North Defiant in Face of U.S. Pressure

"If the U.S. keeps pestering us and increases pressure, we will regard this as a declaration of war and will take a series of physical countermeasures," a spokesperson of the North’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement Wednesday, while the U.N. Security Council mulls over punitive actions against North Korea.

“North Korea has already withdrawn from the Non-Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and is not subject to any international law. The U.S., however, has begun to fabricate a resolution, as soon as we announced our conducting a nuclear test, by controlling the U.N. Security Council. It is also threatening to impose collective sanctions on us,” the North’s Foreign Ministry said

Although the North has not specified the details of the “series of physical countermeasures,” experts believe it implies a threat to launch missiles or an additional nuclear weapons test.

In an interview with Japan`s Kyodo News Service in Pyongyang, Kim Yong Nam, chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly of North Korea, said Wednesday that the issue of future nuclear tests is linked to the U.S.’s responses.

Meanwhile, China also strongly urged the need to take punitive measures against North Korea while the U.N. Security Council was working on sanctions against North Korea on Tuesday.

With the change in China’s attitude over imposing sanctions against North Korea, a resolution is expected to be passed by the end of this weekend. China had been reluctant over imposing sanctions against the North.

China`s UN Ambassador Wang Guangya told reporters before having a meeting at the Security Council Wednesday that there must be punitive actions against North Korea’s nuclear test, but the actions must be decisive, yet constructive and prudent.

In the meantime, the Japanese government said it is reviewing a range of ways to impose additional sanctions exclusively against North Korea along with the sanctions passed by the Security Council.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who attended the budget committee at the House of Councilors Wednesday, said, he is considering taking very strong punitive measures unparalleled to those of other nations.

Abe also indicated the possibility of taking sanctions without having verified North Korea’s nuclear test, saying, “Although (Pyongyang’s nuclear test) requires verification to explain to the international society, a decision can be made by looking its overall context.”