NORTH KOREA provoked an international outcry yesterday after vowing to conduct a nuclear test because of what it called an “extreme threat” from the United States.

After months of sabre-rattling from the Stalinist regime of Kim Jong Il, Pyongyang raised tensions in the region by issuing its most bellicose warning yet.

“The US extreme threat of a nuclear war and sanctions and pressure to compel the DPRK [North Korea] to conduct a nuclear test, an essential process for bolstering nuclear deterrent, as a corresponding measure for defence,” the Foreign Ministry statement said.

It went on to say that North Korea would never use a nuclear weapon and was still committed to the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.

North Korea may be poverty stricken and isolated from the rest of the world, but it does have a functioning nuclear programme capable of producing fissile material — the core of an atomic bomb. Experts believed that the North Koreans could produce more than half a dozen nuclear warheads.

The international community was taking the threat seriously last night. South Korea, still technically in a state of war with the North, raised its threat level and began urgent consultations with other neighbouring states. It will step up monitoring of North Korea to detect any signs that a nuclear test is imminent.

Shinzo Abe, the Japanese Prime Minister, facing his first crisis in office, warned North Korea that unless it responded to the concerns of the international community, “its situation will only worsen”.

America said that North Korea posed an unacceptable threat, Russia said it was deeply concerned, Britain described the North Korean statement as a highly provocative act and France said it was very worried.

The only leading country not to respond publicly was China, arguably the one nation that could exert real influence on North Korea. There was evidence that the traditionally close ties between Beijing and Pyongyang recently have become strained.

Kim Jong Il’s isolated and paranoid regime is highly unpredictable and some will dismiss the latest threats as the rantings of an eccentric dictator. But since Pyongyang withdrew from peace talks a year ago, the regime does appear to have hardened its stand. In July it test fired a Taepodong-2 missile, which could one day have the range to hit America. The test failed after 40 seconds, but the North Koreans then fired five shorter range ballistic missiles to prove that they could still hit targets in the region.

“Pyongyang has been increasingly controlled by hardliners in the past months and its policies and words have become more and more extreme,” said Shi Yinhong, a Chinese foreign policy expert. “The situation is really dangerous.”

The North Koreans are particularly frustrated by American financial sanctions. By playing its nuclear card now, Pyongyang may hope to put pressure on America and its neighbours to ease its isolation.

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