N. Korea says detained American disguised identity

Published May 05, 2013

Associated Press

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  FILE - This 1988 file photo provided by Bobby Lee shows Kenneth Bae, right, and Bobby Lee together when they were freshmen students at the University of Oregon. Bae, detained for nearly six months in North Korea, has been sentenced to 15 years of labor for crimes against the state.AP/The Register-Guard, Bobby Lee

SEOUL, South Korea –  North Korea on Sunday revealed a few more details about a Korean-American recently sentenced to 15 years' hard labor, saying he entered the country with a disguised identity. Pyongyang also rejected speculation that it intends to use Kenneth Bae as a bargaining chip.

In remarks carried by state media, an unidentified Foreign Ministry spokesman did not specify the Washington state man's crimes but said he confessed. He said Bae entered North Korea "with a disguised identity in an intentional way under the back-stage manipulation of the forces hostile toward" the country.

Bae, 44, was arrested in early November in Rason, a special economic zone in North Korea's far northeastern region bordering China and Russia, according to the North's state media. The exact nature of Bae's alleged crimes has not been revealed.

Friends say Bae is a devout Christian and tour operator based in China who traveled frequently to North Korea to feed orphans. Six other Americans have been detained in North Korea since 2009; they eventually were deported or released, some after trips by prominent Americans including Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.

The North Korean spokesman dismissed as "ridiculous and wrong" speculation by foreign media that Pyongyang intends to use Bae as a bargaining chip. He said the "generosity" the country showed in past cases "will be of no use in ending Americans' illegal acts."

North Korea "has no plan to invite anyone of the U.S. as regards Pae's issue," the spokesman said. Pyongyang refers to Bae as Pae Jun Ho, the North Korean spelling for his Korean name.

Bae's sentencing last week came as tension remains on the Korean Peninsula following weeks of warlike rhetoric from Pyongyang and threats to attack the U.S. and South Korea. The U.S. has called for the North to grant amnesty and immediately release Bae.

The U.S. and North Korea officially remain at war because the 1950-53 Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.

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FOX NEWS POLL: Voters take North Korea seriously- FOX NEWS POLL: Obama should have been more involved with Benghazi

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  April 23, 2013: A propaganda billboard, which reads "Forward to the Ultimate Victory" in Korean stands in central Kaesong, North Korea. For weeks, North Korea has threatened to attack the U.S. and South Korea for holding joint military drills and for supporting U.N. sanctions. Washington and Seoul said they've seen no evidence that Pyongyang is actually preparing for a major conflict, though South Korean defense officials said the North appears prepared to test-fire a medium-range missile.AP

American voters have divided views about whether North Korea has missiles that could hit the United States, yet most think threats from the country’s leader Kim Jong Un should be taken seriously, according to a new Fox News poll.

Some 48 percent of voters think North Korea has the ability to hit the U.S. with a nuclear missile.  Nearly as many -- 42 percent -- don’t think so.

CLICK TO VIEW THE FOX NEWS POLL

Political affiliation does not play a role:  Roughly equal numbers of Democrats (51 percent) and Republicans (49 percent) think it’s possible that the U.S. faces a real North Korean nuclear threat.

There’s more consensus among voters on the instability of Kim Jong Un:  74 percent think he’s “crazy” and his threats should be taken seriously.  One voter in five (20 percent), thinks the young leader is just trying to prove himself and his threats are empty.

North Korea has recently been threatening to conduct a missile test, and it has also declared a “state of war” with South Korea.  The United States has responded by moving military resources into the region and President Obama has condemned the North Korean regime’s behavior.

By a 45-36 percent margin, voters approve of the job Obama is doing on North Korea, one of his highest current ratings.  Nineteen percent are unsure.

The president’s job performance ratings are only higher in one area: Terrorism.  On that, voters approve by 55-37 percent.  

On the other issues tested in the poll -- the economy, immigration, gun control and the federal deficit -- the president receives negative job ratings.  

Despite the North Korean threat, foreign policy comes in last when voters are asked about the most important issue facing the country.  Just one percent thinks it should be the top priority.  The economy dwarfs all other issues to top the list (42 percent).  Next is the federal budget deficit (17 percent), followed by terrorism (9 percent), health care (7 percent), guns (5 percent), Social Security (5 percent) and immigration (4 percent).

