TANZANIA, Tanzania — The United States and its allies on Monday urged the UN Security Council to condemn illegal ballistic missile launches by North Korea, but China and Russia have accused the United States of escalating tensions with intensified military drills targeting Pyongyang.
At the emergency meeting, US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council that the US would propose a presidential statement, saying that at a minimum all 15 members should agree to condemn missile launches without North Korea’s precedent, to urge Pyongyang to comply with UN security. The Council sanctions the resolutions and “engages in a constructive dialogue”.
A presidential statement from the Security Council requires the support of all of its members, including North Korea’s closest allies, China and Russia.
Thomas-Greenfield said on Monday that the United States condemned “in the strongest terms” the firing of two short-range ballistic missiles by North Korea, following the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on Saturday, as ” gross violations’ of the Council’s ban on ballistic missile launches.
North Korea’s threatening rhetoric and launches undermine international peace and security, Thomas-Greenfield said.
And she warned the council that her silence and failure to condemn North Korea’s missile activities “leads to futility.”
But Pyongyang’s allies China and Russia have countered that what is needed now is a dialogue between North Korea and the Biden administration, a de-escalation of military exercises, an easing of sanctions against the North Korea and the approval of a resolution they circulated in November 2021 that aims to resolve the situation on the Korean Peninsula.
This resolution urges the Security Council to end a series of sanctions against North Korea and calls on the United States and North Korea to resume dialogue and consider taking steps to reduce tensions and the risk of military confrontation, including adopting a declaration or peace treaty formally ending the 1950-53 Korean War. The war ended in an armistice, technically leaving the peninsula in a state of war.
China’s deputy ambassador to the UN, Dai Bing, said the joint US-South Korean military exercises “on a higher level and on a larger scale”, the deployment of US strategic assets and the very of the NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, in Seoul and Tokyo two weeks ago, are “very provocative” for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), “and aggravate the feeling of insecurity”.
“Given that the United States has repeatedly expressed its willingness to engage in unconditional dialogue with the DPRK, it should take concrete steps to initiate and maintain dialogue,” he said. Prosecuting exclusively and piling up penalties will only lead to a stalemate.”
Russia’s deputy ambassador Dmitry Polyansky told the council that North Korea was responding with missile tests to “unprecedented military maneuvers in the region under the protection of the United States, which are clearly anti-Pyongyang in nature.” “.
Japan’s UN ambassador Kimihiro Ishikane, whose country convened the emergency meeting, told the council that Saturday’s intercontinental ballistic missile fell in Japan’s exclusive economic zone just 200 kilometers away. Hokkaido, where people could see it falling from the sky.
“I guess we can all imagine how terrifying it must have been to see a missile flying towards you,” he said, pointing out that it endangered ships and planes and was “an act of ‘intimidation and threat by force’.
To those who argue that Security Council meetings provoke North Korea “and therefore we must remain silent,” Mr. Ishikane countered that remaining silent “will only encourage offenders to write the playbook as they see fit”.
After the meeting, Ms. Thomas-Greenfield read a statement on behalf of 10 Council nations and South Korea, surrounded by their ambassadors, strongly condemning the latest missile launches and urging the other five Council nations to join in. condemnation of the “irresponsible behavior of the DPRK”.
The 11 countries – Albania, Ecuador, France, Japan, Malta, Mozambique, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States and South Korea – “remain fully committed to diplomacy and continue to call on the DPRK to resume dialogue,” the statement read.
“But we will not remain silent as the DPRK expands its illegal nuclear and missile capabilities, threatening international peace and security,” the statement said.
