Geneva : North Korea has said it is no longer bound by commitments to halt nuclear and missile testing, blaming the United States’ failure to meet a year-end deadline for nuclear talks and “brutal and inhumane” US sanctions.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un set an end-December deadline for denuclearisation talks with the United States and White House national security adviser Robert O’Brien said at the time the US had opened channels of communication. O’Brien said then he hoped Kim would follow through on denuclearisation commitments he made at summits with US President Donald Trump.
Ju Yong Chol, a counsellor at North Korea’s mission to the UN in Geneva, said that over the past two years, his country had halted nuclear tests and test firing of inter-continental ballistic missiles “in order to build confidence with the United States”. But the United States had responded by conducting dozens of joint military exercises with South Korea on the divided peninsula and by imposing sanctions, he said.
“As it became clear now that the US remains unchanged in its ambition to block the development of the DPRK and stifle its political system, we found no reason to be unilaterally bound any longer by the commitment that the other party fails to honour,” Ju told the UN-backed Conference on Disarmament.
Speaking as the envoy from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), North Korea’s official name, Ju accused the United States of applying “the most brutal and inhumane sanctions”.
United States’ disarmament ambassador Robert Wood voiced concern at Pyongyang’s remarks and said Washington hoped the North would return to the negotiating table.
South Korean Ambassador Jang-keun Lee said there must be substantial progress in denuclearisation to “maintain and build upon the hard-won momentum for dialogue”.
US military commanders said any new path could include the testing of a long-range missile, which North Korea has suspended since 2017, along with nuclear warhead tests.(Agencies)