The Fox News poll is based on landline and cell phone interviews with 1,009 randomly chosen registered voters nationwide and was conducted under the joint direction of Anderson Robbins Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R) from April 20 to April 22.  The full poll has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.
 

Related Interactive

Fox News Poll: Voters Say Take Kim Jong Un Seriously

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PYONGYANG POLICY: Japan, US Agree: N. Korea Must Be Nuke-Free

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    How close is North Korea from launching its missiles?

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    Sec. Kerry reaches out to China over tensions with N. Korea

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    China asked to help calm North Korean crisis

Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Japan Sunday on the last leg of his East Asia tour aimed at enlisting support for putting pressure on North Korea amid increasing threats from Kim Jong Un's government.

Kerry, who met with China's top leaders Saturday to discuss reining in Pyongyang, is expected to meet with his Japanese counterpart, Fumio Kishida, according to a Reuters report.

Kerry's visit to Japan comes as North Korea prepares for the birthday of national founder Kim Il Sung on Monday — the biggest holiday of the year. Whether this year's celebrations will include a missile launch remains to be seen.

The U.S. and China committed Saturday to a process aimed at ridding North Korea of its nuclear weapons, with the Obama administration gaining at least the rhetorical support of the only government that can exert significant influence over the reclusive North.

The question now is whether Beijing will make good on its pledge to uphold "peace and stability" and work with Washington on achieving the goal of a nuclear-free Korean peninsula.

The declarations from both nations' foreign policy chiefs came as North Korea appears to be readying a missile test that has caused grave concern for the U.S. and its two close Asian allies, South Korea and Japan.

"We are able -- the United States and China -- to underscore our joint commitment to the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula in a peaceful manner," Kerry told reporters in Beijing before having dinner with State Councilor Yang Jiechi.

Kerry and Yang said they'd seek a peaceful resolution of the North Korean nuclear standoff, which has only grown worse in recent months under its young leader Kim Jong Un.

Since testing an atomic device in February, the North has threatened new tests of its missile capacity and even talked about launching nuclear strikes against the United States, while expanding its U.N.-outlawed uranium and plutonium enrichment program.

"We agreed that this is of critical importance for the stability of the region and indeed for the world and indeed for all of our nonproliferation efforts," Kerry said. "This is the goal of the United States, of China" and of other countries that hope to resume nuclear talks one day with North Korea.

"From this moment forward we are committed to taking actions in order to make good on that goal," he added. "And we are determined to make that goal a reality. China and the United States must together take steps in order to achieve the goal of a denuclearized Korean peninsula. And today we agreed that further discussions to bear down very quickly with great specificity on exactly how we will accomplish this goal."

Kerry said U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and representatives from U.S. intelligence agencies would travel to Beijing later this month. Kerry also is sending his deputy at the State Department, William Burns, as part of the effort to "make sure that this is not rhetoric but that it is real policy that is being implemented."

Yang said his government's position was clear.

"China is firmly committed to upholding peace and stability and advancing the denuclearization process on the Korean peninsula," he said through an interpreter.

"We maintain that the issue should be handled and resolved peacefully through dialogue," Yang said, adding that China would work with the United States and other nations to resume six-party talks with North Korea that fell apart for good four years ago.

Amid almost daily North Korean threats, the U.S. has been counting on China to force its unruly neighbor to stand down. It's a strategy that has produced uneven results over decades of American diplomacy, during which the North has developed and tested nuclear weapons and repeatedly imperiled peace on the Korean peninsula.

But with only the counter-threat of overwhelming force to offer the North Koreans, the U.S. has little other option.

In their statements delivered side by side, neither Kerry nor Yang specifically addressed the immediate crisis: a North Korean test of a missile with a range of up to 2,500 miles that the U.S. believes could happen any day. Later, Kerry said at a news conference that Washington and Beijing "both call on North Korea to refrain from any provocative steps and that obviously refers to any future missile shoot."

Kerry and Yang focused primarily on the long-term problem, which is a nuclear program that may soon, if not already, include the capability to deliver a warhead on a missile.

The question of North Korea's capacity has been subject to great debate in Washington this past week after a U.S. intelligence assessment suggested North Korea had the capacity to put a nuclear warhead on a missile, even if any such weapon would have low reliability.

