Anger in China grows over N.Korea`s nuclear test

Anti-North Korea sentiment in China is spreading over Pyongyang`s latest nuclear test.

After small rallies were held Saturday in Shenyang and Guangzhou, more broke out in Hengyang and Harbin. Placards blasting the nuclear test were placed on streets in downtown Harbin, where an ice lantern festival was being held.

Angry Web users in China also posted photos of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made distorted into ugly forms by computer software.

Protests targeting the North Korean Embassy in Beijing also continued. In a post on Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, a user said, “I just called the North Korean Embassy and asked them to convey the Chinese people`s protest to your supreme commander Kim Jong Un, but I had to hang up because nobody picked up.

Another Web user wrote a post introducing an external bulletin board outside the embassy in Beijing, and suggested that since the bulletin board has a surveillance camera, if one gives the middle finger, people inside the embassy might see it. Posts on Weibo urged users to phone the embassy by providing the phone number 6532-××××."

A netizen said, “The Chinese Foreign Ministry has merely made verbal protests against North Korea’s nuclear test and has effectively declined to join the world in sanctioning the North,” adding, “If this continues, North Korea will turn into a devil and China will become a sinner against humanity.”

In South Korea, a diplomatic source said, “The unprecedented hardline public opinion being formulated in China will add pressure on the Chinese government in implementing North Korea policy.”

mungchii@donga.com