Lee, Obama agree to seek tough response to N. Korean nuclear test

SEOUL, May 26 (Yonhap) -- South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and his U.S.
counterpart Barack Obama agreed Tuesday to seek a stern, unified international
reaction to North Korea's latest nuclear test as the U.N. Security Council was
moving to adopt a new resolution condemning the communist state's action.

The agreement came in a brief telephone conversation between the two leaders.
Pyongyang said it conducted an underground nuclear test early Monday. The North
detonated a nuclear device October 2006 in its first-ever nuclear experiment.
Lee held telephone talks with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso on Monday.
"President Lee and President Obama agreed to work together very closely in
dealing with North Korea," an aide to the South Korean president said, asking not
to be identified.
The official at the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae noted the communist state
may have been hoping for direct talks with Washington while shutting out Seoul.
Inter-Korean relations became strained soon after Lee's conservative
administration was inaugurated early last year.
The South Korean president earlier condemned the North Korea's nuclear test as a
disappointment while Obama called it a "great threat" to the peace and security
of the world.
"Now the United States and the international community must take action in
response," Obama told reporters in Washington.
Under a U.N. Security Council resolution adopted shortly after the North's first
nuclear test in 2006, Pyongyang is prohibited from any nuclear or ballistic
missile activities.
bdk@yna.co.kr
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