Japan announced Friday it will host a ministerial meeting of U. N. Security Council members on Dec. 15 focused on finding peaceful ways to pressure North Ko
UNITED NATIONS – Japan announced Friday it will host a ministerial meeting of U. N. Security Council members on Dec. 15 focused on finding peaceful ways to pressure North Korea to halt its nuclear and ballistic missile tests and denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.
U. N. Ambassador Koro Bessho told a news conference that more must be done beyond the “very robust” sanctions that the council has imposed targeting the financing and materials for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s nuclear and missile programs.
Bessho, who is this month’s council president, said members are discussing a “product” from the ministerial meeting. It isn’t clear whether that might be a statement or a resolution.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is expected to brief the council, and U. S. officials say Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is likely to attend.
Bessho said Foreign Minister Taro Kono will chair the meeting and several ministers and deputy ministers, whom he refused to name, are also expected.
Bessho said the council will also meet separately this month to discuss human rights abuses in North Korea, an annual meeting that China, the North’s main ally, has tried to prevent for the past three years. He said the meeting could be held on Dec. 11.
China tried to stop the three previous meetings by calling a procedural vote. A minimum of nine votes on the 15-member council are needed to win such a vote, and China, Russia, the United States, Britain and France cannot wield their vetoes.
This year’s meeting has the backing of nine members: the United States, France, Britain, Italy, Japan, Senegal, Sweden, Ukraine and Uruguay.
Last year, the United States angered North Korea by blacklisting Kim for human rights abuses.
A landmark 2014 U. N. report on North Korean human rights concluded that North Korean security chiefs — and possibly Kim himself — should face justice for overseeing a state-controlled system of Nazi-style atrocities.
