North Korea yesterday accused US President Joe Biden of pursuing a hostile policy, dismissing “spurious” US diplomacy and warning of a response.
Biden had said on Wednesday that his administration would deal with the threat posed by Pyongyang’s nuclear program “through diplomacy as well as stern deterrence.”
The White House on Friday said that the president was open to negotiations with North Korea on denuclearization following the completion of a policy review, but Pyongyang said Biden had made a “big blunder.”
Photo: Reuters
“His statement clearly reflects his intent to keep enforcing the hostile policy toward the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] as it had been done by the US for over half a century,” Kwon Jung-gun, a North Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs official, said in a statement released by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
“The US-claimed ‘diplomacy’ is a spurious signboard for covering up its hostile acts, and ‘deterrence’ touted by it is just a means for posing nuclear threats to the DPRK,” Kwon said. “Now that what the keynote of the US new DPRK policy has become clear [sic], we will be compelled to press for corresponding measures.”
The White House on Friday said that its goal remains “the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said that Washington would not “focus on achieving a grand bargain,” apparently referring to the kind of deal that former US president Donald Trump suggested was possible when he met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
Neither would the White House follow the more standoffish approach espoused by former US president Barack Obama, she added.
In a separate statement through the KCNA yesterday, North Korea also accused the US of insulting its leadership and COVID-19 measures, referring to a US Department of State news release issued on Wednesday.
Department spokesman Ned Price had issued a statement criticizing North Korea’s human rights abuses and draconian COVID-19 curbs, describing it as “one of the most repressive and totalitarian states in the world.”
“The ‘human rights issue’ touted by the US is a political trick designed to destroy the ideology and social system in the DPRK,” the North Korean foreign ministry said.
In a third statement issued yesterday, Kim’s powerful sister, Kim Yo-jong, lashed out at South Korea over a recent anti-Pyongyang leaflet campaign by a defector group.
Activist groups have long sent flyers critical of the North Korean leadership across the demilitarized zone (DMZ) dividing the peninsula.
The leaflets have infuriated Pyongyang, which last year demanded that Seoul take action and blew up an inter-Korean liaison office on its side of the border.
The South Korean parliament rapidly passed a law criminalizing the leaflet campaigns in December last year, but a defector group said it flew 500,000 leaflets near the DMZ last week in defiance of the law.
Kim Yo-jong blamed South Korean authorities for not stopping them.
“We regard the maneuvers committed by the human wastes in the south as a serious provocation against our state and will look into corresponding action,” she said.
BLUE WAVE: The KMT’s Chiang Wan-an defeated the DPP’s Chen Shih-chung and is to become Taipei mayor, while President Tsai Ing-wen stepped down as DPP chairperson after many of the party’s candidates, handpicked by the leadership, performed poorly The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday flipped key mayoral seats in Taipei, Taoyuan and Keelung, and won control of 13 out of 22 cities and counties in the nine-in-one local elections. President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) last night resigned as Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairperson over a poor showing by the party’s candidates, who were handpicked by the DPP leadership rather than chosen through primaries. The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) won its first high-profile race with Hsinchu mayoral candidate Ann Kao (高虹安) defeating Shen Hui-hung (沈慧虹) of the DPP with 45.02 percent of the vote to Shen’s 35.68 percent. Voters were choosing more than
UNDETERRED: The US chip designer’s plan showed that Taiwan remains attractive for investment by global companies despite cross-strait tensions, Wang Mei-hua said US graphics chip designer Nvidia Corp is planning to relocate its Hong Kong-based logistics center to Taiwan, Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said on Wednesday. The government had been in discussions with Nvidia regarding tax incentives to facilitate the move since last year, Wang said in an interview with the Central News Agency, adding that the two sides had reached a consensus. Wang did not provide details about the timetable for the move or the planned tax arrangements for Nvidia. The relocation would boost the local economy, as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is a major supplier of graphics processing
Kaohsiung police last week busted a money laundering operation suspected of seeking to interfere in tomorrow’s local elections. The operation was allegedly headed by a man surnamed Lee (李), who had received NT$9.5 billion (US$306.18 million) from China over the past six months, Kaohsiung police said yesterday, adding that Lee’s ring is suspected to be part of a larger Chinese effort to interfere in the elections and support pro-China candidates. Officers arrested Lee, 35, and his girlfriend, searched his mansion, and seized the money he had allegedly received from China and three luxury vehicles, police said. The operation was disguised as an online
‘NEWEST’: The company’s Arizona plant is to produce 5-nanometer chips in the initial stage and would later manufacture 3-nanometer chips, Morris Chang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) founder Morris Chang (張忠謀) yesterday confirmed that the company plans to produce its most advanced 3-nanometer chips in the US as part of the company’s phase 2 plan at its plant in Phoenix, Arizona. The 91-year-old entrepreneur, who has been appointed as Taiwan’s envoy to APEC six times, yesterday morning held a news conference at the Presidential Office Building to discuss his delegation’s accomplishments at this year’s APEC Economic Leaders’ Week in Bangkok, which ended on Saturday. He was asked whether TSMC has plans to build advanced chips in the US. “TSMC’s plant in Arizona is
RSS