North Korea 'Broke the Rules Again,' President Obama Charges While Calling for End to Nuclear Arms
BY Helen Kennedy
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
President Obama made a sweeping call for a nuke-free world Sunday, blasting North Korea's defiant rocket launch as an illustration of the looming global threat.
"North Korea broke the rules once again by testing a rocket that could be used for long-range missiles," Obama told a crowd of 30,000 in the Czech Republic.
"This provocation underscores the need for action."
Although Obama called for a strong United Nations response, the world body could not agree on what to do.
Pyongyang insisted Saturday's launch was successful and said asatellite is now circling the Earth, broadcasting "immortal revolutionary songs" praising North Korean leaders.
Not so, says NORAD. The North American Aerospace Defense Command said the rocket, including its payload, splashed harmlessly into the Pacific Ocean.
"No object entered orbit," a NORAD spokesman said.
Successful or not, the launch sent tremors throughout the world because North Korea is a belligerent, totalitarian regime that could pose a threat to the West or export rocket technology to other rogue nations.
Analysts called the muscle-flexing by North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il an almost childlike wail for attention from the world's financial powers, who met with much fanfare last week.
Beset by famine, North Korea regularly uses threats and provocation to wheedle aid from richer countries.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs called it "a pretty big coincidence" that the rocket was launched just three hours before Obama gave a preplanned speech in Prague vowing to rid the world of nuclear weapons.
Obama said the UN should respond strongly to North Korea.
"Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something. The world must stand together to prevent the spread of these weapons. Now is the time for a strong international response," Obama said.
But the UN Security Council - which barred North Korea from missile tests in 2006 - failed toagree on action at an emergency meeting in New York. Russia and China nixed U.S. efforts to toughen sanctions against North Korea.
Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich slammed Obama on "Fox News Sunday" for not ordering preemptive action to stop North Korea's launch.
"One morning, just like 9/11, there's going to be a disaster,"Gingrich warned, calling Obama's emphasis on diplomacy "a fantasy foreign policy."
In Prague, Obama committed America to seeking "a world without nuclear weapons" and said he would hold a global summit on nuclear security within the next year.
"This goal will not be reached quickly, perhaps not in my lifetime," he told the largest crowd of his eight-day European swing. "As the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon, the United States has a moral responsibility to act."
Afterward, Obama flew on to a final stop in Turkey while his Europe-conquering wife headed home to see their daughters.
Reader Comments
New Title Suggested
New title should be "North Korea Breaks Rules Again, and Again, and Again, and Again...and the UN talks, and talks, and talks, and talks...and Obama promises to do more to make them like us.
Will the Never Learn
Uh Oh the North Koreans broke OBama's rules.Now they are in for some stern words.For sure.
Nuke free world?
While President Obama calls for a nuke free world, and unilaterally agreed to reduce the US weapons cache, Obama also said, "North Korea broke the rules again." Is he listening to himself?
So what, exactly, are we doing and why? Why, for example, are we unilaterally willing to shelve, or at least delay, the missile defense shield deployment in Poland? It is apparent that the missile defense system has had some success, and that's just what is unclassified and is very old information; it is likely to be far more successful today than we know. Most importantly, North Korea has proven that we need a missile defense system. Iran has proven, just months before, that we need a missile defense system. And neither of these countries has shown the slightest inclination to obey any "rules" or stop trying to develop nuclear weapons. And what about Syria or some coup in Pakistan; what are our defenses then?
We can only hope that President Obama is not so far to the left that he has the misguided belief that if we unilaterally reduce weapons and decline the use of a missile defense system against these rogue nations (that are getting help and encouragement, even in the UN, from both Russia and China), that he is making us safer. If Obama emasculates us as the Europeans have emasculated their own once-great societies, it is over for the West.
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