In Russia, Japan PM urges 'greatest possible pressure' on N.Korea
In a photo taken on September 6, 2017, Korean People's Army (KPA) soldiers attend a mass celebration in Pyongyang for scientists involved in carrying out North Korea's largest nuclear blast to date. Citizens of the capital lined the streets September 6 to wave pink and purple pom-poms and cheer a convoy of buses carrying the specialists into the city, and toss confetti over them as they walked into Kim Il-Sung Square. Japan on Monday urged the UN Security Council to agree to draft a new sanctions resolution to punish North Korea after its sixth nuclear test as the top UN body met to discuss a response. (Kim Won-Jin / AFP)
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(AFP) - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called Thursday for the world to put the "greatest possible pressure" on North Korea to abandon its nuclear missile programme.
"The international community must unite in applying the greatest possible pressure on North Korea," Abe said, four days after Pyongyang staged its sixth and most powerful nuclear test to date, which it described as a "perfect success".
"We must make North Korea immediately and fully comply with all relevant UN Security Council resolutions and abandon all its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner," Abe said.
"North Korea is escalating an overt challenge to the peace, prosperity, law and order of the region and indeed the entire world."
His remarks were made on the sidelines of an economic forum in the Russian port city of Vladivostok which is also being attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin and South Korea's Moon Jae-In.
On Wednesday, Washington demanded an oil embargo on Pyongyang and a freeze on the foreign assets of its leader Kim Jong-Un in a drastic bid to force an end to the perilous nuclear stand-off.
South Korea has also pushed for moves to cut off Pyongyang's key supplies of fuel oil, but Russia has dismissed such a call, while China is also reluctant to take measures that could lead to instability or a refugee exodus on its frontier.
© Agence France-Presse
