This week the world became a more dangerous place. North Korea’s successful launch of a long-range rocket brings closer the possibility that the rogue nuclear state could one day hit targets as far away as the US. The threat is not yet nuclear because the technology is not sophisticated enough. But the intention is clear.

The launch – dressed up as an attempt to send a civil satellite into space – should dash any hopes that Kim Jong-eun, the country’s new Swiss-educated leader, is more open to international engagement than his father. Instead he seems bent on reinforcing Kim Jong-il’s nuclear ambitions to bolster his own hold on power.

Recently the world has been preoccupied by Iran’s nuclear programme. Yet North Korea is more worrying. It has several nuclear bombs and uranium enrichment facilities. It is also more advanced than Tehran in developing ballistic missiles. Given the Kim dynasty’s habit of selling expertise to any and all comers, it may now only be a matter of time before this is transferred to Iran and beyond.