Pyongyang’s latest missile launch: North Korea, Russia clash with US, South Korea and allies

UNITED NATIONS: North Korea and Russia clashed with the United States, South Korea and their allies at an emergency UN Security Council meeting Tuesday on Pyongyang’s latest intercontinental ballistic missile launch, which it called “a warning counter-measure” to threats from the US and other hostile forces.
North Korean Ambassador Kim Song said this is “the most dangerous year” in the military-security landscape on the Korean Peninsula, pointing to stepped up US-South Korean military exercises and the US deployment of nuclear-powered submarines and other nuclear assets to the area that have raised a “nuclear war danger.”
The US and nine allies pointed to five North Korean ICBM launches, over 25 ballistic missiles launches and three satellite launches using ballistic missile technology this year, violating multiple Security Council resolutions and threatening “the peace and stability of its neighbors and the international community.”
In a statement read just before the council meeting by US deputy ambassador Robert Wood, surrounded by diplomats from the other countries, the 10 countries condemned the latest ICBM launch on Dec. 17 and all launches before it.
North Korea’s Song urged the international community to think about North Korea’s security concerns, calling its counter-measures an “absolutely reasonable, normal and reflective response” in exercise of its legitimate right to self-defense.
He warned the US and South Korea that if they continue “with their reckless and irresponsible military threat,” North Korea’s armed forces “will never remain an onlooker to it and the provokers will be held entirely responsible for all the consequences.”