China has the greatest leverage over North Korea, a country that like few in the world actually cherishes its isolation.

The Chinese dramatically have boosted trade ties with their neighbors and maintain close military relations some six decades after they fought side by side in the Korean War. They provide North Korea with most of its fuel and much of its food aid.

And China has a history of quickly reversing course after talking tougher with North Korea. In late 2010, as American officials were praising Beijing for constructive efforts after the North shelled a South Korean island, a Chinese company agreed to invest $2 billion in a North Korean industrial zone.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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FACTORY FLASHPOINT: N. Korea Dismantling Last Economic Link With South

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  April 6, 2013: South Korean vehicles arrive back from the North Korean city of Kaesong at Unification Bridge in Paju, South Korea.AP

SEOUL, South Korea –  North Korea said Monday it will recall 51,000 North Korean workers and suspend operations at a factory complex it has jointly run with South Korea, moving closer to severing its last economic link with its rival as tensions escalate.

The statement from Kim Yang Gon, secretary of a key decision-making body, the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, did not say what would happen to the 475 South Korean managers still at the Kaesong industrial complex.

The statement comes amid weeks of North Korean war threats and other efforts to punish South Korea and the U.S. for ongoing joint military drills. North Korea is also angry over the U.S.-led push for U.N. sanctions over its Feb. 12 nuclear test.

The complex combines cheap North Korean labor and South Korean know-how and technology. It is the last remaining inter-Korean rapprochement project from previous eras of cooperation.

North Korea closed the border to northbound South Korean managers and cargo last week, though managers already there were allowed to stay. About a dozen of the more than 120 South Korean companies at Kaesong have already shut down because they can no longer get needed supplies.

"The zone is now in the grip of a serious crisis," Kim said, according to state media. He said it "has been reduced to a theater of confrontation with fellow countrymen and military provocation, quite contrary to its original nature and mission."

"It is a tragedy that the industrial zone which should serve purposes of national reconciliation, unity, peace and reunification has been reduced to a theatre of confrontation between compatriots and war against the North," Kim said in remarks carried by the Korean Central News Agency.

The complex combines cheap North Korean labor and South Korean know-how and technology. Most of the employees at Kaesong are women. The complex is the biggest provider of jobs in Kaesong, the country's third-largest city. Shoes and clothing make up 70 percent of the goods produced; the rest are largely chemical and electrical products.

Kaesong is a rare source of foreign cash for North Korea. South Korea's Unification Ministry estimates that North Korean workers in Kaesong received $80 million in salary in 2012.

North Korea objects to portrayals in the South of the zone being crucial to the impoverished country's finances. Kim said North Korea "gets few economic benefits from the zone while the south side largely benefits from it."

North Korea has unnerved the international community by orchestrating an escalating campaign of bombast in recent weeks. It has threatened to fire nuclear missiles at the U.S. and claiming it had scrapped the 1953 armistice that ended fighting in the Korean War.

The threats against the United States are widely dismissed as hyperbole -- analysts say they've seen no evidence North Korea can build a warhead small enough to put on a missile that could hit the U.S. mainland. A direct attack on the U.S. or its allies would result in retaliation that would threaten the existence of the ruling Kim family in Pyongyang. But there are fears the North could launch a smaller-scale attack. Pyongyang recently suggested that foreign diplomats based there leave the country by April 10.

In the 16 months young leader Kim Jong Un has led the authoritarian nation, he also has conducted a nuclear test and launched two long-range rockets, though only one was successful. North Korea said the rockets were satellite missions, but the U.S., South Korea and others say they were a covert test of banned ballistic missile technology.

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Test Launch Coming? N. Korea Moves Missile Launchers, Officials Say

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    The real danger of North Korea's threats

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    How dangerous is North Korea?

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    US commander: North Korea situation 'tense' and 'volatile'

South Korea says North Korea has moved a missile with "considerable range" to its east coast after an unnamed spokesman for the North Korean army warned the U.S. Wednesday that its military has been cleared to wage an attack using "smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear" weapons.

South Korea's defense minister said Thursday the missile moved is not capable of hitting the United States.

Kim Kwan-jin dismissed reports in Japanese and South Korean media that the missile could be a KN-08, which is believed to be a long-range missile that if operable could hit the United States.

