China says N.Korea should be punished http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-10-10T205608Z_01_L08141538_RTRUKOC_0_US-KOREA-NORTH.xml&WTmodLoc=Home-C2-TopNews-newsOne-4
Tue Oct 10, 2006
By Evelyn Leopold and Michelle Nichols
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - China, North Korea's most important ally, on Tuesday joined other world powers in calling for a tough response to the reclusive communist state's announcement of a nuclear weapons test. China and Russia, which both border North Korea, met with other veto-holding members of the U.N. Security Council to discuss a range of sanctions proposed by the United States and Japan to pressure Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear program.
China's U.N. Ambassador, Wang Guangya, told reporters: "I think that there has to be some punitive actions." He added: "We need to have a firm, constructive, appropriate but prudent response to North Korea's nuclear threat."
In Moscow, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov called the reported test a "colossal blow" to the non-proliferation regime but, like China, insisted an eventual United Nations resolution on this issue should not involve the use of force.
"For us that is very important ... imagine if there was military action on the territory of North Korea ... North Korea has borders with three countries, and one of them is Russia," he told reporters.
The United States, France and Britain, the other Council permanent members, agreed that tough measures were needed fast, despite the fact that only one country -- Russia -- has said the evidence so far available confirms a nuclear blast actually occurred.
No vote has been scheduled but Japan's U.N. Ambassador Kenzo Oshima, this month's council president, said: "The general feeling of members is to get it done as early as possible."
In Beijing, China said it had no information about widespread speculation that North Korea might be ready to conduct a second test.
Asked what Beijing thought of the possibility of military action, Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao told a news conference: "I think this is an unimaginable way."
A Hong Kong newspaper, Wen Wei Po, reported that China had canceled leave for troops along at least part of its border with North Korea and that some were conducting "anti-chemical" training exercises.
BLOW TO CHINA
Pyongyang's declaration was a sharp blow to Chinese President Hu Jintao's doctrine of using economic and diplomatic coaxing to persuade it to drop its nuclear ambitions.
The announcement on Monday that it had conducted an underground nuclear test followed years of diplomatic efforts, particularly from Washington, to stop the unpredictable country from joining the seven other declared nuclear weapons states.
It was seen as an attempt to push the United States into ending a crackdown on North Korea's illicit finances, much of it derived from missile sales, and finally agree to one-on-one negotiations.
Washington has insisted any negotiations with Pyongyang should be within regional six-party talks, which have, however, failed to stall Pyongyang's march to nuclear power status.
South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted a North Korean official saying the country would only return to those talks to end its nuclear development if Washington made concessions.
"We are still willing to abandon nuclear programs and return to six-party talks ... if the United States takes corresponding measures," it quoted the unidentified official as saying from Beijing.
But he added that Pyongyang was prepared to put nuclear warheads on missiles and conduct additional nuclear tests "depending on how the situation develops."
A United States draft proposal on sanctions calls for international inspections of cargo moving into and out of North Korea to detect weapons-related material, a provision diplomats believe may be the most controversial
The draft also includes a freeze on any transfer or development of weapons of mass destruction and a ban on luxury goods presumably enjoyed by communist officials as well as other measures.
Japan proposed even more stringent measures in amendments to the document from U.S. Ambassador John Bolton, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters. These included banning all North Korean ships and planes from ports and imposing a travel ban on high-level Pyongyang officials.
JAPAN'S SANCTIONS
Japan effectively froze remittances and transfers to North Korea by those suspected of links to the development of weapons of mass destruction after missile tests by Pyongyang in July.
The other major player in the crisis, South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun, vowed to review his "sunshine policy" of engagement with the North after commentators slammed him for being too soft. One declared the country was now in its worst crisis since the Korean War more than half a century ago. British Prime Minister Tony Blair, asked in a BBC television interview how worried people should be said: "We should be very worried."
"The other tragedy about North Korea is what is happening to the people there. The people live in virtual starvation, almost a form of political oppression that's akin to slavery. And meanwhile they spend billions of dollars on a nuclear weapons program."
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Tokyo wanted to confirm a nuclear test had in fact been carried out before imposing sanctions, but indicated action might be taken even without verification.
U.S. officials said it could take several days for intelligence analysts to determine whether the event in an area near North Korea's border with China was an unsuccessful nuclear test, a small nuclear device or a non-nuclear explosion.
White House spokesman Tony Snow introduced a strong element of suspicion, saying North Korea was claiming to have detonated a nuclear weapon only two years after expelling international weapons inspectors.
"You seriously believe that they have actually done everything within two years? You could have something that is very old and off the shelf here as well," Snow told reporters.
Last week, after Pyongyang said it planned to test a nuclear weapon, the Bush administration made clear it believed any such explosion was completely unacceptable.
"We are not going to live with a nuclear North Korea, we are not going to accept it," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Chris Hill said last Wednesday. He said North Korea "can have a future or it can have these weapons. It cannot have both."
(Additional reporting by Jack Kim, Kim So-young and Jon Herskovitz in Seoul, Chris Buckley in Beijing, Ben Blanchard in Dandong, Evelyn Leopold at the United Nations and Steve Holland in Washington)
© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.