N. Korea ready for 5th N-test, says Park

SEOUL — North Korea is ready to carry out a fifth nuclear test and could press the button at any time, South Korea’s president said on Tuesday, amid reports Pyongyang has readied a powerful, new midrange missile for an imminent flight test.

Concern has been growing for weeks that the North is building up to another nuclear experiment ahead of a rare, ruling party congress to be held early next month.

“We assess that they have completed preparations for a fifth nuclear test and can conduct it whenever they decide to,” President Park Geun-Hye said during a meeting with local media.

If North Korea does go ahead, it would constitute a dramatic act of defiance in the face of tough UN sanctions imposed after its most recent nuclear test in January.

Some analysts have suggested that, by carrying out a fifth test so soon after the fourth, the North might hope to avoid a heavy package of additional sanctions — but Park insisted that the international community’s response would be swift and severe.

“Although the current sanctions are strong, we can impose even stronger sanctions that fill up any holes,” the president said.

“N Korea’s miscalculation is that by ignoring warnings from the international community and continuing to launch provocations, it will not defend its security, but only speed up its own collapse,” she added.

In recent months the North has claimed a series of major technical breakthroughs in developing what it sees as the ultimate goal of its nuclear weapons programme — an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to targets across the continental United States.

We assess that they have completed preparations for a fifth nuclear test and can conduct it whenever they decide to

Park Geun-Hye, SKorea president