North Korea says will boost nuclear deterrent after UN rebuke

UNITED NATIONS: The UN Security Council unanimously condemned North Korea's December rocket launch and expanded existing UN. sanctions, and Pyongyang reacted with a vow to boost the North's military and nuclear capabilities.

While the resolution approved by the 15-nation council on Tuesday does not impose new sanctions on Pyongyang, diplomats said Beijing's support for it was a significant diplomatic blow to Pyongyang.

The resolution said the council "deplores the violations" by North Korea of its previous resolutions, which banned Pyongyang from conducting further ballistic missile and nuclear tests and from importing materials and technology for those programs.

It also said the council "expresses its determination to take significant action in the event of a further DPRK (North Korean) launch or nuclear test".

North Korea reacted quickly, saying it would hold no more talks on the de-nuclearization of the Korean peninsula and would boost its military and nuclear capabilities.

"We will take measures to boost and strengthen our defensive military power including nuclear deterrence," its Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by state news agency KCNA.

The United States' special envoy on North Korea, arriving in Seoul on Wednesday to meet his South Korean counterparts, urged Pyongyang to back down from further provocative actions but left the door open for dialogue.

"If they can... begin to take concrete steps to indicate their interests in returning to diplomacy, they may find willing partners in that process," Glyn Davies told reporters.

Six-party talks aimed at halting North Korea's nuclear program have involved North Korea, the United States, China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. They have been held intermittently since 2003 but have stalled since 2008.

Russia's foreign minister said on Wednesday that North Korea should pay heed to the international community and adhere to limits on its missile and nuclear programmes.

South Korea says the North is technically ready for a third nuclear test, and satellite images show it is actively working on its nuclear site. However, political analysts said they viewed a test as unlikely in the near-term.

"North Korea will likely take a sequenced strategy where the first stage response would be more militarily aggressive actions like another missile launch," said Yang Moo-jin of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.

There are concerns that North Korea could stage a test using highly enriched uranium for the first time, which would give it a second path to a nuclear bomb and enable it to preserve its stocks of plutonium, which are believed to be sufficient for about 12 nuclear devices.

The UN. resolution added six North Korean entities, including Pyongyang's space agency, the Korean Committee for Space Technology, and the man heading it, Paek Chang-ho, to an existing UN. blacklist.