North Korea might need to be stopped by other methods than economic sanctions, Dr Andy Jackson warned.
Speaking to ABC News, he said: “Economic sanctions don’t seem to work.
“They don’t seem to be having the desired effect.
“These missile tests are not slowing down, they have been 22, 20-odd tests this year.”
The Monash University professor said the sanctions imposed by the UN are not impacting North Korea as hoped.
US officials released images which claim to show Chinese tankers transferring fuel to North Korean ships 30 times in just three months despite UN sanctions preventing countries from trading with Kim Jong-un’s regime.
Dr Jackson said: “They don’t seem to be impacting the areas that Washington wants them to impact – the elites and the military.
“If anything these oil supplies that get through to the north are going to be diverted to the military.
“There’s a significant amount of research going into economic sanctions which suggest that actually as more official trade is blocked by economic sanctions, the amount of cross-border unofficial trade actually increases.”
“So for all these reasons we might want to think about changing our strategy towards North Korea.”
Dr Jackson added that military response is one option that could rid the world of Kim Jong-un’s threat.
He said: “The worst option is military action.
“Although Trump said it was on the table, I don’t see him going down that road, he knows the implications.”
The revelations that China had breached the sanctions has sparked anger in South Korea, which has repeatedly urged China to cut ties with Kim Jong-un’s hermit kingdom.
Tensions in the region have soared this year, leading to fears Kim’s provocative nuclear and missile tests could spark World War 3.