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Security Council meets on North Korea missile test

Posted on: Wednesday, 5 July 2006, 09:42 CDT

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council met in closed session on Wednesday to consider a response to a barrage of North Korean missile tests.

John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said going into the meeting that the 15-nation U.N. body would have before it a resolution drafted by Japan.

"This is obviously a very serious matter because of the North Korean provocation," he told reporters.

North Korea test-fired a barrage of missiles on Wednesday, including a long-range weapon said to be capable of reaching Alaska, ratcheting up tensions in north Asia and drawing international condemnation.

At least six missiles were launched early in the morning and a seventh some 12 hours later, officials in Japan and South Korea said. Russia said North Korea fired 10 missiles, but the report from a senior general could not be immediately confirmed.

The long-range Taepodong-2 missile apparently failed 40 seconds into its flight, U.S. officials said. Japanese and South Korean officials said the missiles fell into the sea separating the Korean peninsula from Japan.

Japan, the United States and Britain readied a Security Council resolution demanding that nations withhold all funds, goods and technology that could be used for North Korea's missile program.

The draft, read to Reuters and subject to changes, also condemned the launch and strongly urged North Korea to return to the six-nation talks on its nuclear program. No vote was expected on Wednesday.

The United States warned North Korea against any more provocative acts, and said Washington would take necessary measures to protect itself and its allies.

"The United States strongly condemns these missile launches and North Korea's unwillingness to heed calls for restraint from the international community," White House spokesman Tony Snow said in a statement.

China, North Korea's closest ally and the host of six-way talks on its nuclear program, expressed worry.

"We are seriously concerned about the events that have occurred," Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said in a statement.

"We hope that all sides will maintain calm and restraint, and do things conducive to the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula and Northeast Asia and do not take any further steps that will add to tensions and further complicate the situation."

South Korea's military stepped up its alert level after the launch, Yonhap news agency cited a military source as saying.

The two Koreas are technically still at war more than half a century after the inconclusive truce which halted the 1950-1953 Korean conflict. Some 30,000 U.S. troops remain in South Korea under a mutual defense treaty.

INTIMIDATION

The missile launches "demonstrate North Korea's intent to intimidate other states by developing missiles of increasingly longer ranges," Snow, the White House official, added.

"We are consulting with international partners on next steps."

The European Union condemned North Korea's missile launches as "provocative," while NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said they were a "serious threat" which the Western military alliance could discuss with regional powers including Japan, South Korea and Australia.

U.S. National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley said the multiple firings might have been an attempt by Pyongyang to steal the spotlight away from Iran, which has been the main focus of U.S. nuclear diplomacy in recent months.

"Obviously, it is a bit of an effort to get attention, perhaps because so much attention has been focused on the Iranians," Hadley told reporters.

But like many U.S. officials, he said it was impossible to be sure about Pyongyang's motives.

North Korea, whose government pays close attention to symbolic gestures, chose to launch the missiles as the United States was marking its July 4 Independence Day.

"It got everybody's attention on the Fourth of July. (North Korean leader) Kim Jong-Il can set off fireworks, too," said John Pike, director of the security Web site GlobalSecurity.org.

Japan said it would consider immediate economic sanctions against North Korea. The government banned visits by North Korean ferries for six months.

"Whatever North Korea seeks to achieve or is speculating, nothing positive for North Korea will come out from this," Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said.

U.S. stocks opened lower on the launch news, following losses in Asia and Europe. The Japanese yen and the South Korean won both slipped against the dollar. In Seoul, the government said South Korean authorities would take action if necessary.

Russia, which is a party to six-way talks on North Korea's nuclear program, condemned the launch. Tokyo also called on Pyongyang to return to the six-party talks, which have been stalled since November.

The other participants in the talks are the United States, China, Japan and the two Koreas.

LONG-RANGE MISSILE

North Korean media made no mention of the multiple launches, Japanese reporters in Pyongyang said. Television channels had no programming on Wednesday morning, they said, and state radio led its bulletins on Kim Jong Il's visit to a tire factory.

Experts say the Taepodong-2 has a possible range of 3,500-4,300 km (2,190-2,690 miles).

A State Department official told Reuters the long-range missile had failed 40 seconds after it was launched. A senior South Korean security official said the Taepodong-2 had splashed down in the sea off the peninsula's east coast.

Experts say that Pyongyang is developing long-range missiles to have the capability one day to deliver a nuclear bomb, but that it is years away from acquiring such a weapons system.

(Additional reporting by Jim Wolf, Paul Eckert, Matt Spetalnick in Washington and Jack Kim and Jon Herskovitz in Seoul)

Source: REUTERS

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