The official, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said that while the United States had been saying since May that North Korea was preparing to resume nuclear tests for the first time since 2017, it was not clear when such a test might take place. .
“We have a lot of confidence that they’ve made the preparations. We think they can do it… I can’t tell you ‘we think it’s going to be today for the following reasons’, because we don’t have that level of knowledge.”
Washington wanted to see Russia and China do their best to dissuade Pyongyang.
“We think they (North Korea) are making calculations about the degree of receptivity to others in the region, I think, especially Russia and China. And I think the Russian and Chinese positions have an effect on them,” the official said.
The official made the comments after the United States asked the United Nations Security Council to meet publicly to discuss North Korea on Friday after a series of missile launches, including what the Pentagon said was an ICBM.
The US official said that Pyongyang may have delayed the resumption of nuclear tests because of China, including the recently concluded Chinese Communist Party Congress, and because of the outbreak of the Corona virus in North Korea in May and June.
He expressed his belief that the recent crisis has made North Korea “focus more on ways in which to obtain support from China in particular.”
“China and Russia have long recorded their opposition to the DPRK’s nuclear program,” he said. “So… we believe, and certainly it is our expectation, that they will use the leverage that they have to try to get the DPRK not to conduct a nuclear test,” he added.
The official renewed calls for Pyongyang to resume dialogue with the United States, and said Washington was ready to deal directly with North Korea and discuss humanitarian aid.
Asked how stable the North Korean government led by Kim Jong Un is in his opinion, the official said, “We see no evidence of specific challenges that would undermine Kim Jong Un’s standing.”
In response to another question about the motive behind North Korea’s recent wave of missile tests, which Pyongyang described as a response to “aggressive” military exercises between the US and South Korea, the official said, “We don’t know because they don’t talk to us directly.”
The official dismissed growing calls among some North Korean experts for Washington to recognize Pyongyang as a nuclear power that will never disarm.
“There is an extraordinarily strong global consensus in a whole series of UN Security Council resolutions that were clearly passed with the support of all members of the five permanent members, that the DPRK should not and should not be a nuclear state,” he said.
“No country is calling for this…I think the consequences of changing the policy will be very negative,” he said.
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