Russia urges UN to end monitoring of sanctions against North Korea

Russia imposedé Thursday's dissolution of the UN sanctions monitoring system against North Korea and its nuclear program, a coup denounced by the United Nations by the United States and its allies denouncing mutual protection between the two countries.

“What Russia has done today cynically undermines peace and security in the world, all to promote a flawed barter that Moscow has sealed” with Pyongyang, on arms in particular, reacted Matthew Miller, spokesperson for the American State Department.

For its part, Seoul described Russia's veto as an “irresponsible decision”, via a press release from the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

North Korea has been subject to UN Security Council sanctions linked to its program since 2006 nuclear, reinforced several times in 2016 and 2017.

But since 2019, Russia and China, highlighting in particular the humanitarian situation of the North Korean population, have called for the reduction of these sanctions, which have no end date.

Not having won their case, the Russians targeted the committee of experts responsible for monitoring the application of these measures, a committee whose reports refer to.

Despite several postponements of the vote to allow negotiations, Russia thus vetoed on Thursday a draft resolution extending the mandate of this committee by one year. The text received 13 votes in favor, with China abstaining.

Russian Ambassador Vassili Nebenzia justified this veto by estimating that, in current conditions, the committee no longer has any reason to exist, focusing on “uninteresting questions not commensurate with the problems facing the peninsula.” .

He instead proposed to the Council a reassessment of the sanctions regime. “If there was an agreement for an annual renewal of sanctions, the mandate of the committee of experts would make sense,” he explained. A proposal supported by China.

– “Admission of guilt” –

In its latest report of 600 pages at the beginning of March, the committee of experts underlines that North Korea continues to “flout the sanctions of the Security Council”, in particular by developing its nuclear program, by launching ballistic missiles, by violating maritime sanctions and limits of oil imports.

The committee also claims to have begun to investigate “information” reporting the export by North Korea of ​​”conventional weapons and ammunition” in violation of sanctions, particularly to Russia.

“This veto is not a sign of concern for the North Korean people or for the effectiveness of sanctions. It is about Russia gaining the freedom to violate sanctions looking for weapons to use against Ukraine,” denounced British Ambassador to the UN Barbara Woodward.

This veto “is in fact an admission of guilt. Moscow no longer hides its military cooperation with North Korea (…) as well as the use of North Korean weapons in the war against Ukraine”, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba commented on put an end to two committees of experts, due to the development of its military relations with these governments”, denounced in a joint press release the United States, France, Japan, South Korea and the United Kingdom, in reference to Mali.

Last August, showing its support for Bamako, Russia had in fact blocked a resolution which would have extended the mandate of the experts who had delivered damning conclusions for the Malian junta and its “foreign security partners”.

“There can be no justification for the disappearance of the guardians of the sanctions regime”, the southern ambassador castigated Thursday -Korean Joonkook Hwang. “It's like destroying surveillance cameras to prevent being caught red-handed.”

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