WASHINGTON, Feb 6 : The campaign to win China's backing for deeper sanctions against North Korea gained in intensity on Friday, with the US and South Korean presidents making their case directly to Xi Jinping.
Presidents Barack Obama and Park Geun-Hye spoke to their Chinese counterpart by phone in separate calls to demand punitive measures following a recent nuclear test.
On January 6 Pyongyang detonated what it claimed was a powerful thermonuclear bomb.
The unpredictable hermit state has followed up by threatening to launch a satellite-bearing rocket -- an operation widely seen as a covert ballistic missile test.
The White House and its allies want to respond with a UN resolution that would slap more sanctions on the North.
But they must first win the backing of UN veto power China, which has in the past shielded its neighbour.      ?AFP