US Urges UN To Condemn North Korea After Firing Missiles

The US and its allies urged the UN Security Council to condemn North Korea's illegal ballistic missile launches. Still, China and Russia blamed the US for inflaming tensions with increased military exercises aimed at Pyongyang.

At the emergency meeting on Monday, US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council that the US would propose a presidential statement condemning the North's unprecedented missile launches, urging Pyongyang to comply with UN Security Council sanctions resolutions and engage in meaningful dialogue.

A Security Council presidential statement requires the support of all members, including North Korea's closest allies, China and Russia.

According to Thomas-Greenfield, the United States strongly condemns North Korea's launch of two short-range ballistic missiles on Monday, following the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on Saturday, as flagrant violations of the UN Security Council's ban on the country's ballistic missile launches.

According to Thomas-Greenfield, the launches and North Korea's threatening rhetoric undermine international peace and security.

She also warned the Security Council that its silence and failure to condemn the North's missile activities would render it irrelevant.

However, Pyongyang's allies China and Russia countered that what is now required is the dialogue between North Korea and the Biden administration, de-escalation of military exercises, easing of sanctions on North Korea, and approval of a resolution they circulated in November 2021 aimed at resolving the Korean Peninsula situation.

That resolution urges the Security Council to lift a slew of sanctions against North Korea and urges the United States and North Korea to resume dialogue and consider steps to reduce tensions and the risk of military conflict, including the adoption of a declaration or peace treaty formally ending the 1950-1953 Korean War. The war ended with an armistice, which technically kept the peninsula at war.

The deployment of US strategic assets and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg's high-profile visit to Seoul and Tokyo two weeks ago are highly provocative to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and aggravate a sense of insecurity, according to China's Deputy UN Ambassador Dai Bing.

Since the US has repeatedly expressed its willingness to engage in unconditional dialogue with the DPRK, he believes it should take concrete steps to initiate and sustain the conversation. Pursuing and imposing sanctions solely will result in a dead end.