Kim told lawmakers at a hearing that the missile's range is considerable but not far enough to hit the U.S. mainland. He said he did not know the reasons behind the missile movement, saying it "could be for testing or drills."

North Korea has railed for weeks against joint U.S. and South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over tightened sanctions for a February nuclear test.

The army spokesman said in a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency that troops have been authorized to counter U.S. aggression with "powerful practical military counteractions."

National Security Council spokesperson Caitlin Hayden called the threats "unhelpful and unconstructive."

"It is yet another offering in a long line of provocative statements that only serve to further isolate North Korea from the rest of the international community and undermine its goal of economic development," she said. "North Korea should stop its provocative threats and instead concentrate on abiding by its international obligations."

The Pentagon said in Washington that it will deploy a missile defense system to the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam to strengthen regional protection against a possible attack from North Korea. The defense secretary said the U.S. was seeking to defuse the situation.

Despite the rhetoric, analysts say they do not expect a nuclear attack by North Korea, which knows the move could trigger a destructive, suicidal war that no one in the region wants.

The strident warning from Pyongyang is latest in a series of escalating threats from North Korea, which has railed for weeks against joint U.S. and South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over tightened sanctions for a February nuclear test.

Following through on one threat Wednesday, North Korean border authorities refused to allow entry to South Koreans who manage jointly run factories in the North Korean city of Kaesong.

Washington calls the military drills, which this time have incorporated fighter jets and nuclear-capable stealth bombers, routine annual exercises between the allies. Pyongyang calls them rehearsals for a northward invasion.

The foes fought on opposite sides of the three-year Korean War, which ended in a truce in 1953. The divided Korean Peninsula remains in a technical state of war six decades later, and Washington keeps 28,500 troops in South Korea to protect its ally.

U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Washington was doing all it can to defuse the situation, echoing comments a day earlier by Secretary of State John Kerry.

"Some of the actions they've taken over the last few weeks present a real and clear danger and threat to the interests, certainly of our allies, starting with South Korea and Japan and also the threats that the North Koreans have leveled directly at the United States regarding our base in Guam, threatened Hawaii, threatened the West Coast of the United States," Hagel said Wednesday.

In Pyongyang, the military statement said North Korean troops had been authorized to counter U.S. "aggression" with "powerful practical military counteractions," including nuclear weapons.

"We formally inform the White House and Pentagon that the ever-escalating U.S. hostile policy toward the DPRK and its reckless nuclear threat will be smashed by the strong will of all the united service personnel and people and cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means," an unnamed spokesman from the General Bureau of the Korean People's Army said in a statement carried by state media, referring to North Korea by its formal name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. "The U.S. had better ponder over the prevailing grave situation."

However, North Korea's nuclear strike capabilities remain unclear.

Pyongyang is believed to be working toward building an atomic bomb small enough to mount on a long-range missile. Long-range rocket launches designed to send satellites into space in 2009 and 2012 were widely considered covert tests of missile technology, and North Korea has conducted three underground nuclear tests, most recently in February.

"I don't believe North Korea has to capacity to attack the United States with nuclear weapons mounted on missiles, and won't for many years. Its ability to target and strike South Korea is also very limited," nuclear scientist Siegfried Hecker, a senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University, said this week.

"And even if Pyongyang had the technical means, why would the regime want to launch a nuclear attack when it fully knows that any use of nuclear weapons would result in a devastating military response and would spell the end of the regime? " he said in answers posted to CISAC's website.

In Seoul, a senior government official said Tuesday that it wasn't clear how advanced North Korea's nuclear weapons capabilities are. But he also noted fallout from any nuclear strike on Seoul or beyond would threaten Pyongyang as well, making a strike unlikely. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly to the media.

North Korea maintains that it needs to build nuclear weapons to defend itself against the United States. On Monday, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un led a high-level meeting of party officials who declared building the economy and "nuclear armed forces" as the nation's two top priorities.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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BEEFING UP PRESENCE:In Response to N. Korea Threat, US Moving Ships

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    North Korea vows to restart nuke plant

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    White House responds to North Korea's recent nuke threats

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    North Korea releases disturbing videos

The Pentagon confirmed Tuesday that it is positioning an array of military assets near the Korean Peninsula, as the White House stressed that the "entire national security team" is focused on the escalating threats out of Pyongyang -- with the latest being a pledge to restart a key nuclear reactor. 

