“These launches, which have become far too common in the past several months, violate multiple UN Security Council Resolutions explicitly prohibiting North Korea’s launches using ballistic missile technology”, he said in a statement, adding that US officials would raise the issue during the meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Laos on Tuesday.
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Monday’s missile launches were the latest in a series by North Korea this year in violation of Security Council resolutions that were supported by China and that ban all ballistic missile-related activities by Pyongyang.
“These launches are in grave violation of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s worldwide obligations and UN Security Council resolutions”, the 15-member Council said in a statement. The council gave no indication of what “further significant measures” it might take. Beijing and Pyongyang have traditionally been “as close as lips and teeth”, as the saying goes, but Xi Jinping, China’s president, has made his disdain for the young Kim clear.
The president added that the USA was still open to dialogue with the North Korean government if it changed its course.
“The Security Council must remain unequivocal and united in its condemnation of these tests”.
North Korea and Iran co-operate closely on missile development.
With each test, she said, North Korea demonstrates further advancement of its ballistic missile programme whose aim, according to the country’s leader Kim Jong Un, is “to arm the systems with nuclear weapons”.
Obama said the United States will also increase efforts to stop North Korea gaining access to global currency and technology by tightening loopholes in the current sanctions regime.
Expressing serious concern over the repeated violations by North Korea, the 15-member council urged all the member states to strengthen the enforcement of economic sanctions against the country over its nuclear pursuit.
During their summit meeting on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Laos on Tuesday, President Park Geun-hye and her USA counterpart Barack Obama reaffirmed that the two allies would mobilize all possible means to counter Pyongyang’s continued provocations. In June, after a string of failures, North Korea sent an intermediate Musudan missile more than 1,400 kilometers (870 miles) high in a test launch that outside analysts said showed progress in efforts to acquire the ability to strike US forces in the region.
North Korea had launched an upgraded Taepodong-2 missile in December 2012, which is said to have a range of 10,000 kilometers – the longest for a North Korean missile – and could reach the USA mainland.
“He stressed the need to continue making miraculous achievements in bolstering up the nuclear force one after another in this historic year”, it added.
Kim, for his part, hailed the tests.
Their summit came amid the communist state’s unrelenting saber-rattling, including its launch of three mid-range ballistic missiles Monday and a submarine-launched ballistic missile test last month.
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The missiles likely landed in the sea 200 to 250 km (120 to 160 miles) west of Hokkaido, Japan’s northern-most main island. It said they had been fired over the Sea of Japan (East Sea) without warning.
