SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea vowed Monday to bolster its nuclear arsenal and launch “ thousands-fold” revenge against the…
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea vowed Monday to bolster its nuclear arsenal and launch “thousands-fold” revenge against the United States in response to tough U. N. sanctions imposed after its recent intercontinental ballistic missile launches.
The warning came two days after the U. N. Security Council unanimously approved new sanctions to punish North Korea, including a ban on coal and other exports worth over $1 billion. The U. S. ambassador to the U. N., Nikki Haley, called the U. S.-drafted resolution “the single largest economic sanctions package ever leveled against” North Korea.
In a statement carried by state media, the North Korean government said the sanctions were a “violent infringement of its sovereignty” that was caused by a “heinous U. S. plot to isolate and stifle” North Korea.
It said the U. N. sanctions will never force the country to negotiate over its nuclear program or to give up its push to strengthen its nuclear capability as long as U. S. hostility and nuclear threats persist. The North said it will take an “action of justice, ” but didn’ t elaborate.
“It’s a wild idea to think the DPRK will be shaken and change its position due to this kind of new sanctions formulated by hostile forces, ” said the statement, carried by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency. DPRK stands for the North’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
The North’s statement “rhetorically expresses its anger” against the U. N. sanctions, but the country is not likely to launch a direct provocation against the United States, said Lim Eul Chul, a North Korea expert at South Korea’s Kyungnam University.
