China counters Trump, says N Korea efforts ‘indispensable’

Bloomberg

China hit back at US President Donald Trump on Wednesday, saying its efforts on North Korea have been “indispensable.”
China has “played an important and constructive role” in seeking peace on the Korean peninsula, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told reporters in Beijing. China strictly implements United Nations Security Council resolutions and isn’t the crux of the North Korean issue, he said.
The remarks came a day after Trump said that China had failed to rein in North Korea. The comment suggested he’s weighing new options to deal with a regime that’s vowed to develop nuclear weapons capable of striking the US mainland.
“While I greatly appreciate the efforts of President Xi & China to help with North Korea, it has not worked out,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “At least I know China tried!” Trump commented the day after a 22-year-old college student died in Ohio following more than a year of imprisonment in North Korea. A State Department spokeswoman said Tuesday the U.S. was considering possible steps including a ban on Americans traveling to the country.
Otto Warmbier, who was held for allegedly stealing a propaganda banner, was returned to the US last week in a coma. Trump said afterward the U.S. should have secured his release sooner, calling his treatment “a disgrace” and the North Korean government “a brutal regime.”
The furor in the US over Warmbier’s death recalls the raw emotions felt after a chemical weapons attack in Syria killed children, prompting Trump to fire cruise missiles at an airbase operated by President Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Yet dropping bombs on Kim Jong Un’s nation—an option the U.S. says remains on the table—is so risky that many analysts see it as implausible because of North Korea’s ability to launch a devastating attack on its neighbors in North Asia.
Warmbier’s death is “an outrage even by North Korean standards,” said John Delury, an associate professor of Chinese studies at Yonsei University in Seoul. “It does demand something that’s beyond the typical response. But what do you do? How do you punish North Korea? The instinctive response, such as a travel ban, would not punish the people who killed Otto Warmbier.”
Spy satellites have detected what appear to be modifications around a tunnel entrance to an underground test area at North Korea’s nuclear test site, CNN reported Wednesday, citing two U.S. officials it did not identify. It said military options for North Korea had been updated and would be presented to Trump.

Political Pressure
White House press secretary Sean Spicer didn’t signal any change in the administration’s approach to North Korea in a briefing Tuesday, saying the US “will continue to apply economic and political pressure and try to continue to work with our allies.” But shortly after Spicer spoke, Trump posted his statement on Twitter.
Trump’s administration talked up the threat of military action earlier this year, sending aircraft carrier strike groups to the region. In April, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi warned a war would devastate the region.
Since then, things had appeared to calm down. North Korea has refrained from testing a nuclear device and is yet to test an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. In turn, U.S. officials focused on diplomatic efforts. The new government in South Korea has repeatedly said it wants to use both sanctions and dialogue to rein Kim in.
In one interview, Trump appeared to empathize with Kim, telling Reuters that taking over North Korea after his father’s death was “a very hard thing to do.” He told Bloomberg in May he’d be open to meeting Kim under the right conditions.
The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that U.S. diplomats have held discussions for more than a year with North Korea’s top nuclear negotiator, focused on freeing American prisoners. Warmbier’s death undercuts any progress from those meetings.
“This makes dealing with Kim Jong Un so toxic,” Ralph Cossa, president of the Pacific Forum CSIS in Honolulu.