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The US and South Korea are to blame for North Korea’s latest missile launch over Japan, and further sanctions on the regime will not ameliorate the situation, Russia said Tuesday.
In defiance of UN resolutions banning its missile testing and fresh international sanctions drafted by the US, North Korea carried out another missile test on Tuesday, the fourth in as many days, this time directly over Japan for the first time. The regime has already traded barbs with President Donald Trump due to its repeated missile testing and expanding range including a direct threat made at US pacific territory Guam.
That threat prompted the US to rally its allies and, with China and Russia on side, impose new sanctions on the rogue state.
Anticipating more of the same to follow, Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told journalists on Tuesday that US actions were pushing the regime toward more tests, not halting it, state news agency Itar-Tass reported.
“If we go by how colleagues from the US and other western countries have acted in the past, then of course we can expect new steps towards tightening the sanctions, but this will not solve the problem,” Ryabkov said. “It is now obvious to everyone that the resources for influencing North Korea with sanctions have run out.”
Ryabkov referred to the joint military exercises the US is currently holding with ally South Korea. The latest Ulchi Freedom Guardian activity involved computer-simulated warfare and took place over the weekend. The drill aims to strengthen the ability to respond to an potential attack from the North and continues until the end of August. The Russian minister called it “a trend of escalation,” a reiteration of China and Russia’s previous arguments in favor of limiting US military presence in the Asia Pacific neighborhood.
The North regularly protests US drills in the region, and in his statement Ryabkov appeared to refer to Ulchi Freedom Guardian directly, taking a more sympathetic approach to the North’s tests.