(Updates with U.S. confirming test, Russia, China delaying vote) By Evelyn Leopold UNITED NATIONS, Oct 13 (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council expects to impose arms and financial sanctions on North Korea on Saturday for its reported nuclear weapons test, with U.S. intelligence pointing to confirmation that it took place. Russia and China submitted new amendments to a U.S.- drafted U.N. resolution, which are expected to delay the vote by several hours, but U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said he was confident the resolution would be adopted on Saturday. In Washington, a preliminary U.S. intelligence analysis has shown radioactivity in air samples collected near a suspected North Korean nuclear test site, a U.S. official said on Friday, five days after Pyongyang announced it conducted the test. "That's right, though this is only a first look. People have been saying all along that the working assumption is it was a nuke," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. At the United Nations, Bolton said on Friday evening that weapons-related "technical" amendments had arrived from Moscow, which council members were studying. "I'm still ready to go for a vote. We will just have to see what the instructions are overnight in particular from Moscow and China," Bolton said. "It is late in the process and the imperative for swift action because of the North Korean nuclear test remains." Seeking to meet objections from China and Russia, the latest version of the U.S.-drafted resolution makes clear the measures do not include military force under Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter. The resolution has never threatened force but China wanted to make sure the measure would not be used to justify military action against North Korea. On Friday, China's U.N. ambassador, Wang Guangya, voiced reservations about the most controversial provision in the text that authorizes nations to search cargo going to and from North Korea for nuclear materials or ballistic missiles. China wants the wording softened to make interdiction less mandatory in the resolution, while Russia has criticized other parts of the text. "We are not at the final text yet," Wang said. The draft U.N. resolution would prohibit the transfer or development of weapons of mass destruction and ban sales of luxury goods to North Korea. It would freeze funds overseas of people or businesses connected with Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programs. It also imposes an arms embargo on heavy conventional weapons and allows a travel ban on individuals connected with North Korea's dangerous weapons programs, and their families, if a council sanctions committee approves the names. RICE GOES TO ASIA In an effort to defuse the crisis, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit China, Japan and South Korea from Oct. 17 to 22 to discuss responses to North Korea's announcement on Monday of a nuclear test. A U.S. official said Rice would also likely travel to Moscow during the trip. She may meet Chinese, Russian, Japanese and South Korean officials in Beijing to underscore their unity in opposing a nuclear North Korea, a U.S. official said. North Korea remained unrepentant and blamed the United States for the international condemnation. Washington's "hostile policy ... has gone beyond the tolerance limit and a dangerous atmosphere of confrontation reminiscent of that on the eve of war is now prevailing on the Korean Peninsula," North Korea's state news agency, KCNA, said. Christopher Hill, the State Department's point man on North Korea, said the United States was not nervous about Pyongyang's "blood-curdling threats." "I can assure you we can deal with these sorts of belligerent threats," he said in remarks at Washington's National Press Club. "North Korea makes threats every day of the week, including on Sundays." China is anxious to avoid driving the North, with its 1.2 million-strong army, further into a corner, and worries about a wave of refugees if the impoverished country were to collapse. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alexyev reported from Pyongyang that North Korea favored returning to the six-party talks among the two Koreas, the United States, China, Russia and Japan, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency. North Korea walked out of the talks, aimed at ridding Pyongyang of nuclear arms in exchange for economic incentives, to protest financial sanctions by the United States. The talks have been on hold for almost a year. (David Morgan reported from Washington. Additional reporting by Michelle Nichols at the United Nations; Jack Kim in Beijing, Will Dunham and Sue Pleming in Washington, George Nishiyama and Linda Sieg in Tokyo, Oleg Shchedrov and Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow, Jon Herskovitz in Seoul and Karin Strohecker in Vienna)
