The United Nations Security Council today took up a softened American proposal for sanctions over North Korea’s reported nuclear test, but its prospects were clouded when China appeared to pull back from its earlier support for tough measures. Skip to next paragraph Multimedia Video North Korea’s Nuclear Test In Washington, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Stephen Hadley, the national security adviser, met with a senior Chinese diplomat, Tang Jiaxuan, to discuss North Korea, Reuters reported. A spokesman for the National Security Council, Frederick Jones, said the group talked about “the way forward in dealing with North Korea.”
The new American resolution, to be formally introduced this morning, would declare North Korea’s actions to be a threat to international peace and stability and would require countries to freeze assets related to Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs and ban the sale or transfer of materials that could be used in them. It would also ban travel by people involved in the programs and bar the sale of the luxury goods used to reward the regime’s elite, diplomats said late Wednesday.
But unlike an earlier version, it would allow but not require inspections of all cargo going into or out of North Korea, or the freezing of assets related to counterfeiting or narcotics, which American officials say are crucial sources of the hard currency needed to fund the weapons programs. Japanese demands for a ban on allowing North Korean ships or planes to enter other countries were also dropped.
In Beijing today, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry appeared to back away from a statement on Tuesday by the country’s United Nations ambassador expressing support for “punitive” sanctions.
