N Korea crisis puts Beijing in middle
10 July 2006
North Korea's Kim Jong-il said he is ready for an "all-out war" as the UN Security Council prepares to vote today on sanctions following last week's missile test. The comments, broadcast through that country's state media and reported around the world, were the first by the country's leader since North Korea fired seven missiles into the sea last Wednesday. They came amid a United States-led push to impose sanctions and comments by Japan that it is willing to strike first if faced with a nuclear threat. Beijing has been caught in the middle, somewhere between the Security Council's stance, its own philosophy of non-interference and the belief that more sanctions could further impoverish the country and push millions of refugees across the border.
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