Seoul – Reuters:
North Korea denounced the United Nations Security Council for holding a meeting to discuss its recent attempt to launch a satellite at a US request in a “gangster way” and vowed to continue to reject sanctions and take “self-defense” measures.
The United States had called for a meeting of the Security Council last week to discuss North Korea’s attempt to put the first spy satellite into orbit, an attempt that ended in failure with the fall of the missile booster and payload into the sea.
Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and a senior official in the ruling party, said accepting Washington’s “gangster-like” request and ignoring North Korea’s right to develop space-related activities is another sign that the council acts like a “political vassal” of the United States.
“I am deeply displeased that the Security Council regularly criticizes our exercise of political rights in compliance with the wishes of the United States, and we strongly condemn and reject this as the most unfair and biased act of interfering in our internal affairs and violating our sovereignty,” Kim said in a statement carried by KCNA.
Referring to the satellite launch, she said her country had the right to defend itself against growing threats from the United States and its allies, whom Pyongyang accuses of stoking tensions with their annual spring military exercises.
The North Korean leader’s sister said the UN sanctions resolutions were “a product of the hostile policy of the United States and its affiliated powers”, adding that North Korea would never recognize them, and vowed to continue exercising its sovereign rights, including launching spy satellites.
In another report, KCNA published a commentary it said was from international affairs analyst Kim Myong-chol criticizing a decision by the Security Committee of the International Maritime Organization to “strongly” condemn North Korea’s missile tests as a serious threat to sea travelers and international shipping.
The analyst accused the organization of being “completely politicized” in line with the hostile policy led by the United States.
Later on Sunday, South Korean Defense Minister Lee Jong-sob and his Japanese counterpart Yasukazu Hamada met at a security conference in Singapore, condemned the satellite launch and agreed to enhance security cooperation.
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