N Korea sanctions ‘act of war’
NORTH Korea yesterday slammed fresh UN sanctions imposed over its missile tests as an “act of war”, its first response to the latest diplomatic move to punish Pyongyang’s ever-accelerating weapons drive.
Tension has been high on the flashpoint peninsula as the isolated but nuclear-armed regime has staged a series of atomic and intercontinental ballistic missile tests – most recently on November 29.
The latest launch of the Hwasong-15 ICBM, seen capable of hitting all major US cities, further heightened global alarm over the rapid advance in the country’s weapons technology.
“We fully reject the latest UN sanctions . . . as a violent breach of our republic’s sovereignty and an act of war that destroys the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula and a wider region,” Pyongyang’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the state-run KCNA news agency.
Pyongyang’s bellicose reply came a day after the UN Security Council unanimously passed new, US-drafted sanctions that will restrict oil supplies vital for the impoverished state.
The third raft of sanctions imposed on the North this year, sparked by last month’s ICBM test, also received the backing of China – the North’s sole major ally and economic lifeline.
The round of sanctions, proposed by the United States and adopted by a vote of 15-0, was the third imposed this year in an escalating effort to force the North into negotiations. China and Russia joined in the vote, in a striking display of unity, but only after the Trump administration agreed to soften a couple of provisions.
Under the new sanctions, the amount of refined petroleum North Korea can import each year will be cut by 89 percent, exacerbating fuel shortages. Roughly 100,000 North Korean labourers who work abroad, a critical source of hard currency, will be expelled within two years. Nations will be urged to inspect all North Korean shipping and halt ship-to-ship transfers of fuel, which the North has used to evade sanctions.
But the resolution does not permit countries to hail or board North Korean ships in international waters, which the Trump administration proposed in September. That would be the most draconian measure, because it would enable the US Navy and its Pacific allies to create a cordon around the country, although Pentagon officials say it would risk setting off a firefight between North Korea and foreign navies.
It also bans sales of all industrial machinery, trucks, iron, steel and other metals to the North and added 15 Pyongyang officials to the UN sanctions blacklist for global visa ban and assets freeze.
The North has defended its missile and nuclear weapons programs as measures for selfdefence against “hostile” US policies towards Pyongyang.
And a defiant Pyongyang vowed yesterday the country would continue its weapons push “more vigorously” to “form a balance of power with the US”.
“If you think that those toothless ‘sanctions’ could stop the victorious march of our people who have . . . achieved the historic goal of building the national nuclear weapons, there would not be a bigger mistake than that,” the Foreign Ministry said.
“The US and its puppet followers should never forget the newly-upgraded status of our nation as a nation that could pose a real nuclear threat to the US mainland,” it added.
But experts believe that Pyongyang has yet to develop the advanced technology to allow its rockets to survive re-entry into the earth’s atmosphere.
The latest UN sanctions were hailed by US President Donald Trump, who tweeted, “The World wants peace, not Death!”