N. Korea slams multination statement backing anti-Pyongyang sanctions as 'strategic failure'

Seoul, October 31 (Yonhap) -- North Korea harshly condemned a recent joint statement from the United States, South Korea, and other nations backing sanctions against Pyongyang's nuclear and weapons programs, branding it a "strategic failure." A spokesperson from North Korea's foreign ministry criticized the move, which was issued by 11 countries and the European Union, in a statement on Saturday.

The joint statement reaffirmed the commitment to monitoring North Korea's activities in violation of U.N. Security Council sanctions resolutions and highlighted findings of the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team on the country's illicit activities. The North's spokesperson argued that the hostile forces' denial of the country's constitutional status and their inability to prove the effectiveness of sanctions demonstrated a strategic failure.

He emphasized that futile sanctions and pressure would never work on North Korea, and that the country's status as a nuclear weapons state would remain unchallenged. The spokesperson also denounced the U.S. and its allies' malicious and unreasonable policy toward North Korea, stating that time would prove the sanctions on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to be doomed to fail.