Obama, Park pledge ‘most powerful’ sanctions on N. Korea

Pyongyang is extremely sensitive to any outside criticism of the authoritarian leadership of Kim, the third member of his family to rule.

British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond is asking South Korea to refrain from resuming propaganda broadcasts across the border into North Korea.

Washington has said it was time to impose tougher measures on Pyongyang. South Korea’s defense ministry says K-pop songs will pique interests of the listeners in the North.

North Korean military forces often compete to show their loyalty to the leader.

At least three USA intelligence-gathering aircraft left a US air base Thursday on the Japanese island of Okinawa, though it wasn’t clear if they were investigating the North Korean explosion. The North had signboards of its own to relay such messages as, “Let’s Establish a Confederate Nation!”

“In light of new developments, China will continue to protect the non-proliferation regime and will work with all parties to resolve this issue”, the diplomat said.

It was unclear how more sanctions would deter North Korea, which has conducted four nuclear tests since 2006.

The vast majority of North Korea’s business dealings are with China, which bought 90 per cent of the isolated country’s exports in 2013, according to data compiled by South Korea’s International Trade Association.

Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond hailed Japan as Britain’s “closest security partner in Asia” as he arrived in the capital for discussions on security.

Chuck Downs, an expert on North Korea’s negotiating strategy, said the announcement is an “ad portraying North Korea as the leader of the world’s anti-American forces …”

North Korea, by its defiance, has sought to weaken global treaties that are meant to limit and ultimately eliminate the risk posed by these most destructive of weapons.

President Barack Obama and his South Korean counterpart Park Geun-hye held a 20-minute phone conversation Thursday morning, Park’s presidential office said in a statement.

South Korea said it would respond “sternly” to any North Korean provocation in announcing Thursday a resumption of the broadcasts that led North Korea to mobilize troops in August before marathon talks managed to ratchet down tensions. Officials refused to elaborate, but the assets likely are B-52 bombers, F-22 stealth fighters and nuclear-powered submarines.

On 6 January, North Korea claimed to have conducted an underground test of a nuclear explosive device at 1000 local time.

But an early analysis by the USA government was “not consistent with the claims that the regime has made of a successful hydrogen bomb test”, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

The device, while “highly unlikely to have been a hydrogen bomb”, may have been “a boosted fission weapon, indicative of North Korea’s developing weapons capabilities”, said Alison Evans of intelligence consultants IHS Country Risk. There are still many unanswered questions about the nuclear test. Beijing has urged Pyongyang to observe the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.