Unfazed by global pressure, a defiant North Korea conducted a "successful" underground nuclear test on May 25, 2009, far more powerful than its first one in October 2006. The test was aimed at strengthening North Korea's self-defence nuclear deterrent in every way.
In April 2009, Pyongyang pulled out of six-party talks on its nuclear programme, in protest against international condemnation of its test-firing a rocket.
The UN Security Council had imposed sanctions on North Korea and banned the country from all activities related to its nuclear weapons programme following its first test in 2006.
Confining International Community
The present test was up to 20 times more powerful than the North’s first nuclear test about two-and a-half-year ago, underscoring the advances in its nuclear programme despite multilateral talks on ending Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons ambitions.
The latest test will confound the international community, which has for years tried a mixture of huge aid pledges and tough economic sanctions to persuade the impoverished North to give up efforts to build a nuclear arsenal. It is also bound to raise concerns about proliferation, a major worry of the United States which has in the past accused Pyongyang of trying to sell its nuclear know-how to states such as Syria.
Japan, South Korea and the US — along with China and Russia — have been negotiating since 2003 to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear programmes in exchange for energy aid and security guarantees.
The US President Barack Obama said North Korea's attempts at developing nuclear weapons was a threat to international peace and security, while the North’s neighbour and long-time benefactor, China, said it was “resolutely opposed” to the test.
Russia, which also called the test a threat to regional security, said the blast was about equal in power to the US atom bomb dropped on the Japanese city of Nagasaki in the Second World War.
North Korea had warned their Governments of the test about an hour before detonation, but nearby Japan said it was not given advance notice. Germany, Britain and France were among the nations condemning the test while the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he was “deeply worried.”
The Objective
The test also will serve to raise North Korea’s leverage in any negotiations with the United States. It comes as speculation has mounted that leader Kim Jong-il, his health uncertain after reports of a stroke last year, wants to strengthen an already iron grip on power so he can better secure the succession for one of his three sons.
North Korea’s attempts to develop nuclear weapons, as well as its ballistic missile programme, constitute a threat to international peace and security.
North Korea already is so isolated there is little left with which to punish an autocratic government that has long been willing to take dealings with the outside world to the brink. At home, its leaders repeatedly stress the threat from a hostile United States to justify heavy spending on the military that keeps them in power but which has meant deepening poverty, at times famine, for most of the rest of its 23 million people.
The test also will serve to raise North Korea’s leverage in any negotiations with the US. It comes as speculation has mounted that leader Kim Jong-Il, his health uncertain after reports of a stroke in 2008, wants to strengthen an already iron grip on power so he can better secure the succession for one of his three sons.
Blow to South Korea
The nuclear test dealt another blow to South Korean markets, already unsettled by fears of domestic unrest after former President Roh Moo-hyun, who had been questioned over his links to a corruption scandal, jumped to his death during the weekend.
South Korea’s main stock market index fell more than six per cent at one stage on worries by some that investors would flee. But the decline was short-lived and analysts said investors were used to the North’s repeated saber-rattling, even as it became more aggressive and would likely panic only if there was military conflict on a peninsula where two-million troops face each other across one of the world’s most heavily armed borders.
The success of the nuclear test at this time is greatly encouraging our army and people who have risen up as one in the 150-day battle, vigorously igniting the flame of new great revolutionary upswing for opening the gate to a powerful State.
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