Korea tyrant Kim is begging for war, warns US
It tells rogue state: Our patience isn’t unlimited
NORTH Korea is desperate for a war with the United States, a senior American ambassador said yesterday.
Amid concerns that Kim Jong-un’s dictatorial regime is preparing further missile tests, Nikki Haley warned time was running out for diplomacy.
‘His abusive use of missiles and his nuclear threats show that he is begging for war,’ she said. ‘War is never something the United States wants, we don’t want it now, but our country’s patience is not unlimited.’
The envoy to the UN urged an emergency meeting of the Security Council to impose the strongest possible sanctions against Pyongyang to halt its nuclear testing.
She acknowledged that sanctions had not worked so far but added: ‘Enough is enough. The time for half measures is over. The time has come to exhaust all of our diplomatic means before it is too late.’
The emergency meeting was summoned in response to escalating fears about Pyongyang’s nuclear capabilities after it claimed to have tested a hydrogen bomb, estimated to be seven times more powerful than the device dropped Hiroshima.
South Korea says the regime appears to be planning a further missile launch, possibly of an inter-continental ballistic missile. In a test last week it sent a missile over Japan.
And in July it tested two ICBMs thought to be capable of reaching the US mainland – in defiance of existing UN sanctions.
South Korea yesterday simulated a ballistic missile attack on its northern neighbour’s nuclear test site and said the live-fire exercise was intended as a ‘strong warning’. It said it would carry out more drills involving F-15 jets carrying Taurus air-to- surface missiles in the next few weeks.
The defence ministry in Seoul also told parliament the US would seek to deploy a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to the seas off the peninsula.
Four more units of the US Thaad missile defence system – strongly opposed by China and Russia – would also be deployed to join two already at a site in Seongju, south of Seoul. South Korean president Moon Jae-in spoke to US counterpart Donald Trump and agreed Seoul would scrap its weight limit on its own missiles as an ‘effective countermeasure’ to the threat from the North.
A bilateral agreement between the two countries had previously capped its missile warhead weight to 500kg. South Korea does not have nuclear weapons but has significant military power and conventional weaponry, and the support of the Americans.
Britain’s ambassador to the UN, Matthew Rycroft, backed the calls for stronger sanctions and said there was evidence that existing export bans on North Korean coal and iron were having an effect on funding for the country’s nuclear programme.
Mrs Haley suggested the US would take action against North Korea’s trading partners: ‘The US will look at every country that does business with North Korea as a country that is giving aid to their reckless and dangerous nuclear intentions.’
Mr Trump tweeted on Sunday that he would consider stopping all trade with any country that did business with the rogue state.
China is Pyongyang’s biggest supplier of food and oil, although there have been reports that North Korea began stockpiling oil supplies earlier this year in anticipaon
‘Reckless and dangerous’
tion of a possible import embargo. China’s foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said Beijing would consider it ‘unacceptable’ if it was punished for its interests in North Korea.
Beijing condemned the nuclear tests but called for a return to negotiations with Pyongyang instead of tougher sanctions or military action.
The Security Council will meet again next week to vote on the sanctions proposal.
A spokesman for Theresa May said: ‘China has leverage over North Korea and we should be encouraging them to use that leverage to ensure North Korea stop their illegal acts. Our focus is on how we increase pressure and come to a peaceful solution.’