Kim Son Gyong, vice-minister for International Organizations of the Foreign Ministry of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), issued the following press statement on Monday

The reason why the UN Security Council fails to fulfill its important duty to ensure global peace and security and get rid of its malfunction can be clearly seen in the “joint statement of 10 countries” issued by the U.S. and its followers.

The “joint statement,” signed by some permanent member states of the UNSC gripped by extreme prejudice and double-standards and some UN member states accustomed to blindly follow the U.S. instruction instead of considering whether it is right or wrong, is nothing but a conspiratorial document without any effect in the light of international law and political influence.

The DPRK’s reconnaissance satellite launch is a legitimate and just exercise of the right to self-defense aimed at correctly seeing through and thoroughly coping with the grave military moves of the U.S. and its followers, which are becoming more undisguised in their aggressive nature.

If the reconnaissance satellite “Malligyong-1” brought to space is a “threat” to the signatories of the “joint statement”, are the nuclear carriers, nuclear strategic submarines and nuclear strategic bombers deployed on the doorstep of the DPRK by the U.S. 30-odd times this year “apostles of friendship and peace”?

Do the “ten countries”, which accused the DPRK of using ballistic missile technology in launching the satellite, launch their satellites by rubber balloon or null gravity, not by a carrier rocket using the same technology as ballistic missile?

Such brigandish idea of the U.S. and its vassal forces that the DPRK is not allowed to exercise its due right to space exploration, a right belonging to all UN member states, is a typical expression of the most hideous and brazen-faced violation of sovereignty that denies the justification of the existence of the DPRK, before being the mere issue of partiality and double-standards.

Our stand is clear.

The U.S. finds its main interest and hobby in encroaching upon the sovereign rights of independent countries through high-handed practice and threat, but what the DPRK is interested in is its full exercise of the universal sovereign rights common to all countries like satellite launch.

No matter what critical statements and harshest-ever sanctions the U.S. and its vassal forces may issue or impose, they can neither check the DPRK’s exercise of its sovereign rights nor get what they want.

To make it crystal-clear that the U.S. and the West’s outrageous and illegal interference in the internal affairs of independent sovereign countries and employment of double-standards against them can never work, the DPRK will squarely, unhesitatingly and perfectly exercise its sovereign rights including satellite launch, and this will contribute to the establishment of a just and equal new international order.

If the U.S. and its vassal forces again seek to violate the sovereignty of the DPRK under the pretext of the utterly unlawful “resolution” of the UNSC, they will be held wholly accountable for any consequences to be entailed by it.

Kim Son Gyong, vice-minister for International Organizations of the Foreign Ministry

Kim Son Gyong, vice-minister for International Organizations of the Foreign Ministry