UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik) – The South Korean ambassador warned that North Korea’s actions pose a grave challenge to the security of all regional states.
"This year alone, North Korea conducted its 13th round of ballistic missile tests and it test fired a total of 29 missiles of a variety of types, ranges and trajectories, including intermediate range missiles and short-range missiles. So obviously by now, what they’re doing is not just separate, random missile tests, I think they are doing all of this with the systematic comprehensive purpose of upgrading and refining their missile technologies," Oh Joon said on Wednesday.
Meanwhile US Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power said that Washington is committed to protecting South Korea against North Korea’s provocations.
"The actions we have taken with the Republic of Korea [RoK] are purely defensive, they are about protecting the people of South Korea, protecting alliance forces who are stationed in the RoK and they are focused — in the case of the THAAD system — focused squarely on ballistic missile defense as it relates to the threat posed by the country we have gathered yet again to discuss," Power told the UN Security Council on Wednesday.
She also pointed to Pyongyang’s recent ballistic missile tests as evidence of North Korea’s plans to enhance its missile capabilities.
"These defensive measures come about because, as you all know as well as we do, again and again, you see the DPRK [North Korea] seeking to enhance its capabilities. Firing short and medium-range ballistic missiles, failing sometimes, refining capabilities, succeeding in firing them farther and farther, and we, the US and the RoK and all of us who are allied have a responsibility to our citizens to ensure that we can defend against this threat," Power said.
North Korea fired a ballistic missile from its eastern shore early on Wednesday. It traveled hundreds of miles before plunging into the Sea of Japan not far from the northern Japanese coast.
North Korea is currently under pressure from the international community since its January nuclear test and a long-range rocket launch in February, which resulted in sanctions against Pyongyang being tightened in a UN Security Council resolution in March.
In July, the US Department of Defense announced it would deploy the Terminal High Altitude Air Defense (THAAD) anti-missile in South Korea to counter the threat from Pyongyang.
