Korea, US vow concerted efforts against NK nuke

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has said it will end its nuclear testing, if a peace treaty with Washington can be reached, and the United States ends its joint-military exercises with South Korea.

But China’s leverage over Pyongyang is mitigated, analysts say, by its overriding fear of a North Korean collapse and the prospect of a reunified, US-allied Korea directly on its border.

Large amounts of virus e-mails were sent out shortly after North Korea’s recent nuclear test purporting to be from Cheong Wa Dae and other major South Korean government agencies.

Pyongyang has said the annual U.S.-South Korea military drills are rehearsal for an invasion.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken made the statement on Saturday during a news conference following talks with vice foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan in Tokyo.

The allies have in the past repeatedly urged Pyongyang to focus on its own behavior rather than make their military exercises a condition for denuclearization.

China, a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, is North Korea’s economic benefactor, but traditional ties have become strained as Beijing’s patience has worn thin with Pyongyang’s behaviour and unwillingness to rein in its nuclear weapons ambitions.

“So it’s very hard to take any of their overtures very seriously, particularly in the wake of their fourth nuclear test”.

The two Koreas remain technically at war since their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce and not a peace treaty.

It is time for the Obama Administration to abandon its policy of timid incrementalism and fully implement existing US laws by imposing stronger sanctions on North Korea and to work with Congress to determine additional measures.

State Secretary John Kerry is to travel to Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Laos, Cambodia and China – where he’s expected to hold talks on responses to North Korea with officials in Beijing.

Hwang evaded a question about whether China expressed concern over the deployment of a U.S.-led Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (Thaad) battery on the Korean Peninsula.

Officials from the global community have met North Korea’s claim of a successful hydrogen bomb test with suspicion and condemnation.

North Korea tested nuclear devices in 2006, 2009 and 2013, each detonation leading to tougher sanctions against the country.