UN Hands North Korea Control of Key Nuclear Position, Embarrassing Blow to UN's Little Remaining Credibility
North Korea has assumed leadership of a United Nations forum devoted to nuclear disarmament, beginning its chance at the rotating presidency with a declaration of hate.
“My country is still at war with the United States,” North Korean Ambassador Han Tae-Song said, according to the Guardian.
North Korea has a turn at the helm because the ground rules of the U.N. Conference on Disarmament in Geneva are that every one of the 65 member nations gets a turn as the body goes in alphabetical order, using English.
The body meets three times a year.
Need more proof of how broken the @UN system is? North Korea is heading the UN Disarmament Forum for a month. North Korea is the world’s leading weapons proliferator, has conducted over 1 round of missile testing every 10 days this year. China & Pak are in the UNHRC, & now this!
— Palki Sharma (@palkisu) May 30, 2022
Giving leadership of a disarmament conference to a country testing missiles was denounced by some nations, according to the Washington Examiner.
“We remain gravely concerned about the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s reckless actions, which continue to seriously undermine the very value of the Disarmament Conference,” Australian Ambassador Amanda Gorely said.
Asked about the value of the U.N. group, State Department spokesman Ned Price, using the acronym for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, said, “It certainly does call that into question when you have a regime like the DPRK in a senior leadership post, a regime that has done as much as any other government around the world to erode the non-proliferation norm.”
Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, which monitors the U.N., said North Korea’s leadership would “seriously undermine the image and credibility of the United Nations,” according to CNN.
Everything is fine here at the UN in Geneva:
?? Friday: China elected to World Health Organization’s Executive Board.
?? Today: UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet ended a visit to China by echoing Beijing propaganda.
?? Monday: North Korea takes over as chair of UN Disarmament. pic.twitter.com/6o1hINCYj3
— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) May 29, 2022
“This can only highlight the irrelevance of the CD in the current context,” said Marc Finaud, an expert at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, using an acronym for the Council on Disarmament.
While playing the role of president of the body, Ham said he took note of the comments directed against North Korea.
He criticized any efforts at restraining North Korea’s weapons expansion program.
“No country has the right to criticize or interfere in the national defense policy” of North Korea, he said, according to the Examiner.
The U.S. aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan concluded a naval exercise with South Korea in the Philippine Sea on Saturday, the two militaries said, amid signs that North Korea is possibly preparing to conduct its first nuclear test explosion since 2017.https://t.co/Ix5TYJG2u7
— Newsmax (@newsmax) June 4, 2022
On Sunday, North Korea fired eight short-range ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan one day after the United States and South Korea held joint drills that included the USS Ronald Reagan, an aircraft carrier, according to the Guardian.
The launches were the 18th of the year for North Korea as it steps up the pace of its missile testing.
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