Pentagon spokesman George Little said that two destroyer warships, the USS Decatur and USS McCain, have arrived in the region as part of a missile-defense mission. Previously, the Pentagon had only revealed that it had moved the USS McCain to the region. 

"They have arrived at predetermined positions in the western Pacific, where they will be poised to respond to any missile threats to our allies or our territory," Little said Tuesday. 

In addition, the Pentagon has already announced plans to have two sea-based radar systems in the western Pacific. One is already in northern Japan; the other has not yet deployed and is currently conducting non-North Korean related systems tests off Pearl Harbor. 

The system in Japan can serve to protect the Korean peninsula as well as threats to the western United States that originate from North Korea. 

"I am not going to get into specifics of where our assets are in South Korea or elsewhere, but we stand ready to defend South Korea from external threats, wherever they may originate," Little said, while also calling for "the temperature to be taken down." 

Meanwhile, U.S. officials on Tuesday condemned North Korea's latest threat to restart a nuclear reactor that can make one bomb's worth of plutonium a year. The plutonium reactor was shut down in 2007 as part of international nuclear disarmament talks that have since stalled. The declaration of a resumption of plutonium production -- the most common fuel in nuclear weapons -- and other facilities at the main Nyongbyon nuclear complex will boost fears in Washington and among its allies about North Korea's timetable for building a nuclear-tipped missile that can reach the mainland U.S., technology it is not currently believed to have. 

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said it would be "extremely alarming" if North Korea followed through on the vow to restart the reactor, though added that there was "a long way to go" between the North stating an intention and following through on it. 

Nuland spoke ahead of a meeting between Secretary of State John Kerry and South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se. 

White House spokesman Jay Carney said the U.S. is taking steps to ensure it has the capacity to defend itself and its allies, and that President Obama is being updated regularly. 

"The entire national security team is obviously focused on this, as you would expect," Carney said. 

But Carney noted that a string of threats from North Korea toward the U.S. and South Korea so far have not been backed up by action, calling the threats part of a counterproductive pattern. He called on Russia and China, two countries he said have influence on North Korea, to use that influence to persuade the North to change course. 

A spokesman for North Korea's General Department of Atomic Energy said Tuesday scientists will quickly begin "readjusting and restarting" the facilities at its main Nyongbyon nuclear complex, including the plutonium reactor and a uranium enrichment plant. Both could produce fuel for nuclear weapons. 

Fox News' Justin Fishel and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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North Korea Vows to 'Settle Accounts' After US Sends B-2s to Region

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  UNDATED: This photo shows a B-2 Spirit.(U.S. Air Force/Bobbie Garcia)

The U.S. military announced Thursday that two B-2 stealth bombers were sent to South Korea to participate in a training exercise, demonstrating the Pentagon's commitment to defend its ally against threats from North Korea.

The two B-2 Spirit bombers flew more than 6,500 miles from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri to South Korea, dropping inert munitions before returning to the U.S., according to a statement released by U.S. Forces Korea.

"The United States is steadfast in its alliance commitment to the defense of the Republic of Korea, to deterring aggression, and to ensuring peace and stability in the region," the statement said.

The B-2 Spirit is capable of delivering both conventional and nuclear weapons. The Pentagon said the mission was part of its ongoing Foal Eagle training exercise series, which began March 1 and ends April 30.

The exercise was announced a day after North Korea said it had shut down a key military hotline usually used to arrange passage for workers and goods through the Demilitarized Zone.

The hotline shutdown follows a torrent of bellicose rhetoric in recent weeks from North Korea, which is angry about annual South Korea-U.S. military drills and U.N. sanctions over its nuclear test last month. North Korea calls the drills rehearsal for an invasion; Seoul and Washington say the training is defensive in nature and that they have no intention of attacking.

North Korea's threats and provocations are seen as efforts to provoke the new government in Seoul, led by President Park Geun-hye, to change its policies toward Pyongyang. North Korea's moves at home to order troops into "combat readiness" are seen as ways to build domestic unity as young leader Kim Jong Un strengthens his military credentials.

North Korea previously cut Red Cross phone and fax hotlines with South Korea, and another communication channel with the U.S.-led U.N. command at the border between the Koreas. Three other telephone hotlines used only to exchange information about air traffic were still operating normally Thursday, according to South Korea's Air Traffic Center.

