Following remarks from the leaders of South Korea and Japan, President Donald Trump has responded to North Korea's latest "perfect" nuclear test, emphasizing that South Korea's "talk of appeasement will not work," and that Kim Jong Un and his government "only understand one thing!" He added that the nuclear test is an embarrassment...to China.
In both tone and substance, Trump's response echoed his tweet from last week when he said that the US's policy of paying the North "extortion money" wasn't working, and that "talking is not the answer" to the North's nuclear threat, although it is unclear if the latest provocation will prompt the US president to do anything more than just jawbone again.
North Korea has conducted a major Nuclear Test. Their words and actions continue to be very hostile and dangerous to the United States.....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 3, 2017
..North Korea is a rogue nation which has become a great threat and embarrassment to China, which is trying to help but with little success.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 3, 2017
South Korea is finding, as I have told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work, they only understand one thing!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 3, 2017
Elsewhere, China's foreign ministry said that North Korea had conducted the nuclear test “with no regard to the general objections of the international community." It added that it "strongly condemns" the test and that China would be willing to work with the UN Security Council to pass even more restrictive sanctions.
“The Chinese government resolutely opposes and strongly condemns this,” the ministry said in a statement.
“China will work together with the international community to comprehensively and completely implement the relevant resolutions of the Security Council of the UN, unswervingly push forward the denuclearization of the peninsula, and unswervingly maintain the peace and stability of the peninsula,” it said.
China's foreign ministry also once again called for the de-nuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.