DPRK Foreign Ministry and DPRK government office buildings in central Pyongyang (Photo: NK Leadership Watch).
The DPRK Government sent a message to the US Government via the DPRK Mission to the United Nations on July 10 (Sunday) concerning the recent sanctions designation by the US Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control and supporting documentation of Kim Jong Un (Kim Cho’ng-u’n) and other senior officials for ““for having engaged in, facilitated, or been responsible for an abuse or violation of human rights.” According to DPRK state media, the message “clarified its stand to take practical actions as already declared in the statement of the Foreign Ministry.”
The DPRK Governments message “vehemently denounced the recent US sanctions measure which impaired the dignity of the supreme leadership of the DPRK as the most hideous criminal act and a declaration of war against the DPRK. Now that the US refused to comply with the DPRK’s demand for the immediate withdrawal of the sanctions measure, the DPRK Government notified the US that it would take practical actions against the US stage by stage as already clarified and would totally cut off the New York DPRK-US contact channel, the only official contact channel, at the first phase.” The DPRK Government also “informed the US government of its principled stand that from now on it would deal with all the issues arising in the DPRK-US relations under wartime law of the DPRK the issue of detained Americans is no exception and the US it wholly to blame for the ensuing unpleasant things happening in the bilateral ties.”
DPRK Foreign Ministry building and DPRK Cabinet building in Kim Il Sung Square in central Pyongyang (Photo: Google image).
On July 11 (Monday), the DPRK Foreign Ministry held a meeting to brief ambassadors and diplomatic personnel from Asian countries who are stationed in the DPRK. Attending the meeting were ambassadors from Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Iran, India and Vietnam and the charge d’affaires from Pakistan. Foreign Ministry Asian and Oceanian Department Director-General Choe Hui Chol (Ch’oe Hu’i-ch’o’l) said that “the US dared take issue with the supreme leadership of the DPRK on July 6 when opening to the public the report of the Department of State related with the ‘human rights issue’ of the DPRK peppered with false stories and fabrication and the list of targets of special sanctions of the Department of Treasury pursuant it” and stress was placed that it was “an open declaration of a war against the DPRK as it is the worst hostile act far beyond confrontation over the ‘human rights issue.”
Choe said that “now that the US crossed the ‘red line’ in an all-out confrontation with the DPRK while slandering the dignity of the supreme leadership of the DPRK, the latter can never remain a passive onlooker to. Proceeding from this, the Foreign Ministry of the DPRK on July 7 stated that in case the US does not life the current sanctions, all diplomatic contact space and channels between the DPRK and US will be cut off immediately and the toughest measures to resolutely smash the US hostile acts will be taken.” Choe referred to the “fact that the south Korean puppet forces are steadily escalating the tension on the Korean peninsula as evidenced by the decision to deploy THAAD in south Korea in league with the US despite the strong protest of the DPRK and its neighboring countries” and he stressed that “all Asian countries should be vigilant against this, clearly understand who is the ringleader and chief criminal driving the situation on the peninsula to an unpredictable phase and neither sympathize nor join in action harmful to the regional peace and stability.”
According to KCNA, some of the ambassadors present expressed “deep understanding of the fact that the US heinous hostile policy toward the DPRK is rendering the situation on the Korean peninsula and in the region extremely tense.”
Filed under: 2016 Strategic Rhetoric, Central Committee, DPRK Cabinet, DPRK Diplomat Corps, DPRK External Relations, dprk-asean, DPRK-Cambodia Relations, DPRK-India rels, DPRK-Indonesia Relations, DPRK-Iran Relations, dprk-laos diplorels, DPRK-Laos Relations, DPRK-Malaysia rels, DPRK-South Central Asia, DPRK-Southeast Asia Relations, DPRK-United Nations Relations, DPRK-US Relations, DPRK-Vietnam relations, dprk-vn relations, Executive Policy Bureau, International Affairs Department WPK, International Department, KJI Personal Secretariat, Korean Workers' Party (KWP), Ministry of Foreign Affairs, North Korean press, Ri Yong Ho (FA), State Affairs Commission
