The ruling Saenuri Party’s former floor leader Rep. Won Yoo-chul on Friday renewed his call for nuclear armament in South Korea, in response to North Korea’s fifth and strongest nuclear test earlier in the day. 

The fifth-term lawmaker said the government should promptly begin the process of developing nuclear weapons. Other preventive measures, such as sanctions by the United States and the United Nations, have failed to discourage the communist regime’s nuclear ambitions, he added. 

“Obtaining nukes is the most effective way to deter a nuclear threat,” the former chairman of the parliamentary National Defense Committee said in a statement issued after the test which is believed to have produced a more powerful explosive than previous tests. 
 

Won, a leading advocate of nuclear armament, said in a recent interview with The Korea Herald that Seoul’s nuclear power status is crucial to maintaining the balance of power with Pyeongyang and that the South should use the North’s nuclear test as a “trigger” to obtain nukes. 

The lawmaker, who also heads a parliamentary group for nuclear armament, suggested that the concept of nuclear armament includes measures ranging from the development of nukes to the redeployment of US tactical nuclear weapons here. 

Won’s proposal was once dismissed as “individual opinion’ by the party leadership, however, the assertive stance against the North appeared to gain traction this time in the conservative party. The Saenuri Party’s spokesman Rep. Yeom Dong-yeol said the party is paying attention to the “rising call for stronger self-defense measures.” 

The Saenuri Party’s floor leader Rep. Chung Jin-suk also took up the issue, urging the military to seek measures to deter the North’s nuclear threats such as by introducing a nuclear submarine against the North’s submarine-launched ballistic missiles. 

The three leading political parties, meanwhile, agreed to adopt a joint resolution condemning the North’s nuclear test. The resolution, which was approved unanimously by the members of the Assembly’s foreign affairs, trade and unification committee later in the day, is expected to clear the National Assembly on Sep. 20. 

In the draft resolution, lawmakers from the Saenuri Party, The Minjoo Party and the People’s Party urged the government to impose tougher sanctions on the nuclear provocations while continuing efforts to resolve cross-border tension peacefully.

By Yeo Jun-suk  (jasonyeo@heraldcorp.com)