MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono and South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha agreed on the importance of the strategic cooperation with Russia and China for achieving the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the South Korean Foreign Ministry said in a press release Thursday, following the meeting between the counterparts on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum.
"The parties have agreed to continue to cooperate closely in order to ensure the implementation of existing resolutions' [of the UN Security Council] provisions, including the new resolution imposing tougher sanctions, and to continue the strategic collaboration with China and Russia," the press release said.
The same day, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he believed that the international community needed to exert maximum pressure on North Korea, which is becoming an unprecedented threat.
"It is necessary to compel North Korea to immediately and fully implement all relevant UN Security Council resolutions, as well as to abandon all programs for the development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles in a full-fledged, verifiable and irreversible way. For this the international community must unite and exert maximum pressure on North Korea," Abe said at the Eastern Economic Forum.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in, in his turn, said that the North Korean nuclear tests were a provocation that threatened the entire Northeast Asia and thanked Russia for supporting sanctions against the DPRK.
"Dear Mr. President Putin, ladies and gentlemen. North Korea carried out a provocation recently — the sixth nuclear test, which is a threat not only to the Korean Peninsula, but also to Northeast Asia in general. For Russia it is also an issue to be resolved in the interests of Far East development," Moon Jae-in said at the Russian Eastern Economic Forum.
"I thank Russia for its active participation in the application of sanctions against North Korea and I wish Russia continued its support in this matter," he added.
On Sunday, North Korea announced that it had successfully tested a hydrogen bomb that could be loaded onto an intercontinental ballistic missile. A number of countries have firmly condemned North Korea's test calling for retaliation.
