North Korea made its most explicit statement yet that it plans to detonate another nuclear device -- its third -- in the near future, in what it said was "a new phase of the anti-U.S. struggle."
North Korea
made
its most explicit statement yet that it plans to detonate another nuclear
device -- its third -- in the near future, in what it said was "a new
phase of the anti-U.S. struggle."
The National Defense Commission, a body of generals considered the most
powerful part of North Korea's authoritarian regime, said the country would
launch "a variety of satellites and long-range rockets . . . one after
another" and carry out "a nuclear test of higher level."
The commission said the action would be targeted "against the U.S., the
sworn enemy of the Korean people," though North Korea has yet to test a
missile that could reach the U.S.
North Korea issues near-daily statements critical of the U.S., which sided with
South Korea in the Korean War of the 1950s and has kept troops stationed there.
But the North rarely mentions the nuclear weapons it has been developing since
the 1970s.
Diplomats in Russia, China and South Korea urged North Korea not to test
another nuclear explosive, in what would be the country's first such test since
dictator Kim Jong Eun succeeded his father in 2011.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said
Pyongyang
has
been "needlessly provocative," and that the
U.S.
is
fully prepared for any action by
North
Korea
. The U.S. Treasury on
Thursday levied new sanctions, against a Hong Kong-based company and two
officials from a North Korean bank it said was linked to
North
Korea
's weapons programs.
The reference to a test of a "higher level" could suggest
North
Korea
has reached a point where it
can test a weapon made from highly enriched uranium, rather than the plutonium
fissile material used in its two previous tests. In 2010,
North
Korea
revealed a laboratory in
which it was trying to enrich uranium.
Some analysts predict a test timed around the inauguration of
South
Korea
's new president, Park
Geun-hye, on Feb. 25. That would also come amid a changeover of the
U.S.
national-security lineup;
North
Korea
has often issued provocations
to test new administrations in
Washington
.
The North Korean statement followed the same pattern of increasingly aggressive
rhetoric seen before its nuclear explosions in 2006 and 2009. In both cases,
rocket launches were followed by United Nations Security Council penalties,
which
North Korea
then
cited to justify tests of nuclear explosives.
Last month,
North Korea
launched a satellite. This week, the Security Council extended its sanctions;
that led
Pyongyang
to
issue statements threatening to detonate another nuclear device.
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