The United States, South Korea and Japan have announced the creation of a new multinational group to monitor the implementation of sanctions against North Korea. The decision was made after Russia and China disrupted monitoring activities at the UN. This was reported by Reuters, according to UNN.
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The mechanism, called the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Group, was introduced after Russia rejected in March the annual renewal of the UN panel of experts that has monitored the implementation of sanctions aimed at curbing North Korea's nuclear and missile programs for the past 15 years. China abstained from voting.
The team is to continue the work of the UN team, including the development of regular reports on the application of sanctions. Eight other countries, including the United Kingdom, France, and Germany, will participate in its work.
The launch of the new team was announced at a joint press conference in Seoul by U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell, South Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Hong-kyung and Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Masataka Okano, along with ambassadors from eight countries.
There was a lot of discussion about how to build an effective monitoring system that could replace the UN team, but even during this process, there were still cases of North Korea violating sanctions, so we thought we shouldn't delay any longer and should fill the gap quickly,
While the allies will continue to look for ways to reinstate the UN scheme, the team is open to all countries that want to help enforce sanctions, he added.
Campbell said that Russia's veto was likely influenced by a previous report by a UN panel on North Korea's illegal purchases of military equipment and ammunition for the war in Ukraine.
The potential for this to become a serious attempt to track and hold accountable the steps that North Korea is taking with respect to a number of provocative actions is real. So this is a big step in the right direction,
