China reins in North Korea by supporting UN sanctions
GETTY China yesterday struck a blow to North Korea by banning several imports
Beijing announced it will enforce tough new UN sanctions agreed earlier this month and will stop imports of North Korean coal, iron ore, lead and seafood. The global ban on trade in these items is expected to slash the already impoverished nation’s £2.3billion a year export revenue by one-third. China’s pledge to rein in its rogue ally came as US chiefs played down the crisis, which has seen North Korea and the US warn of nuclear war.
Kim Jong-un’s regime had threatened to fire intermediate range missiles to within 20 miles of the US Pacific island of Guam, prompting President Donald Trump to warn that the US military was “locked and loaded” if North Korea acted unwisely. Speaking in South Korea, the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Joseph Dunford said military options being prepared were for when diplomatic and economic sanctions failed. He said: “We’re all looking to get out of this situation without a war.”
GETTY Kim Jong-un’s regime had threatened to fire intermediate range missiles towards Guam
US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson used an article in the Wall Street Journal to emphasise US efforts to defuse the crisis.
The US has no interest in regime change Jim Mattis and Rex Tillerson
Their article said: “The US has no interest in regime change.” They stressed that they were applying diplomatic and economic pressure “to achieve the complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula and a dismantling of the regime’s ballistic missile programs”.
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GETTY President Donald Trump has warned that the US military was 'locked and loaded'