In a state media report on Thursday, an unnamed North Korean official told the US to stop making “careless remarks” and “keep its mouth shut”. Biden administration officials earlier this month confirmed a declassified US intelligence assessment that Russia was in the process of buying weapons from North Korea, including millions of artillery shells and rockets, as Moscow tries to ease severe supply shortages in Ukraine that have worsened from US-led export controls. and sanctions. North Korea’s statement came weeks after Moscow described the US intelligence finding as “fake”. North Korea’s arms exports to Russia would violate United Nations resolutions that prohibit the country from importing or exporting weapons. The North Korean official stressed that Pyongyang has never recognized the “illegal” UN Security Council sanctions against the country that were “cooked up by the US and its vassals”. The official said the export and import of military equipment is a “legal right belonging to a sovereign state,” according to an English translation of the statement published by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency. “But we take this opportunity to make one thing clear. We have never exported arms or ammunition to Russia in the past and will not plan to export them,” said the official, described as deputy director general of the defense ministry’s general equipment office. “It is not certain where the rumor spread by the US came from, but it is aimed at tarnishing the image of the DPRK,” the official said, referring to the country’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Facing sanctions and export controls, Russia in August bought Iranian-made drones that US officials said had technical problems. Experts say that North Korea, if it wishes, could become an important source of small arms, artillery and other ammunition for Russia, given the compatibility of its defense systems based on Soviet roots. North Korea has sought to tighten ties with Russia even as most of Europe and the West have distanced themselves, blaming the US for the crisis and denouncing the West’s “hegemonic policy” as justification for Russia’s military action in Ukraine to protect himself. The North Korean government has even hinted that it is interested in sending construction workers to help rebuild pro-Russian breakaway areas in eastern Ukraine. In July, North Korea became the only nation besides Russia and Syria to recognize the independence of the territories, Donetsk and Luhansk. North Korea has also used the war as a window to accelerate its weapons development, testing dozens of weapons, including its first long-range missiles since 2017, taking advantage of the gap in the UN Security Council, where Russia and China have block US efforts to tighten sanctions on Pyongyang. The North has marked its testing activity with repeated threats of nuclear conflict with Seoul and Washington. The latter was a law passed by Pyongyang’s parliament this month that further cemented the country’s status as a nuclear power and authorized the preemptive use of nuclear weapons in a wide range of scenarios where its leadership is threatened. Sung Kim, the Biden administration’s special representative on North Korea, met with his South Korean counterpart Kim Gunn in Seoul on Thursday, where they expressed “serious concern” over the North’s escalating nuclear doctrine set out in the new law, the ministry said Foreign Affairs of South Korea. Diplomats reaffirmed the US commitment to defend South Korea in the event of a nuclear war with the full range of its military capabilities, including nuclear. The allies also maintained their months-long assessment that North Korea was preparing to conduct its first nuclear test since 2017 and discussed “stern” countermeasures to such an action, the ministry said.
