A defiant North Korea condemned Tuesday the latest round of UN sanctions against the country and warned the United States of “forthcoming measures” by the hands of the secretive state.
In an attempt to punish North Korea for its latest nuclear test, the UN Security Council approved new sanctions, targeting the country’s textile industry and limiting its import of crude oil.
“The proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, as well as their means of delivery, constitutes a threat to international peace and security,” the council said in a statement.
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North Korea said it successfully conducted its sixth nuclear test on Sept. 3. The latest test was said to have been a hydrogen bomb designed to be mounted on a newly developed intercontinental ballistic missile that has “great destructive power,” state media said following the announcement of the test.
North Korea’s ambassador to the United Nations Han Tae Song lashed out at the UN’s latest “illegal and unlawful” sanctions against his country, calling it a “grave challenge to international peace and justice.”
“The adoption of sanction resolution against my country is an extreme manifestation of U.S. intention to eliminate at any cost the ideology, social system of DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) and its people,” the ambassador said while addressing other state representatives in Geneva. “My delegation condemns, in the strongest terms, and categorically rejects the latest illegal and unlawful UN Security Council resolution.”
The North Korean ambassador went on to warn the U.S. that it will suffer consequences for the approved sanctions.
“The DPRK is ready to use any form of ultimate means,” Song said. “The forthcoming measures by DPRK will make the U.S. suffer the greatest pain it’s ever experienced in its history.”
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On Monday, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, said her country was not looking for war with North Korea, and that Pyongyang had “not yet passed the point of no return.”
“If it agrees to stop its nuclear program, it can reclaim its future. If it proves it can live in peace, the world will live in peace with it,” she told the Security Council after the council adopted the new sanctions.
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On Tuesday, Song said the U.S. had already opted for “military confrontation.”
“Instead of making a right choice with a rational analysis on overall situation, the Washington regime finally opted for political, economic and military confrontation, obsessed with the wild dream of reversing the DPRK’s development of nuclear force, which has already reached the completion phase,” the North Korean ambassador said.
–with a file from the Associated Press
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