Obama: N. Korea 'recklessly challenging' the world

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Obama: N. Korea 'recklessly challenging' the world
By MERRILL HARTSON
Associated Press Writer

AP Photo/Evan Vucci

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama said Monday that North Korea's latest nuclear test should be "a matter of grave concern to all nations" and accused Pyongyang of behaving recklessly and defying international will.

Obama also said in an early-morning statement that the United States "will continue working with our allies and partners" in multilateral talks and will hold consultations with members of the U.N. Security Council on it and a subsequent series of test-firings of short-range ground-to-air missiles.

In Pyongyang earlier, North Korea said that it had carried out a powerful underground nuclear test - much larger than one conducted in 2006. The regime also test-fired three short-range, ground-to-air missiles later Monday from the same northeastern site where it launched a rocket last month, the Yonhap news agency reported, citing unnamed sources.

The rocket liftoff, widely believed to be a cover for a test of its long-range missile technology, drew censure from the U.N. Security Council, which scheduled a meeting in New York for later Monday.

Reining in Pyongyang's nuclear program has been a continuing problem for U.S. administrations, dating to the Clinton administration. Former President George W. Bush labeled North Korea as a country that was part of an international "axis of evil," but the United States subsequently removed Pyongyang from its list of official state sponsors of terrorism when it shut down a nuclear installation late in the Bush administration.

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