If North Korea carries out a nuclear test, the United States would immediately ask for stronger sanctions at the United Nations, a diplomat warned on Tuesday, after the failure last week of a American resolution against Pyongyang blocked by China and the Russia.

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Asked about a possible new attempt to pass a UN resolution against North Korea, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, US ambassador to the UN and whose country chaired the Security Council in May, thundered: "Absolutely, We will do it !".

But "we must first apply the sanctions over which we already have authority" before "obviously pushing for additional sanctions as we have been trying to do lately," insisted the American diplomat.

Ms. Thomas-Greenfield was referring to the May 26 veto by Russia and China of an American resolution in the Security Council to strengthen international sanctions against Pyongyang and its ballistic missile attacks.

Faced with this Sino-Russian blockage on Thursday, Washington then accused Beijing and Moscow of emboldening Pyongyang, promising new unilateral American punitive measures.

In fact, on Friday, the US Treasury announced new financial sanctions following the latest North Korean missile launches, including an intercontinental one, on May 24, just after President Joe Biden's visit to Asia at the end of May. These measures target two Russian banks accused of supporting the communist regime's weapons of mass destruction program.

In addition, the United States expects an imminent nuclear test from Pyongyang, breaking the moratorium observed since 2017, even if this fear did not materialize during the visit of the American president to Northeast Asia. came to support Japan and South Korea.

If the North Koreans have developed their ballistic armament and have several atomic bombs, they have not yet succeeded, according to diplomats, in combining the two technologies in order to have a missile with a nuclear head.