NEW YORK: Japan, the United States, South Korea and 10 other countries said on Tuesday that they “condemn in the strongest possible terms” North Korea’s launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on Thursday.

The ICBM launch, in addition to North Korea’s more than 100 ballistic missile launches since 2022 to date, “jeopardizes international peace and security,” the countries said in a joint statement.

All U.N. member states are “obliged to implement sanctions” on North Korea, the statement said, apparently warning against support for Pyongyang by China and Russia.

In a separate joint statement, foreign ministers from countries such as Japan, the United States and South Korea expressed “grave concerns” about the deployment of North Korean troops to Russia.

The ministers said that North Korea’s direct support for Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine “would mark a dangerous expansion of the conflict, with serious consequences for European and Indo-Pacific peace and security.”

The troop deployment “would be a further breach of international law, including the most fundamental principles of the U.N. Charter,” the ministers said.

They said they “condemn in the strongest possible terms” increasing military cooperation between North Korea and Russia, urging Pyongyang to stop providing assistance to Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine.

JIJI Press