North Korea warns nukes 'as precious as life'

North Korea has lashed out at China, warning it will never give up nuclear weapons.

In a rare criticism of its main trading partner and last real ally, Pyongyang's state news agency said the country would "never beg for the maintenance of friendship with China".

North Korea's nuclear programme was "as precious as its own life", the commentary said.

China accounts for 90% of North Korea's external trade, the bulk of which travels over the China-Korea Friendship Bridge from the northeastern Chinese city of Dandong.

The southern border, between the two rival Koreas, is heavily militarised, but here the Yalu River is all that separates the two countries.

We set off down the river in a speedboat, on a section where Chinese tourists are allowed up close to North Korea on sightseeing trips.

Our guide points out what he says is the start of North Korean territory, around 100 meters away, and a military camp. We can see soldiers moving in the shadows of a building beyond.

The river here is shared, but the land on either side through this stretch is North Korean - we watch an ageing ferry, carrying passengers and their bicycles, navigating its way slowly across.

Two men in uniform stand guard at the back, affecting not to notice the large Chinese tourist boat that has pulled alongside.

Our progress is carefully monitored from the shore - a border guard peering out through binoculars from a watchtower.

Up on a hilltop, we could see more military personnel, this time in naval uniform, shovelling material into large white sacks.

Further along, what looked like a barracks, a soldier scrubbing clothes down by the shoreline, another having his head shaved in the shade.

This is what daily life looks like in one of the world's most repressive and isolated states - an impoverished country whose leader is determined to develop nuclear weapons, capable of reaching the US mainland.

Thus far, the main thrust of President Trump's strategy for dealing with North Korea, seems to involve getting China, under his new great friend, Xi Jinping, to "solve" the situation for him.

But China and the United States' interests here are not the same.

Much as Chinese officials do not want to see a nuclear-armed state right here on their border, neither do they want to see American troops, which they fear could follow the collapse of the Kim regime, on a peninsula unified under the leadership of Seoul, an American ally.

"The core of the problem is China's strategic distrust of the United States," explained Yanmei Xie, China policy analyst at Gavekal Dragonomic.

"China's ultimate nightmare is a united Korean peninsula allied with the United States.

"In comparison with that, a rogue regime next door armed with nuclear weapons is uncomfortable, annoying, embarrassing, and brings trouble to China, but it is a lesser threat to China than a US ally right next door."

So while China may be prepared to put a little more pressure on Kim Jong-Un, at least enough to placate Washington, and to cool the situation down, it does not want to bring about his regime's demise.

Instead, Beijing continues to provide the means for its survival.

Seventy per cent of North Korea's trade travels over the China-Korea Friendship Bridge in Dandong.

We watched truck after truck heading across.

North Korea also depends on China for supplies of oil.

So whilst China likes to protest it doesn't have control over Pyongyang, it does have the power to cut off its main economic lifeline.

Thus far, it has chosen not to do so.

In February, China banned North Korean coal imports, as part of its enforcement of UN sanctions, but overall trade between the two countries for the first three months of the year was up 37%.

A shop-owner along the route in Dandong told us he sees around 150 to 200 trucks pass by here every day.

This year is no different, he said.

By;Worldcoinsmoney.blogspot.com