EOUL, South Korea — North Korea
vowed on Thursday to launch more long-range rockets and conduct its third
nuclear test, saying that it would build up
its capability of striking the United States
after the United Nations’s expansion of
sanctions against North Korea.

The North’s

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States, and
its last
remaining major ally, China, and rattled
governments in Northeast Asia that are
undergoing sensitive transitions of
power.

In a statement issued through state-run
media, the National Defense Commission,
the North’s highest governing agency,
headed by Mr. Kim, said that “a variety of
satellites and long-range rockets which
will be launched by the D.P.R.K. one after
another and a nuclear test of higher level
which will be carried out by it” will be
“targeted” at “the U.S., the sworn enemy
of the Korean people.”

The statement, which used the acronym
for the North’s official name, Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea, did not clarify
when it would conduct such a test, which
would be the first since Mr. Kim came to
power after the death of his father, Kim
Jong-il, in December 2011.

But citing preparations at the Punggye
test site in northeastern North Korea,
Army Col. Wi Yong-seob, deputy
spokesman of the Defense Ministry of
South Korea, said on Thursday, “North
Korea can conduct a nuclear test as soon
as its leadership makes up its mind.”

North Korea had previously hinted at the
possibility of conducting a nuclear test, as
its Foreign Ministry did on Wednesday
when it issued a scathing statement
rejecting a unanimous resolution that the
United Nations Security Council adopted
on Tuesday. The resolution tightened
sanctions and condemned North Korea’s
Dec. 12 rocket launching as a violation of
earlier resolutions that banned the
country from conducting any tests
involving ballistic-missile technology…