Several days ago North Korea claimed a successful nuclear test, despite pressure from the international community for it to abandon its nuclear weapons program. It also has brought into sharp focus on International peace and security, provisionally in East Asian Region which can trigger an arms race.

The blast was believed to have occurred at an underground facility in North Hamgyong province of North Korea. Many defence analysts believe North Korea does not yet have the capability to do that, but there seemed no reason to believe North Korea was bluffing. Both Russian and U.S. experts said they believed the claim was accurate and that the explosion may have had the power of about 15 kilotons of TNT, roughly the same as the Hiroshima bomb in 1945.

The world leaders condemn the North Korean act because it has threatened peace and stability. Therefore they are calling for sanction in the Security Council on North Korea under Chapter Seven of The UN Charter which deals with “threats to the peace” and “acts of aggression”.

International Atomic Energy Agency reported nuclear test threatens the nuclear non-proliferation regime and creates serious security challenges not only for the East Asian region but also for the international community. The problem is Pyongyang pulled out of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003 and has refused for a year to attend talks aimed at ending its nuclear ambitions, so the treaty was no longer binding for North Korean.

North Korea also test-fired seven missiles in July this year, including a failed test on a long-range Taepodong-2 thought capable of reaching the U.S., that is why North Korea’s nuclear weapons test creates “a grave threat” to the U.S. and its allies in trying to rein in the rogue state, in spite of opens a dangerous new chapter in nuclear proliferation. Consequently hard-liners in Washington have called for a pre-emptive attack on the North’s nuclear sites in the case of an imminent threat.

Even the motive to use pre-emptive attack has a good purpose, but my personal though will not agree with that action. Because, however, legitimating of the so-called right of pre-emptive attack would be a free licence for unrestrained and whimsical unilateral use of force by the mighty against the weaker countries, and odes violence to the UN Charter scheme of international community action through the instrumentality of the Security Council.

As we know that The U.S. and its partners in East Asia have had a broad array of financial sanctions in place for months that affected to the root of economical problems for North Korea. Indeed, analysts in Seoul, Beijing and Washington believe Pyongyang’s fury over the sanctions was one of the reasons behind its defiant nuclear test. North Korea’s claimed nuclear test is the culmination of nearly two decades of confrontation with the United States, a dangerous game of chicken in the heart of the world’s most dynamic economic region. Therefore, China and some other countries reluctant to back tough U.N. sanctions, pristine drafted by the US, which calls for sanctions on North Korea over its claimed nuclear test. They don’t want Pyongyang responds with “strong countermeasures” that will inflict the countries surroundings the North Korea if the sanctions are enforced.

Therefore, from the other end of the political spectrum, Taylor Marsh argues that the North Korean test is further proof of the failure of the Bush administration’s diplomacy, in first dumping Bill Clinton’s policy and then taunting Pyongyang by bracketing North Korea with Iran and Iraq in the “axis of evil”. The North Korean learned from Iraq that they need to be as nasty as they can be to avoid an invasion from.

From Iran to North Korea to Venezuela one is witnessing a strategic calculation by anti-western leaders to call the west’s bluff is it on the strength of Oil dollars or on the weakness of an overstretched U.S. Military with a diminished public appetite for pre-emptive Military action. We are absolutely agree that the nuclear proliferation shall be exterminated, nevertheless if the US, UK and other governments wish to stop other countries having nuclear weapons then I think they should lead by giving an amity example first.

[The writer is a Postgraduate Student of Master of Comparative Law at Faculty of Law, University of Delhi. He can be reached through his email: pm_faiz_kw@yahoo.com or log on into http://faizlawjournal.blogspot.com]