China, Missile Tests | featured news

It remains unclear just when, if ever, North Korea will attempt their controversial third nuclear test, but there are growing signs that the reclusive nation's biggest political ally is growing weary of its behavior.

China has provided some assistance to North Korea's missile program, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Thursday, a week after the hermit state's failed rocket launch triggered international condemnation.

India announced plans Wednesday to test launch a new long-range missile, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead as far as the Chinese capital Beijing for the first time. Officials and defense experts said if the tests of the Agni-V missile proved successful, it would mark a significant improvement in India’s nuclear deterrent capability, and would strengthen its hand in a hostile neighborhood, sandwiched between nuclear-armed rivals Pakistan and China.

A joke circulating among officials in Beijing pretty much underlines the bind China is in over North Korea's plans to send a satellite into space. North Korea's young ruler Kim Jong-un phones a Chinese leader to tell him about timing of the planned rocket launch. "When will it be?" asks the Chinese leader. Kim replies: "Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four..."