{"id":216937,"date":"2019-06-01T04:04:24","date_gmt":"2019-06-01T08:04:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=216937"},"modified":"2019-06-01T04:04:24","modified_gmt":"2019-06-01T08:04:24","slug":"s-korea-urges-restraint-after-norths-missile-test","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/06\/01\/s-korea-urges-restraint-after-norths-missile-test\/","title":{"rendered":"S. Korea urges restraint after North’s missile test"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
FILE: Jeong, Kyeong-doo, Republic of Korea (ROK) Minister of National Defense. (File Photo By U.S. Navy photo\/Wikimedia commons, Public Domain<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

SINGAPORE \u2014 South Korea’s Defence Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo on Saturday fended off calls to step up pressure on North Korea after it test-fired missiles last month.<\/p>\n

Jeong told an annual security conference in Singapore that the tests were being investigated and a conclusion is within reach.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are discussions whether or not it is a short-range ballistic missile. There is a perspective that it is a Russian Iskander missile, or it is a new tactical ballistic missile,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are data that we can verify, and we are working off those data to make sure we have a verification.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeong was responding to a question on whether the tests were a violation of a military agreement between South and North Korea last September to halt acts of aggression against each other.<\/p>\n

He said the North was \u201cin fact acting within the boundaries\u201d of the agreement and tensions between their militaries \u201chave been lowered to a significant extent.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo currently the actions done by the North Korean regime have the intent to carry out the peace process through dialogue and talks. And I believe that’s the hidden intent behind the lines in terms of their missile launches.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeong called on the\u00a0international\u00a0community to \u201cassure North Korea that the decision to denuclearize is indeed the right decision.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that South Korea sees humanitarian aid and the lowering of military tensions as ways \u201cto lead North Korea into conversation and away from … the ways of the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

North Korea itself has defended the launches, saying it was exercising its right to self-defence.<\/p>\n

The U.S. and Japan say the short-range ballistic missile tests on May 4 and 9 were a violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions. The tests ended a pause in launches that began in late 2017, and came amid deadlocked negotiations to rid North Korea of nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n

Japanese Defence Minister Takeshi Iwaya, who spoke at the same session on Korean security, stressed that a strict implementation of sanctions against North Korea was necessary.<\/p>\n

He specifically directed his comments at South Korea, China and Russia.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to enhance surveillance on a global scale while strengthening effort locally to ensure the full implementation of sanctions,\u201d Iwaya said.<\/p>\n

Earlier Saturday, U.S. Acting Secretary of Defence Patrick Shanahan told the Shangri-La Dialogue conference that North Korea \u201cremains an extraordinary threat\u201d and has \u201cneared a point where it could credibly strike regional allies, U.S. territory, and our forward-deployed forces.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SINGAPORE \u2014 South Korea’s Defence Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo on Saturday fended off calls to step up pressure on North Korea …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":216938,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-216937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-w","mauthors-annabelle-liang","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216937"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":216939,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216937\/revisions\/216939"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}