China urges restraint after N. Korea put army on alert
2013/10/09 17:51
BEIJING, Oct. 9 (Yonhap) -- China called for "calm and restraint" on the Korean Peninsula on Wednesday, a day after North Korea put its military on full alert against a major joint naval drill involving South Korea, the U.S. and Japan.
The three-day drill, led by U.S. nuclear-powered supercarrier USS George Washington, had been originally scheduled to begin off the Peninsula's south coast from Tuesday, but was postponed for a few days because of an approaching powerful typhoon.
"We call on all relevant parties to bear in mind the overall interests of this region ... keep calm, exercise restraint and maintain the momentum of dialogues," China's foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said when asked about the North's latest moves against the naval drills.
Hua also called for an early resumption of the six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear programs that have been stalled since 2008.
She said all concerned parties should do their best to create proper conditions for the talks to reopen at an early date.
The six-party talks involve the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Russia and Japan.
South Korea's intelligence agency told lawmakers on Tuesday that North Korea has restarted a plutonium-producing reactor, a move that may give the country more fissile fuel to make bombs.
The Soviet-built 5-megawatt reactor in North Korea's main nuclear complex of Yongbyon has long been at the center of international focus as it is believed to have been used by the North to obtain weapons-grade plutonium to make bombs in the 1990s and 2000s.
As part of an aid-for-disarmament deal with the U.S., North Korea mothballed the graphite-modulated reactor in the mid-2000s, but it announced in April that it will put the facility back in operation, insisting that it has become a nuclear weapons state.
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