Trump renews threat against N. Korea; China to back sanctions

BEIJING — President Donald Trump renewed a threat Thursday to use military force against North Korea and raised doubts about whether negotiations could succeed in resolving the crisis over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons.

“Military action would certainly be an option. Is it inevitable? Nothing’s inevitable,” Trump said during a news conference. “It would be great if something else could be worked out. We would have to look at all of the details, all of the facts.”

U.S. officials said an offer to negotiate with North Korea remains on the table, but Trump has repeatedly discounted the value of beginning another effort to talk North Korea out of its arsenal.

All previous efforts have failed, and North Korea now possesses both a stockpile of weapons and missiles capable of threatening U.S. shores. “We’ve had presidents for 25 years now, they’ve been talking, talking, talking, and the day after an agreement is reached, new work begins in North Korea” on its rogue nuclear weapons program, Trump said. “So I would prefer not going the route of the military, but it’s something certainly that could happen.”

The United States is seeking the toughest-yet U.N. sanctions against North Korea in response to its latest nuclear test, according to a draft resolution circulated Wednesday. The sanctions would stop all oil and natural gas exports and freeze the government’s foreign financial assets.

North Korea greeted the proposal with a threat. “We will respond to the barbaric plotting around sanctions and pressure by the United States with powerful counter measures of our own,” read a statement delivered at an Asian economic summit in Russia on Thursday.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Beijing would support further U.N.-imposed “measures” against North Korea following its latest nuclear test Sunday but stopped short of saying whether China would back crippling economic sanctions.