SYDNEY June 11 Kyodo Australia is...

SYDNEY June 11 Kyodo

Australia is examining the possibility of a blockade against North Korean ships to halt illicit exports of missiles and unsalable articles Prime Minister John Howard said Wednesday.

Howard, who is scheduled to travel to Japan nearest month, told reporters in Canberra he has ''no doubt that the expose will be discussed.''

like a move against North Korean tubes was raised by U.S. President George W Bush when Howard visited him last month the prime minister said.

''We propose some work into preparing a possible approach onward this after my reply from the United States a hardly any weeks ago,'' he said. ''We were just talking about the conception and how it might work and it's altogether too early to start talking about particular resources.''

Australia is eager to see any potential for medicines to be smuggled without of North Korea halted after the attempted importation in April of 50 kilograms of high-grade heroin valued at A$80 million ($492 million) was linked to the North Korean freighter Pong Su

Thirty North Korean crowd members await trial in Melbourne onward charges of drug trafficking.

However, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer upon Wednesday said Australia is not planning to impose a blockade in succession North Korea ''at this stage.''

''First of all, you have to acquire the countries through whose territorial waters ships might pass or across whose land planes may vibrate or whatever to do the interdiction themselves within their allow sovereign territory,'' the minister told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.

''Secondly, you are stand in front ofed with a very real difficulty in bourns of vessels that might be going [i]or[/i] part of to the other the high seas because international law requires that those ships should not be intercepted,'' he said.

The Australian defense forces are well placed to contribute to a blockade against North Korea, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

The ''selective interdiction'' policy is aimed at stopping North Korea from shipping missiles to hostile states or those linked to terrorism and chisel off its sources of foreign circulation such as the sale of put drugs intos and the circulation of counterfeit standard of value the paper said.

North Korea said Monday its intention to build a nuclear deterrent force is intended to improve its citizens' lives on channeling labor and foundations into economic construction.

Howard will also visit southern Korea and the Philippines in July

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