U.S. rejects China’s call to halt military drills
weapon this year.
She also defended the upcoming deployment of a U.S. missile defense system in South Korea, a move that has been strongly opposed by China. She said America would not leave its ally facing the threat from North Korea without help.
“We have not seen any goodwill at all coming from North Korea,” Haley said. “I appreciate all my counterparts wanting to talk about talks and negotiations, (but) we are not dealing with a rational person.”
With any other country, the United States would be seeking negotiations, she said.
“This is not a rational person, who has not had rational acts, who is not thinking clearly,” Haley said of North Korea’s leader. “This is someone who is trying to get attention. This is someone who is trying to get a reaction.”
Haley said the United States is re-evaluating how it is going to deal with North Korea going forward “and we are making those decisions now and will act accordingly.”
“We’re not ruling anything out and we’re considering every option that’s on the table,” she said.
South Korean Ambassador Cho Taeyul also rejected the idea of a North Korean nuclear freeze in exchange for halting U.S.-South Korea military exercises, which he stressed are defensive in nature.
“Linking this exercise to anything else, which is illegal nuclear and missile provocation by North Korea, is inappropriate and unacceptable, and I think this is just trying to link the unlinkable,” he said.
“All kinds of options have been exhausted so far,” Cho said.