The United States urged restraint today following a North Korean artillery attack on South Korea and vowed to forge a "measured and unified" response with major powers including China.
North Korea fired several dozen artillery shells at a South Korean island in one of the heaviest bombardments of the South since the Korean War ended in 1953, sharply increasing tensions on the divided peninsula.
South Korea warned North Korea of "enormous retaliation" if it took more aggressive steps. But the United States, which has around 28,000 troops stationed in South Korea, played down the chances of any immediate US military action to deter the reclusive state.
"We're still monitoring the situation and talking with our allies. But I wouldn't say there's anything that's been initiated as a result of the incident," said Pentagon spokesman Colonel Dave Lapan.
State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the United States was seeking a unified diplomatic front with North Korea's neighbours including China, Pyongyang's sole remaining major backer which has in the past resisted international efforts to get tough with its isolated ally.
"We're not going to respond willy nilly," he said.
The White House strongly condemned the attack. US president Barack Obama was awoken at 3.55am for an emergency briefing and was outraged over the strike, the White House said. He was due to speak with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, White House spokesman Bill Burton said.
"North Korea has a pattern of doing things that are provocative. This is a particularly outrageous act," Mr Burton said aboard Air Force One as Mr Obama headed to Indiana to visit a car plant.
The South fired back after the attack and sent fighter jets to the area, but no US forces were involved in the South's response, a US official said.
Global stock markets fell in reaction to the escalting tensions. In the United States, major stock indexes such as the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 1.5 per cent while an investor flight to safety pushed up gold and the US dollar.
The artillery attack posed the second test in three days of Washington's vow that it will not reward what it deems bad behaviour with diplomatic gestures, like resuming aid-for-disarmament talks.
The attack followed revelations over the weekend of a uranium enrichment facility - a second source of atomic bomb material in Pyongyang's nuclear program.
"It is time for the international community to recognise and treat North Korea like the rogue nation that it is," said Pete Hoekstra, the leading Republican lawmaker on the House intelligence committee, calling for swift UN action.
"The Obama administration also should increase pressure on North Korea's patron, China, to reign in the rogue regime."
Stephen Bosworth, the US envoy to North Korea who was in Beijing for talks, said all sides agreed restraint was needed: "I expressed to them the desire that restraint be exercised on all sides and I think we agree on that."
North Korea's deputy UN ambassador said the incident should be discussed by the two countries, not the UN Security Council.
Envoy Pak Tok-hun said: "It should not be discussed by the Security Council but should be discussed inter-Korea between the North and South," Mr Pak said as Security Council diplomats consulted on how they might respond to the incident.
"The Security Council is dealing with threats to international peace and security," he said. "This is a regional issue between the North and South."
UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon earlier condemned the North Korean attack and voiced his "utmost concern" to British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant, the current president of the Security Council.
Analysts said the North may be again pursuing a strategy of calculated provocations to wrest diplomatic and economic concessions form the international community.
Asked about the North's motives, Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said: "I don't know. This is an extremely unpredictable government in Pyongyang and they do things that you could not possibly have predicted in a rational world."
Mr Morrell also appeared to play down the possibility of more sanctions, telling MSNBC television: "It's hard to pile more sanctions upon the North than are already there."
Reuters