The United States and its allies have clashed with China and Russia over North Korea’s escalating ballistic missile launches and US-led military exercises in South Korea, barring any action by the re-divided UN Security Council.
The United States and its allies have clashed with China and Russia over North Korea’s escalating ballistic missile launches and US-led military exercises in South Korea, barring any action by the re-divided UN Security Council.
The US and its allies clashed with China and Russia on Friday North Korea’s growing ballistic missile launch and US-led military exercises in South Korea, again preventing any action by the deeply divided UN Security Council.
US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said North Korea’s “59 ballistic missile launches this year”, including 13 from October 27 and “unprecedented impacts” at a range of about 50 kilometers (30 miles) off the coast of South Korea, have been reported. They are more than willing to advance Pyongyang’s military capabilities and create tension and fear among their neighbours.
He said 13 of the 15 members of the Security Council have condemned North Korea’s actions since the beginning of the year, but Pyongyang has been protected by Russia and China, following UN sanctions by the Democratic People’s Republic of China. -Bars are “bent backwards” to justify violations. Korea, or DPRK, the official name of the country.
“And, in turn, they enabled the DPRK and made fun of this council,” she said.
China’s UN ambassador Zhang Jun countered that the DPRK missile launch is directly linked to the relaunch of massive US-South Korean military exercises after a five-year break, involving hundreds of warplanes. He also pointed to the U.S. Department of Defense’s 2022 Nuclear Posture Review, which he said envisages the DPRK’s use of nuclear weapons and claims that ending the DPRK regime is one of the strategy’s main goals. .
Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Anna Evstigneeva blamed the significantly deteriorating situation on the Korean peninsula on “Washington’s willingness to impose sanctions and pressure and compel unilateral disarmament using force”.
He described the US-South Korean exercises, which began on October 31 with about 240 military aircraft, to be of unprecedented size and claimed they were “essentially a rehearsal for carrying out large-scale strikes in the territory of the DPRK.”
The US’s Thomas-Greenfield responded to China and Russia’s claims that military exercises were creating tensions on the Korean peninsula: “This is nothing but propaganda for the DPRK.” It said the long-running defensive military exercise “posed no threat to anyone, let alone the DPRK.”
“In contrast, just last month, the DPRK said that a flurry of recent launches were the spurious use of strategic battlefield nuclear weapons to ‘hit and wipe’ potential targets of the US and the Republic of Korea,” she said. “The DPRK is only using this as an excuse to further its illegal programs.”
After North Korea’s first nuclear test explosion in 2006, the Security Council imposed sanctions and tightened them over the years, seeking to rein in its nuclear and ballistic missile programs and cut funding. In May, however, China and Russia blocked a Security Council resolution that tightened sanctions on missile launches in the first serious crackdown on the council over sanctions against North Korea.
The rift remains and appears to be deepening, but Russia, China and the United States have agreed on one thing: the need for renewed dialogue and a diplomatic solution to the escalating crisis on the Korean peninsula.
China’s Xun called on the United States to “prevent unilateral tensions and confrontations” and to “respond to the legitimate and reasonable concerns of the DPRK to create conditions for the resumption of meaningful dialogue”. And he added that the Security Council should, instead of demanding additional pressure on the DPRK, “contribute to the resumption of dialogue and negotiations and to resolve the humanitarian and livelihood difficulties facing the DPRK.”
Russia’s Evstigneeva said further sanctions would risk “unacceptable social, economic and humanitarian upheaval” to North Korean citizens, and reiterated the need for “preventive diplomacy and the importance of Washington finding political diplomatic solutions and genuine steps”, A more substantive dialogue than promises to establish.”
Ms Thomas-Greenfield also said in the face of the DPRK’s escalating missile launch, “the United States is committed to a diplomatic solution” and conveyed to the DPRK its request for dialogue at all levels of the US government.
“Despite our lack of engagement with Pyongyang, we will continue to have meaningful dialogue,” he said.