North Korea said it conducted a “higher level” nuclear test Friday leading to swift condemnation from the United Nations, the U.S., Japan and China.
The announcement from the Kim Jong-un government marked the second time this year the North has conducted a nuclear test and raised fears the country is a step closer to developing a nuclear-armed missile that could strike North America.
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U.S. President Barack Obama promised “serious consequences” following the nuclear test and called it “a grave threat to regional security.”
“The United States does not, and never will, accept North Korea as a nuclear state,” Obama said in a statement. “Today’s nuclear test, a flagrant violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions, makes clear North Korea’s disregard for international norms and standards for behaviour and demonstrates it has no interest in being a responsible member of the international community.”
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But with the isolated country already under the toughest sanctions it has faced in decades because of a January nuclear test, some experts questioned whether North Korea has anything significant left to apply effective sanctions to.
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Christian Leuprecht, professor of political science at Kingston’s Royal Military College and Queen’s University, says China could play a major role in deterring future tests.
China shares a border with North Korea and is one of the last countries in the world to maintain a diplomatic relationship.
Leuprecht said cutting off oil imports are one of the last leverage points against the North.
Leuprecht said any significant actions taken by the West would have to be in cooperation with China, which appears unlikely.
Michael Ivanovitch, president of research firm MSI Global and a former OECD senior economist, told NBC news that only the U.S., China and Russia can stop the escalation in North Korea, but their diverging interests in the peninsula make that unlikely.
“Their interests don’t coincide,” Ivanovitch said. “They were on the opposing side of the Korean War and the sequels of that conflagration are still unresolved.”
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An agreement between the U.S. and South Korea to deploy an anti-missile defense system, known as the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), in South Korea has caused tension in the region.
While the U.S. and South Korea hope to use THAAD to counter North Korea, Beijing and Moscow have viewed that idea as a regional security threat.
Leuprecht said the thorny North Korea issue has put Beijing between a “rock and hard place.”
Leuprecht said an estimated five million refugees would flee North Korea alone if the country were to destabilize.
— With files from The Associated Press
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