North Korea’s foreign minister called UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “a puppet of the United States” as she slammed the UN chief for joining US-led condemnation of the North’s recent intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test.
Guterres earlier issued a statement strongly condemning North Korea’s ICBM launch on Friday and reiterating his call on the country “to immediately desist from taking any further provocative actions.”
Guterres’ statement came after the US and other countries issued similar criticism of the North’s ICBM test that showed an potential to strike anywhere in the continental US.
Photo: AP
“I often take the UN secretary-general for a member of the US. White House or its State Department,” North Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs Choe Son-hui said in a statement carried by state media.
“I express my strong regret over the fact that the UN secretary-general has taken a very deplorable attitude, oblivious of the purpose and principles of the UN Charter and its proper mission which is to maintain impartiality, objectivity and equity in all matters,” Choe said.
Choe accused Guterres of overlooking the US and its allies taking the North’s ICBM test to the UN Security Council, saying: “This clearly proves that he is a puppet of the US.”
The Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting for yesterday morning on North Korea’s ICBM launch at Japan’s request.
However, it was unclear if it could impose new economic sanctions on North Korea, because China and Russia, two of the council’s veto-wielding members, have opposed the previous US and its allies’ moves to toughen sanctions on the North over its banned tests of ballistic missiles earlier this year.
On Sunday, top diplomats from the world’s major industrialized democracies issued a joint statement calling for strong steps by the Security Council in reaction to the North Korean missile launch.
“[North Korea’s] actions demand a united and robust response by the international community, including the need for further significant measures to be taken by the UN Security Council,” said the statement by foreign ministers from the G7 nations — Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US.
Tens of thousands of Filipino Catholics yesterday twirled white cloths and chanted “Viva, viva,” as a centuries-old statue of Jesus Christ was paraded through the streets of Manila in the nation’s biggest annual religious event. The day-long procession began before dawn, with barefoot volunteers pulling the heavy carriage through narrow streets where the devout waited in hopes of touching the icon, believed to hold miraculous powers. Thousands of police were deployed to manage crowds that officials believe could number in the millions by the time the statue reaches its home in central Manila’s Quiapo church around midnight. More than 800 people had sought
DENIAL: Pyongyang said a South Korean drone filmed unspecified areas in a North Korean border town, but Seoul said it did not operate drones on the dates it cited North Korea’s military accused South Korea of flying drones across the border between the nations this week, yesterday warning that the South would face consequences for its “unpardonable hysteria.” Seoul quickly denied the accusation, but the development is likely to further dim prospects for its efforts to restore ties with Pyongyang. North Korean forces used special electronic warfare assets on Sunday to bring down a South Korean drone flying over North Korea’s border town. The drone was equipped with two cameras that filmed unspecified areas, the General Staff of the North Korean People’s Army said in a statement. South Korea infiltrated another drone
COMMUNIST ALIGNMENT: To Lam wants to combine party chief and state presidency roles, with the decision resting on the election of 200 new party delegates next week Communist Party of Vietnam General Secretary To Lam is seeking to combine his party role with the state presidency, officials said, in a move that would align Vietnam’s political structure more closely to China’s, where President Xi Jinping (習近平) heads the party and state. Next week about 1,600 delegates are to gather in Hanoi to commence a week-long communist party congress, held every five years to select new leaders and set policy goals for the single-party state. Lam, 68, bade for both top positions at a party meeting last month, seeking initial party approval ahead of the congress, three people briefed by
Cambodia’s government on Wednesday said that it had arrested and extradited to China a tycoon who has been accused of running a huge online scam operation. The Cambodian Ministry of the Interior said that Prince Holding Group chairman Chen Zhi (陳志) and two other Chinese citizens were arrested and extradited on Tuesday at the request of Chinese authorities. Chen formerly had dual nationality, but his Cambodian citizenship was revoked last month, the ministry said. US prosecutors in October last year brought conspiracy charges against Chen, alleging that he had been the mastermind behind a multinational cyberfraud network, used his other businesses to launder
RSS