During the Chinese New Year, North Korea presented China with a special gift – a nuclear test it had previously been told to abandon, sending jitters to the whole world.

Facing a militant yet reckless North Korea, it is China who more urgently needs to contain North Korea's nuclear programmes, and in doing so must take on the responsibility and capability to provide countermeasures to North Korea's frequent nuclear provocations.

North Korea has been sending a rather clear message to the international community via its ballistic missile test, satellite launches, and nuclear tests, all the while ignoring Chinese authorities – ironically widely regarded as its only ally.

Since Kim Jong-Un assumed North Korea's leadership, the country has made more aggressive and frequent efforts in consolidating its decaying regime through military measures. Yet North Korea should already know that such doings will not earn global respect or lift its people from impoverishment; instead, they further endanger North Korean people.

There are misconceptions both in China and in the international community that North Korea's moderate development in nuclear weapons increases China's North Korean stake. But in fact, North Korea's possession of nuclear weapon contradicts with China's interests long before it turns into an international disaster.

For China, a country that has been sparing no effort in shielding North Korea, the further North Korea takes its development of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), the weaker China's influence will be. China in turn will have to discard the notion that it can control North Korea.

Once North Korea possesses nuclear weapons, it will soon wish to assume a position equal to that of China in the international community and will likely use its nuclear threat to solidify its bargaining position with the United States, Japan, and South Korea.

In this regard, North Korea has already been too costly a neighbour to benefit China's foreign policy.

China should give the U.S. its silent consent to launch operations against North Korea's nuclear facilities. It should also support more severe and concrete sanctions against the regime.

Destroying North Korea in a short period will be extremely costly for any country; that does not fit China's own national interest. Cutting down its nuclear capability, however, will be a better solution and is possible via sanctions, surgical operations, and Special Forces' raids.

The U.S. and its allies in East Asia have long mulled such operations; they haven't done it so far largely due to China's objections to any military intervention in North Korea.

But in light of the present Korean Peninsula situation, China has to open its mind to other solutions as to create a real containment of North Korea before more advanced WMD are produced.

Limited by its own resources, economic and technological capabilities, a comprehensive sanction combined with blockade is feasible to trim down North Korea's nuclear weapon production and upgrade. Before North Korea truly agrees to cooperate, China should send more such messages to the international community to support those countermeasures against North Korea.

Meanwhile, China should prepare its own detailed countermeasures against North Korea's recklessness, not only to show the world that North Korea is not China's protégé, but also as it is the only option to prevent North Korea from endangering China with its WMD.

North Korea's WMD are destructive to the U.S. and its allies as much as they form a hazard to China. To ensure its own nuclear facility's safety, North Korea is building bases closer to China's border, evident of its intention to force China's involvement.

Once the war starts, these WMD facilities are first to be destroyed. When that really happens, the pollution, and even the damaging power, will affect China. In the worst case scenario, should internal conflicts arise in North Korea with a coup d'état, it would be difficult to ensure those nuclear warheads will not target China.

China's continuous efforts in protecting its neighbor North Korea might be a result of traditional friendship, mutual sympathy and even for the sake of continuation only. North Korea used to serve as China's strategic screen and a buffer zone to fend off any menace from the U.S., Japan and South Korea.

But the recent drastic developments force China to reconsider its North Korea policies. China should have a contingency plan for the possible post-North Korea era as to prepare itself for all problems should North Korea face annexation one day. The plan ought to include responses to any possible disasters occurring in the neighbouring country, as well as China's policy shift regarding Northeast Asia and its own sovereign security.

The author is a news commentator.

This article was first published in Chinese and translated by Chen Boyuan.

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.