China, Russia lambast Canada summit on N Korea
January 17, 2018, 11:06 am

The 20 countries meeting in Vancouver to discuss North Korea’s nuclear program pledged to reinforce sanctions and tighten the noose around leader Kim Jung-un [Xinhua]

China and Russia have questioned the validity of a summit on North Korea’s nuclear program hosted in the Canadian city of Vancouver because it did not adequately represent the world community.

The meeting, which was organized by Canada and the United States and attended by 18 other nations, did not include China or Russia.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said in Beijing that the absence of these two key playes rendered the Vancouver summit without legitimacy and was not representative.

“Since this meeting does not have legitimacy or representativeness, China has opposed the meeting from the very beginning,” he said.

“While countries are committed to finding a proper solution for the peaceful settlement of the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue, some parties hold such a meeting in the name of the so-called United Nations command during the Cold War era,” he told reporters during a briefing in Beijing.

“We do not know what the purpose of convening such a meeting is.”

The 20 nations who attended the Vancouver meeting are “old” allies which fought on the same side against the North during the Korean War of the 1950s.

They all condemned North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear weapons and said they would work to prevent that from happening.

During a press briefing in Vancouver, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that the US remained committed to a diplomatic solution with North Korea but drew the line at Pyongyang possessing nuclear arms.

“I think we all need to be very sober and clear-eyed about the current situation, as North Korea has continued to make significant advances in both its nuclear weapons, the lethality of those weapons, as demonstrated by their last thermonuclear test, as well as the continued progress they’ve made in their intercontinental ballistic missile systems,” Tillerson said.

“We have to recognize that that threat is growing. And if North Korea does not choose the path of engagement, discussion, negotiation, then they themselves will trigger an option.”

The foreign ministers from the 20 countries also pledged to reinforce UN sanctions against North Korea.

Russia also criticized the Vancouver Summit with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov saying, “I think that with all due respect to those who came up with this initiative, I do not expect anything productive”.

“When we found out about the meeting, we asked: Why do you need all those countries together?” Lavrov told the Russian media. “Greece, Belgium, Colombia, Luxembourg – what do they have to do with the Korean Peninsula?”

The BRICS Post with inputs from Agencies