Obama, G8 leaders boost pressure on N Korea, Iran

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Managing Director & CEO of Sonali Bank Limited Md Humayun Kabir presiding over a performance evaluation meeting organised by the bank in the city recently. Other high officials of the bank also attended the meeting.

ONTARIO, June 27 (Reuters): US President Barack Obama led the Group of Eight (G8) rich nations Saturday deploring what they said was North Korea's sinking of a South Korean warship, and Obama said there must be consequences for such irresponsible action.
The G8 closed its annual summit with a strong statement accusing Pyongyang of stoking tensions that could spread far beyond northeast Asia, and urged North Korea and Iran to halt atomic programs which have set the world on edge.
Obama said the United States (US) firmly backed South Korea's push for the UN Security Council to condemn North Korea for the March 26 attack, which killed 46 South Korean sailors and sharpened tensions on the divided Korean peninsula.
"We are fully supportive of that effort and we think it is the right thing to do," Obama told reporters after a meeting with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit in Toronto.
North Korea has denied responsibility for the attack and China, Pyongyang's main backer, has not said if it would be ready to back new UN moves against the unpredictable, nuclear-armed state.
In a review of the world's hotspots, the G8 pressed Israel and the Palestinians to work for direct peace talks, and said conditions in Gaza under an Israeli blockade were "not sustainable and must be changed."
The G8 highlighted fears over nuclear proliferation, and fingered North Korea and Iran as major threats.
"The governments of Iran and North Korea have chosen to acquire weapons to threaten their neighbors. The world must see to it that what they spend on these weapons will not be the only costs they incur," Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said.