The United States and allied powers threatened Monday to impose new penalties on North Korea after the defiant regime announced a second nuclear bomb test, but their leverage in derailing the weapons program appeared limited.
The five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, meeting in emergency session in New York, denounced the test as a "clear violation" of a 2006 resolution banning such actions. China and Russia, usually North Korea's defenders, joined with France, Britain and the United States in the statement. The council plans to meet again today to consider further steps.
President Obama described the test as a "blatant violation of international law," and declared that the United States and other world powers "must take action in response."
U.S. officials insisted that the blast, and a subsequent test of short range missiles, did not catch them by surprise. But the timing is bad for an administration already facing a nuclear threat in Iran and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Consumed by those crises, the Obama team has yet to develop its formal policy on North Korea.
While U.S. officials said they expected world powers to pull together, some acknowledged that sanctions were not likely to cause North Korea quickly to change a course of action that began late last year, when Pyongyang declared it was ending participation in the six-country disarmament talks, tested a long range rocket, and expelled international nuclear inspectors.
The test, which U.S. officials estimated to have several kilotons' force, was viewed in South Korea, Japan and some other countries as a more disturbing development than the single-kiloton 2006 test that was widely seen as a failure. While few believe North Korea would actually launch a nuclear attack, a nuclear-armed Pyongyang would raise the possibility of terrorists acquiring a device and put the regime in a vastly stronger position in negotiating with its neighbors and the United States.
China said in a statement after the test that it was "resolutely opposed" to the test, according to a Foreign Ministry statement carried by the official Xinhua news agency. The Kremlin issued an unusually harsh condemnation, saying it had "extremely serious concern." Even so, it remained unclear how far China and Russia would go in trying to punish the Pyongyang regime.
"What's important is not as much what's in the sanctions as the fact that there is unity," one U.S. official said.
