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North Korea faces 'exceptional' UN sanctions over nuclear tests, says US US proposes 'toughest sanctions yet' against North Korea
(35 minutes later)
A US-China draft resolution to punish North Korea for its latest nuclear test would impose some of the toughest sanctions ever ordered by the United Nations, the US ambassador, Susan Rice, said on Tuesday. The UN security council is considering imposing some of the toughest sanctions yet conceived against North Korea as senior diplomats from the 15 council member nations began discussions on a draft resolution framed by the US and China that would seek to deflect Pyongyang from its belligerent nuclear path.
Rice circulated the draft to security council members, telling reporters that "the breadth and scope of these sanctions is exceptional" and that they would further impede the growth of North Korea's nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles programmes. "We hope for a unanimous adoption later this week," she said. Susan Rice, the US ambassador to the UN, said the draft sanctions resolution that she circulated to the security council was exceptional in its "breadth and scope". It would hit senior figures within the North Korean regime where it hurts them most – their pockets – by targeting for the first time illicit banking activities and movements of capital, she said.
The fourth sanctions resolution would for the first time target illicit activities of North Korean diplomats and illicit banking relationships and cash transfers, Rice said. The resolution pledged to take further measures if North Korea carried out another missile launch or nuclear test, she added. In a statement delivered to the security council, Rice said the sanctions would target the "illicit activities of North Korean diplomatic personnel, North Korean banking relationships, illicit transfers of bulk cash and new travel restrictions". She said the sanctions would "significantly impede North Korea's ability to develop further its illicit nuclear and ballistic missile programs … and demonstrate clearly to North Korea the continued costs of its provocations."
Hours before the UN meeting, Pyongyang threatened to cancel the 1953 ceasefire that ended the Korean war, as tensions on the Korean peninsula soared again over the nuclear test in February. Should the resolution be agreed, it would impose the fourth round of sanctions on the North Korean regime. It will now go before diplomatic and technical experts from the relevant security council member countries for detailed fine tuning, before being rushed to a vote as early as the end of this week.
Any fresh international sanctions are certain to infuriate North Korea, which has claimed the right to build nuclear weapons to deter alleged US aggression. Rice said the proposals would ensure that "North Korea will be subject to some of the toughest sanctions imposed by the United Nations".
Citing the US-led push for sanctions, the Korean People's Army supreme command on Tuesday warned of "surgical strikes" meant to unify the divided Korean peninsula and of an indigenous, "precision nuclear striking tool". Western diplomats are relatively confident about the passage of the sanctions through the security council because of Beijing's willingness to support it. China is the traditional ally and major trading partner of North Korea's, but it joined the US and other western powers in expressing its alarm and displeasure after the regime carried out its third test of a nuclear device on 12 February.
China is North Korea's closest ally, but it has indicated it is concerned about Pyongyang's behaviour. The underground test was said by Pyongyang to be focused on the development of a "miniaturized" nuclear weapon that could be attached to missiles able to reach the US. Nuclear weapons experts, however, remain skeptical that North Korea has succeeded in achieving that capability.
Hours after North Korea carried out its third atomic test on 12 February, all 15 council members approved a press statement condemning the explosion and pledging further action. The swift, unanimous response from the UN's most powerful body set the stage for a fourth round of sanctions. The leadership of Kim Jong-un has responded with trademark bluster to the threats of tightened sanctions. Hours before the UN security council convened, the regime threatened to nullify the armistice that has held between North and South Korea since 1953. The three-year Korean war has never technically ended, only suspended, and the threat to stop the truce has been a much-deployed – though not as yet followed-through – intimidation.
North Korea's neighbours and the west condemn Pyongyang's efforts to develop nuclear missiles capable of hitting the United States as a serious threat to northeast Asia's delicate security and a drain on the precious resources that could go to North Korea's largely destitute people. On Tuesday, the supreme command of the Korean People's Army said it would carry out "surgical strikes" to reunify the peninsula, and made reference to a "precision nuclear striking tool".
North Korea says its nuclear programme is a response to US hostility that dates back to the 1950-53 Korean war, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty, leaving the Korean peninsula still technically in a state of war. The regime's anger has been piqued not just by the impending sanctions but by the latest US military exercises with South Korea. The drills happen every year, prompting an annual ritual of recriminations and counter-recriminations.
North Korea said Washington and others were going beyond mere economic sanctions and expanding into blunt aggression and military acts. The new US secretary of state, John Kerry, delivered a direct message to Kim from Qatar. He emphasized that Washington's preference was "not to brandish threats to each other; it's to get to the table".
He said it was "very easy for Kim Jong-un to prove his good intent here. Just don't fire the next missile, don't have the next test. Just say you're ready to talk."
The hope within the security council is that by affecting the personal finances of senior members of the Kim regime, sanctions might dissuade them from pursuing the nuclear tests.