North Korea nuclear test provocative - Bishop
Australia has joined other nations in condemning North Korea's latest nuclear test.
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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, in Micronesia for a meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum, said the country's reckless conduct put the world's peace at risk.
'Australia utterly condemns the reckless provocative, dangerous action by North Korea today with this nuclear test', he told reporters, while Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, in London, said the country's action was provocative and it should be doing more to help its own people.
'While North Korea is testing nuclear weapons and carrying out these nuclear and ballistic tests, their people are suffering', she told reporters in London.
'The long-suffering people of North Korea need a regime that focuses on their needs, not provocative behaviour that represents a global and regional threat'.
The latest nuclear blast, detected on Friday, is Pyongyang's fifth atomic test and the second in eight months. It appears to have produced the largest explosive yield of any of the tests.
After initial reports of seismic activity, North Korea confirmed it had conducted a 'higher level' nuclear warhead test explosion, which it is trumpeting as finally allowing it to build 'at will' an array of stronger, smaller and lighter nuclear weapons.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye strongly condemned the test, saying in a statement that it showed the "fanatic recklessness of the Kim Jong Un government as it clings to nuclear development."
US President Barack Obama, who was briefed on board Air Force One by National Security Adviser Susan Rice about reported seismic activity near North Korea's nuclear test site earlier on Friday, said any provocative actions by North Korea would have 'serious consequences' .
China said it 'resolutely opposes' North Korea's nuclear test and 'intensely urges' Pyongyang to abide by its non-proliferation promises, while Japan described it as a grave threat to its national security.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called the test, and the 21 missile launches carried out by North Korea this year, unacceptable and said Japan would request an emergency meeting of the UN executive body.syd
France has also condemned the test.
'France vigorously condemns the new nuclear test that was conducted last night by North Korea and calls the United Nations' security council to take up this violation of its resolutions', the French presidency said in a statement.
The test was 'deeply troubling' and in defiance of Security Council resolutions, the head of the UN's nuclear watchdog said'.
This is in clear violation of numerous UN Security Council resolutions and in complete disregard of the repeated demands of the international community,' said International Atomic Energy Agency Director Yukiya Amano.'It is a deeply troubling and regrettable act,' he says in a statement.
Credit: Sky news
