Kim’s sister rejects US offer of dialogue and vows more satellite launches

The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un yesterday dismissed U.S. calls for a return to diplomacy and lambasted its condemnations of the North’s recent spy satellite launch, vowing more launches in violation of U.N. bans.

During a U.N. Security Council meeting earlier this week, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, called the North’s satellite launch a “reckless, unlawful” action that threatens its neighbors. But she reiterated the U.S. offer for dialogue without any preconditions, saying North Korea “can choose the timing and topic.”

Kim’s sister and senior official, Kim Yo Jong, rejected the U.S. overture and threatened more satellite and other weapons launches.

“The sovereignty of an independent state can never be an agenda item for negotiations, and therefore, (North Korea) will never sit face to face with the U.S. for that purpose,” Kim Yo Jong said in a statement carried by state media.

“(North Korea) will continue to make efforts to develop everything belonging to its sovereign rights and continue to exercise the sovereign rights, enjoyed by all the member states of the U.N., in a dignified manner without being restricted in the future, too,” she said.

Multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions ban North Korea from performing any launches using ballistic technology, such as satellite liftoffs and missile tests. But the North has argued it has sovereign rights to launch spy satellites and test-flight ballistic missiles to cope with what it calls U.S.-led military threats. It views major U.S.-South Korean military drills as invasion rehearsal and often reacts with its own weapons tests.

Kim Yo Jong said the U.N. Security Council meeting last Monday was convened at “the gangster-like demand of the U.S. and its followers.” She said Thomas-Greenfield must first explain why U.S. strategic assets have frequently appeared at South Korean ports, rather than branding the North’s satellite launch as “illegal.”

She apparently referred to the increasing temporary deployments of powerful U.S. military assets like aircraft carriers and nuclear-powered submarines in line with an earlier U.S.-South Korean agreement to boost their defense against North Korea’s evolving nuclear threats.

HYUNG-JIN KIM, SEOUL,MDT/AP