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Diplomacy holds the key North Korea

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December 27, 2017

Why in news?

Fresh sanctions are being imposed on North Korea.

What are the recent North Korean Aggressions?

  • Pyongyang launched its first intercontinental ballistic missile in November 2017.
  • Ever since, North Korea claims to have acquired the potential to deliver a nuclear warhead to anywhere in North America.
  • In September, North Korea detonated its sixth underground nuclear device, which it claimed was a hydrogen bomb.
  • Though unverified, experts believe that the explosion was many times more powerful than previous detonations.
  • These developments have increasingly narrowed the scope for military options available to the international community.
  • Various governments also recently aired suspicion that the North Korean government orchestrated the world-wide ‘WannaCry’ cyber-attacks.
  • This, coupled with the frustration over the continuing nuclear stand-off, led to fresh economic sanctions on North Korea.

What are the sanctions about?

  • They were imposed unanimously by the UN Security Council.
  • The sanctions include an 89% curb on refined petroleum imports into North Korea, with stringent inspections of ships transferring fuel to the country.
  • Also, to cut-off hard currency supply, there was a call for the expulsion of thousands of working North Koreans in other countries within 2 years.
  • Despite supporting the sanctions, Beijing and Moscow did stress the potentially destabilising and counterproductive impact of these measures.

What is the way ahead?

  • The objective of the sanctions has been to force North Korea to halt its nuclear programme and start disarmament negotiations.
  • But diplomacy remains the best option to bring it to disarmament talks.
  • A revival of stalled peace negotiations between the P-5 nations and North Korea may be the only realistic alternative on the horizon.
  • The fairly successful Iranian nuclear deal provided a constructive template to negotiate with North Korea.

 

Source: The Hindu

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