Obama condemns North Korean nuclear test

But successive USA administrations made no effort to punish Pakistan, whose help Washington felt was needed first in Afghanistan and later in the War on terror.

North Korea has been hit by five sets of United Nations sanctions since it first tested a nuclear device in 2006.

The blast, on the 68th anniversary of North Korea’s founding, was more powerful in fact than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, according to some estimates.

The North Korean government in the capital of Pyongyang said the test was of a nuclear warhead created to be mounted on ballistic rockets and demonstrated that it was prepared to hit back at its enemies including the United States if provoked.

“It’s hard for us to verify their claim”.

“At the same time, we must strengthen defense cooperation with our allies in the region”, the former secretary of State said.

India on Friday condemned a nuclear test conducted by North Korea, its most powerful ever, describing it as a matter of “grave concern” that the country had violated its worldwide obligations.

“The patience on our side and that of the global community has already reached its limit”, South Korean President Park Geun-Hye said, slamming the North’s young leader Kim Jong-Un for his “maniacal recklessness”.

Some analysts have begun to explore the possibility that Kim Jong Un, the country’s communist leader, is determined to make his country a nuclear power to deter worldwide efforts against his government, such as those seen in Iraq in 2003 and in Libya in 2011. “This kind of provocation will only quicken its eventual self-destruction”.

President Obama was briefed aboard Air Force One on Thursday night about the reported seismic activity near the North Korean nuclear facility. Earnest said the President spoke separately to South Korean and Japanese leaders by phone, reassuring them of “the unbreakable USA commitment to the security of our allies in Asia and around the world”.

Yesterday, a 5.3-magnitude tremor was detected near the Punggye-ri underground nuclear site, where the country has previously tested nuclear weapons.

On Friday, South Korean President Park Geun-hye said in Laos after a summit of Asian leaders that North Korean President Kim Jong-un was showing “maniacal recklessness” in completely ignoring the world’s call to abandon his pursuit of nuclear weapons.

The ministry plans to strictly implement sanctions namely banning entry of smuggled North Korean goods to South Korea and continuing to halt all North Korea exchanges by private institutions.

A USA official told CNN that it looked like a nuclear test but confirmation would be dependent on seismic readings, location of the seismic event and whether it can be matched to an underground test site.

“We take them at their word and have built a defensive architecture that assumes that they have the capability – but we have never actually seen it demonstrated”.

While the Trump campaign is correct that four of North Korea’s nuclear tests were conducted after Clinton was named secretary of state in 2008, building up the country’s nuclear program has been a focus of North Korean leaders since the 1950s.

North Korea said its test will allow it to finally build “at will” stronger, smaller and lighter nuclear weapons.

North Korea trumpeted the test – its fifth and largest – as a demonstration of its ability to produce nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles.

North Korea has been under United Nations sanctions since 2006.

The news of this recent testing may be even more unsettling especially for neighboring countries such as Japan and China who are exposed to North Korea’s constant threats.

“The reason is because the worldwide community is not taking it seriously”.

Pyongyang has carried out a series of nuclear and ballistic missile attempts since the turn of the year with mixed results – causing tough new sanctions to be imposed by the UN Security council.

The blast also caused a 5.3-magnitude natural disaster, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS).