions of the UN Security Council, stop taking wrong actions that exacerbate the situation and are not in its own interest, and return to the track of resolving the issue through dialogue, \u201d the Chinese Foreign Ministry said.
Tensions between North Korea and the international community flared last week when Pyongyang flew a ballistic missile over Japan for the first time. The US and its allies responded by sending fighter jets and bombers over the Korean Peninsula.
Analysts have said for months that another nuclear test was likely on the way, with satellite imagery revealing that a tunnel had been dug earlier this year.
\u201cFor months North Korea refrained from conducting a nuclear test and from launching missiles over Japan, \u201d said David Wright, the co-director of the Union of Concerned Scientists Global Security Program. \u201cIt now seems to have decided to end that restraint.\u201d
What exactly North Korea set off remains unclear. If its claims are true, it exploded a thermonuclear weapon, which typically uses a fission explosion to create a fusion reaction. That would be far more powerful than a fission reaction.
Sunday\u2019s test comes almost one year after Pyongyang\u2019s fifth nuclear test last September, which triggered a 5.3-magnitude seismological event. That took place September 9, the country\u2019s Foundation Day holiday.
North Korea claimed it set off a thermonuclear weapon during that test, but experts said the data showed it was more likely a boosted fission weapon.
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