Putin warns against ‘intimidating’ North Korea after missile test

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday condemned North Korea’s “dangerous” missile test but warned against “intimidating” the rogue regime and called for a peaceful solution in the region.

“I want to confirm that we are categorically against the expansion of the club of nuclear powers, including with the Korean Peninsula and North Korea,” Putin said at a Chinese economic summit in Beijing, saying it would be “harmful and dangerous.”

AP

But in comments apparently directed at the US, Putin said “intimidating the DRPK is unacceptable,” using the acronym for North Korea.

“At the same time, we understand that what we have observed in the world recently, and specifically flagrant violations of international law and incursions into the territory of foreign states, changes in regime, lead to such kinds of arms races,” he said.

The Russian leader criticized the US airstrike on a Syrian airfield in April in retaliation for President Bashar al-Assad’s use of poison gas on his citizens and has blamed America’s aggressive policies in the Middle East for the spread of ISIS.

The regime of President Kim Jong Un test-fired a medium-range ballistic missile on Sunday that the US military said landed about 60 miles off Russia’s east coast.

North Korea on Monday said the rocket was capable of carrying a nuclear warhead.

The White House in a statement said the “latest provocation” shows a need for all countries to implement stronger sanctions against North Korea, and singled out Russia.

“With the missile impacting so close to Russian soil — in fact, closer to Russia than to Japan — the President cannot imagine that Russia is pleased,” the statement said.

But Moscow said its defense ministry had tracked the missile and said it landed 300 miles away from the coast in the Sea of Japan and never posed a threat to Russian territory.

“The North Korean rocket followed a trajectory away from Russia and at a significant distance,” the ministry said in a statement released Monday. “This missile launch posed no threat to the Russian Federation.”

Putin called for diplomacy rather than military action to ease tensions in the region.

“We need to return to dialogue with North Korea and stop scaring it and find ways to resolve these problems peacefully, ” he said

 

Source:nypost.com