North Korea's warning to neighbours over UN sanctions

NORTH Korea warned South Korea yesterday against joining United States-led sanctions against Pyongyang, saying any such move would be seen as a serious provocation leading to a "crisis of war".

The UN Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution applying sanctions to the North for its 9 October nuclear test, but South Korea - a major aid provider to the impoverished North - has been reluctant to adopt stern measures against its volatile neighbour.

The UN resolution calls for all member countries to state how they plan to implement sanctions within 30 days of the 14 October adoption.

Seoul's sanctions task force held its first meeting on Tuesday, Lee Kyu-hyung, the vice foreign minister, said.

But the North warned that any move by South Korea to impose trade, travel and financial sanctions would be seen as a "declaration of confrontation" that would elicit "corresponding measures" from Pyongyang. "If North-South relations collapse due to reckless and imprudent sanctions against us, the South Korean authorities will be fully responsible for it and will have to pay a high price," the North's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland said.

In its first official confirmation of the North's nuclear test, South Korea's science and technology ministry said yesterday that xenon - an inert gas released when there is a nuclear explosion - had been found in air samples collected in South Korea.

The South Korean task force reviewing the UN sanctions is expected to focus on two key inter-Korean economic projects. One is a tourism programme run by South Korea at North Korea's Diamond Mountain and the other is an industrial complex in the North Korean city of Kaesong.

At least $900 million has been sent north under the projects since the late 1990s, and Washington suspects the funds might have helped the North's arms programmes.