Following a succession of ballistic missile launches by Pyongyang, the senior diplomats of Japan, South Korea, and the United States announced their unity against Pyongyang on Saturday.
Following a day of negotiations in Honolulu, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, South Korean Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong, and Japanese Foreign Minister Hayashi Yoshimasa issued an unified statement condemning the seven launches as “destabilizing.”
They urged Pyongyang should “stop its unlawful activities and instead engage in diplomacy.”
“The DPRK is in a phase of provocation,” Blinken told a press conference alongside his fellow foreign ministers, using the acronym for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
“We continue to work to find ways to hold the DPRK accountable,” he said, citing the most recent sanctions slapped on eight people and entities tied to the North Korean government.
The three diplomats reaffirmed their commitment to denuclearizing the entire Korean Peninsula and their willingness to begin negotiations with Pyongyang, which has so far ignored overtures from US President Joe Biden’s administration.
“The Secretary and Foreign Ministers emphasized they held no hostile intent towards the DPRK and underscored continued openness to meeting the DPRK without preconditions,” they said in the statement.
