Julie Bishop welcomes UN sanctions against North Korea after nuclear warhead test
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Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has welcomed new sanctions designed to punish the North Korean regime for testing a nuclear warhead in September which led to magnitude-5.3 seismic event off the coast of the peninsula.
The test came after a series of ballistic missile launches by the Kim Jong Un regime and has been condemned by the international community and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull as reckless, provocative and dangerous.
North Korea confirmed the nuclear test and claimed it had achieved its goal of attaching a miniature nuclear warhead to a rocket, raising tension with the United States and South Korea.
In response, the United Nations (UN) Security Council has unanimously passed a new swathe of sanctions on the North Korean Government, as proposed by the United States and China.
The 17-page resolution intends to cut North Korean coal exports by a reported $700 million, denying the regime of one its few remaining sources of revenue.
Ms Bishop said the sanctions would also target illicit transporting and commercial activities used to generate revenue for the North Korean weapons program.
"The resolution calls for North Korea to respect the human rights of the North Korean people and those of other nationalities detailed in North Korea, reiterating appeals made by Australia over an extended time," she said.
"In addition to these strong multilateral measures, I continue to assess and designate individuals and entities linked to the regime's weapons and missile programs for targeted financial sanctions and travel bans."
'I am considering further measures'
Ms Bishop called on North Korea to abandon its nuclear program and engage constructively with the international community.
"We will continue to work with our friends and partners including the United States, the Republic of Korea, Japan and China to uphold peace and stability in North Asia," she said.
"I am considering further autonomous measures Australia can impose.
"These measures will be determined following public consultations in early 2017."
South Korean President Park Geun-hye, who offered to resign earlier this week amid an influence-peddling scandal, said Kim Jong-un had behaved with "maniacal recklessness".
She said North Korea was in clear violation of UN Security Council resolutions and had challenged the international community.
Mr Turnbull said the Security Council had already considered eight breaches by the regime before the September test.
"The recklessness of North Korea puts the world's peace at risk," he said.
"It's persistent, it's provocative, it's dangerous."
Topics: world-politics, unrest-conflict-and-war, australia, korea-democratic-people-s-republic-of
