After a flurry of North Korean missile tests this year, a growing number of sanctions have been imposed on the secretive state in a bid to quell the growing tensions on the Korean peninsula.
However, the missile test on November 29 suggested Pyongyang has no plans to give up its nuclear and missile programmes and fresh efforts are being made to find a way to bring the situation under control.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson recently mentioned the “right to interdict maritime traffic transporting goods” to and from the North, which would cut off the country’s supply routes without resorting to military action.
This move has also been discussed in South Korea, with officials desperate to avoid conflict because of the unimaginable loss of life on both sides of the Korean peninsula.
North Korea’s state-run news agency KCNA has hit out at the plans and said any naval blockade would be considered an act of war.
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It reported: “The US moves for sea blockade can never be tolerated as they constitute a wanton violation of the sovereignty and dignity of an independent state.
“The US is trying to openly take the measure of sea blockade against the DPRK and strangle its economy in peace time.
“This is part of its scheme to escalate political and economic blockade against the DPRK which has lasted for decades.”
Citing the London treaty on the definition of invasion and U.N. General Assembly Resolution 3314, the KCNA claimed blockade-type sanctions against a sovereign state in peacetime is an “act of invasion, an illegal act.”
It added: ”Now the US is trumpeting about sea blockade, not content with staging largest-ever nuclear war drills against the DPRK in the sea and air after shipping the strategic assets into the Korean peninsula.
“This is a hideous war criminal act to push the situation to an ‘uncontrollable’ catastrophic phase and to a touch-and-go phase of a war.”
North Korea is prepared to open a direct dialogue with the US to seek guarantees on national security from Washington, according to Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov.
The Russian foreign ministry said in a statement: “The sides discussed further steps to put an end to the civil conflict in Syria via establishing a sustainable negotiating process involving all Syrian political forces, including within the Geneva process and in the format of the forthcoming National Dialogue Congress in Sochi, with concurrent completion of the defeat of international terrorist groups.
“The Russian and US top diplomats also expressed common opinion that North Korea must strictly abide by the United Nations Security Council resolutions.
“Touching on issues of the bilateral agenda, Lavrov pointed to the inadmissibility of pressure on Russian media and diplomats in the United States, including the US special services’ recruitment attempts.”