North Korea said there was no need for communication between the countries in a situation "where a war may break out at any moment."

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell told reporters that North Korea's "latest threat to cut off communication links coupled with its provocative rhetoric is not constructive to ensuring peace and stability on the peninsula."

Although North Korea has vowed nuclear strikes on the U.S., analysts outside the country have seen no proof that North Korean scientists have yet mastered the technology needed to build a nuclear warhead small enough to mount on a missile.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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WILL IT END THREATS? UN Security Council OKs Tough N. Korea Sanctions

UNITED NATIONS –  The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously Thursday for tough new sanctions to punish North Korea for its latest nuclear test, and a furious Pyongyang threatened a nuclear strike against the United States.

The sanctions drafted by North Korea's closest ally, China, and the United States send a powerful message that the international community condemns the ballistic missile and nuclear tests -- and repeated violation of Security Council resolutions.

"Adoption of the resolution itself is not enough," China's U.N. Ambassador Li Baodong said. "We want to see full implementation of the resolution." Li also urged calm and a resumption of the stalled six-party talks aimed at denuclearizing the Korean peninsula.

"The top priority now is to defuse the tensions, bring down heat ... bring the situation back on the track of diplomacy, on negotiations."

Immediately before the vote, an unidentified spokesman for Pyongyang's Foreign Ministry said the North will exercise its right for "a preemptive nuclear attack to destroy the strongholds of the aggressors" because Washington is "set to light a fuse for a nuclear war."

The statement was carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency, which issued no immediate comment after the Security Council vote.

In North Korea, Army Gen. Kang Pyo Yong told a crowd of tens of thousands that North Korea is ready to fire long-range nuclear-armed missiles at Washington, which "will be engulfed in a sea of fire."

The White House responded by saying the U.S. is fully capable of defending itself against a North Korea ballistic missile attack.

Although North Korea boasts of nuclear bombs and pre-emptive strikes, it is not thought to have mastered the ability to produce a warhead small enough to put on a missile capable of reaching the U.S. It is believed to have enough nuclear fuel, however, for several crude nuclear devices.

The United States has long been concerned that North Korea could eventually pose a missile threat to U.S. territory. It was mainly with such a potential threat in mind that the Defense Department first began to operate a ground-based missile defense system in late 2004.

The United States responded to North Korea's threat saying it will take the necessary steps to defend itself and its allies.

"Taken together, these sanctions will bite, and bite hard," U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice said after the vote. "They increase North Korea's isolation and raise the cost to North Korea's leaders of defying the international community."

South Korea's U.N. Ambassador Kim Sook said North Korea's threats and inflammatory statements will be dealt with "resolutely."

"North Korea must wake up from its delusion of becoming a ... nuclear weapons state and make the right choice," he said. "It can either take the right path toward a bright future and prosperity, or it can take a bad road toward further and deeper isolation and eventual self-destruction."

Tensions have escalated following a rocket launch by Pyongyang in December and its third nuclear test on Feb. 12. Both acts defied three Security Council resolutions that bar North Korea from testing or using nuclear or ballistic missile technology and from importing or exporting material for these programs.

The resolution is the fourth sanctions resolution against North Korea since its first nuclear test in 2006.

It condemns the North's third nuclear test in February "in the strongest terms" for violating and flagrantly disregarding council resolutions. It bans further ballistic missile launches, nuclear tests "or any other provocation" and demands that North Korea return to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. It condemns all of North Korea's ongoing nuclear activities, including its uranium enrichment.

But the resolution also stresses the council's commitment "to a peaceful, diplomatic and political solution" to North Korea's nuclear program and urges a resumption of six-party talks.

It strengthens inspections of suspicious cargo heading to and from the country, calls on states to step up "vigilance" of possible illegal activity by North Korean diplomats and reiterates the council's commitment to a diplomatic solution. In a measure targeted at the reclusive nation's ruling elite, the resolution bans all nations from exporting expensive jewelry, yachts, luxury automobiles and racing cars to the North.

The U.N. resolution identifies three individuals, one corporation and one organization that will be added to the U.N. sanctions list. The targets include top officials at a company that is the country's primary arms dealer and main exporter of ballistic missile-related equipment, and a national organization responsible for research and development of missiles and probably nuclear weapons.

