Michael Ramirez on North Korea’s Nuclear Test

AP: N. Korea urged to abandon atomic weapons

With speculation mounting of a North Korean nuclear test as early as this weekend, a unanimous U.N. Security Council urged the secretive, communist nation Friday to abandon all atomic weapons as it promised last year and cancel plans to detonate a device. Japan hinted the North could face sanctions or possible military action.

With tensions rising, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il met hundreds of his top military commanders and urged them to bolster the nation’s defenses, as officers cheered, “Fight at the cost of our lives!” the North’s official Korean Central News Agency reported earlier Friday.

A North Korea expert in China, the North’s closest ally, said only the removal of American economic sanctions against Pyongyang could dissuade the country from carrying out a nuclear test.

“North Korea has already made a decision to carry out a test,” said Li Dunqiu, of China’s State Council Development Research Center, a Cabinet-level think tank. But “if the U.S. removes sanctions … then tensions can be eased. Otherwise launching a nuclear test is unavoidable for North Korea.”

The North Koreans and Kim Jong-Il must perceive the United States as WEAK.

They have UNDERESTIMATED the United States and our allies.

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