United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice sought on Wednesday on a whistle-stop tour of the region to ensure North Asian powers were committed to a unified stance on United Nations sanctions following North Korea’s nuclear test.
Rice arrived in Tokyo for talks with the Japanese foreign and defence ministers as intelligence experts warned a second nuclear test was likely following an increase in activity at the site of North Korea’s test on October 9.
”When there is a change in the threat environment, which I think you can certainly consider the North Korean test to be, it is first and foremost important to talk to your allies and reaffirm alliance commitments,” Rice told reporters on the plane.
Despite the widespread outrage and sanctions after the first test, Pyongyang remained defiant saying it had withstood international pressure before and was hardly likely to yield now it had become a nuclear power.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-il made his first public appearance since the test in Pyongyang on Tuesday night at a massive choreographed sound and light extravaganza to mark the 80th anniversary of the founding of the ”Down with Imperialism Union”, a precursor to the ruling Communist Workers Party.
Kim listened enthusiastically to a concert where songs such as Love of Comrades and Always looking up to the Leader were performed, the official KCNA news agency said.
US officials said North Korea had moved equipment into a place that may indicate it plans a second nuclear test. NBC television quoted officials as saying the North’s military had already informed China.
But South Korea said it was not aware of an imminent test.
”As we understand it, China has not received such a notice. We understand the North has not given notice of such a plan,” South Korean vice foreign minister Lee Kyu-hyung told reporters.
Diplomatic campaign
Rice arrives in Asia as the Bush administration begins a diplomatic campaign to rally international support for sanctions agreed on Saturday. After Japan, she goes to South Korea on Thursday and Beijing on Friday.
Her biggest challenge will be to get firm assurances from China, worried over the possible collapse of its neighbour, that it will follow through diligently on the UN resolution.
But the overseas edition of the People’s Daily — the mouthpiece of the ruling Communist Party — said the North Korean test had ”touched China’s warning-line”, adding that it had increased the common interest among Beijing, Washington, Tokyo and Seoul.
In the analysis, the paper also said China could cut off vital food and fuel aid to North Korea if Pyongyang continues to escalate the situation.
Rice said her mission was intended in part to reassure South Korea and Japan they had no need to develop a nuclear deterrent of their own in response to the North’s weapons programme.
”I don’t see how it helps the situation. The Japanese have made clear that it is not the course they are on.”
Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso said on Wednesday there was nothing wrong with Tokyo discussing whether the country should possess nuclear weapons, but he stressed that Tokyo would stick to its decades-old policy of not going nuclear.
”When a country next to us comes to have [nuclear weapons], we can’t consider, we can’t talk, we can’t do anything and we can’t exchange opinions. That’s one way of thinking,” Aso told a lower house panel on foreign affairs. ”I believe it is important to have various discussions on it as one more way of thinking.”
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said repeatedly this week that Japan, the only country to suffer an atomic bombing, would not change its nuclear arms policy.
White House spokesperson Tony Snow said Washington would not be surprised by a second North Korean blast meant to test the will of the United Nations and the countries — the United States, China, Japan, South Korea and Russia — engaged in long-stalled talks with Pyongyang about its nuclear ambitions.
”The North Koreans have made no secret of their desire to be provocative,” he said in Washington.
The US government has confirmed the underground blast in the north-east of North Korea was a nuclear explosion. – Reuters