The success of a new round of sanctions could depend on enforcement by China, where most of the companies and banks that North Korea is believed to work with are based.

According to the resolution, all countries would now be required to freeze financial transactions or services that could contribute to North Korea's nuclear or missile programs.

To get around financial sanctions, North Koreans have been carrying around large suitcases filled with cash to move illicit funds. The resolution expresses concern that these bulk cash transfers may be used to evade sanctions.

The resolution also bans all countries from providing public financial support for trade deals, such as granting export credits, guarantees or insurance, if the assistance could contribute to the North's nuclear or missile programs.

It includes what a senior diplomat called unprecedented new travel sanctions that would require countries to expel agents working for sanctioned North Korean companies.

The resolution also requires states to inspect suspect cargo on their territory and prevent any vessel that refuses an inspection from entering their ports. And a new aviation measure calls on states to deny aircraft permission to take off, land or fly over their territory if illicit cargo is suspected to be aboard.

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'TOUGHEST' YET: US Pushes Sanctions Amid New North Korea Threats

The United States, dealing with an increasingly belligerent North Korea under the leadership of the impetuous Kim Jong-un, moved Tuesday through the U.N. framework to tighten sanctions on the regime -- with the goal of reining in Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programs. 

The move came as Pyongyang threatened, in retaliation, to cancel the 1953 cease-fire that ended the Korean War. The Korean People's Army Supreme Command warned of "surgical strikes" meant to unify the divided Korean Peninsula. 

Pyongyang was evidently agitated with the resolution, which was backed by its ally China and described by U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice as "some of the toughest sanctions" ever imposed by the U.N. 

"The sanctions contained in this draft resolution will significantly impede North Korea's ability to develop further its illicit nuclear and ballistic missile programs," Rice said, adding that they would "demonstrate clearly to North Korea the continued costs of its provocations." 

She said the international community is "united and very firm in its opposition to North Korea's illicit nuclear and missile programs." 

The proposed resolution, worked out by Rice and China's U.N. Ambassador Li Baodong over the last three weeks, reflects the growing anger of the U.N.'s most powerful body at North Korea's defiance of three previous sanctions resolutions that demanded a halt to all nuclear and missile tests. 

This one pledges additional measures if Pyongyang keeps ignoring the council with new tests, Rice said. North Korea's latest test was in February. 

With the support of China, the North's closest ally, the proposed resolution is not expected to face serious opposition, though council members will send it to their capitals for review. 

"We hope for unanimous adoption later this week," Rice said. 

The draft resolution targets for the first time the illicit activities of North Korean diplomats, the country's illicit banking relationships and its illegal transfers of bulk, Rice said. It also adds new travel restrictions. 

Before the U.N. meeting, and as word emerged of the U.S.-China proposal, Pyongyang threatened to cancel the 1953 cease-fire that ended the Korean War. 

Hours after North Korea carried out its third atomic blast on Feb. 12, all 15 council members approved a press statement condemning the nuclear test and pledging further action. 

The sanctions have been aimed at trying to derail the country's rogue nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs. In addition to barring North Korea from testing or using nuclear or ballistic missile technology, they also ban it from importing or exporting material for these programs. 

North Korea's neighbors and the West condemn the North's efforts to develop long-range nuclear missiles capable of hitting the United States as a serious threat to Northeast Asia's delicate security and a drain on the precious resources that could go to North Korea's largely destitute people. 

North Korea says its nuclear program is a response to U.S. hostility that dates back to the Korean War, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty, leaving the Korean Peninsula still technically in a state of war. 

North Korea says Washington and others are going beyond mere economic sanctions and expanding into blunt aggression and military acts. 

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said President Obama and the American people would like to see North Korea's leader promote peace and engage in talks. 

"Rather than threaten to abrogate and threaten to move in some new direction, the world would be better served ... if he would engage in a legitimate dialogue, legitimate negotiations, in order to resolve not just American concerns, but the concerns of the Japanese and the South Koreans and the Russians and the Chinese, everybody in the region," Kerry said in Doha, Qatar. "That's our hope." 

The North's latest nuclear test was seen as a crucial step toward its goal of building a bomb small enough to be fitted on a missile capable of striking the United States. Many outside analysts still believe the North hasn't achieved such a miniaturization technology. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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