[Asia Economy Reporter Park Hyungsoo] The Group of Seven (G7) issued a chair statement calling on North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons and refrain from provocations, but North Korea reacted strongly, calling it an act of interference in internal affairs.
On the 18th, North Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs posted on its website, criticizing the G7 by saying, "Strengthening national defense, which any country does, is labeled as 'provocative behavior,'" and condemned the mention of "complete, verifiable, and irreversible abandonment" as "a violent infringement on sovereignty and an act of interference in internal affairs that denies the exercise of rights by a sovereign state, and an unacceptable provocation."
The G7 Foreign and Development Ministers' Meeting held in the UK from the 11th to the 12th reaffirmed in its chair statement "the explicit goal of complete, verifiable, and irreversible abandonment (CVIA) of all weapons of mass destruction and all-range ballistic missiles in accordance with United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions."
The G7 replaced the previously used term "complete, verifiable, and irreversible dismantlement" (CVID) with CVIA. The G7 chair statement also included a demand that "we again urge North Korea to refrain from provocative acts and engage in diplomatic procedures."
North Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticized, saying, "It is a country that could not utter a word when the United States brought nuclear strategic assets to the Korean Peninsula and conducted joint military exercises," and argued that "labeling the strengthening of national defense, which is a sovereign state's right to self-defense, as 'provocation' is absurd."
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