North Korea calls as ‘nonsense’ US claims it hacked UN database

UNITED NATIONS — North Korea dismissed as “nonsense” on Wednesday the claim of the United States that Pyongyang hacked the database of the United Nations committee that monitors sanctions against the North, even saying the Trump administration should instead be working toward peace.

North Korea’s UN Mission said in a statement that linking the country to the recent hacking incident is a “stereotyped trick to keep up the atmosphere of sanction and pressure” against Pyongyang “at all costs.”

A spokesperson for the US Mission said that “the quotes and comments attributed to the U.S. delegation are entirely false.” The spokesperson was not authorized to speak publicly and had no further comment.

North Korea’s statement was the first disclosure of the hacking of the Security Council sanctions committee’s database.

The Security Council has imposed increasingly tough sanctions on North Korea over its nuclear weapons program that have severely restricted its exports and imports.

Many diplomats and analysts credit the sanctions with helping promote the thaw in relations between North Korea and South Korea as well as a planned meeting between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. The date for the meeting could be announced by week’s end.

Sessions of the sanctions committee, which includes all 15 Security Council members and is known as the 1718 committee, are closed. It has imposed a travel ban and asset freeze on 80 individuals, and ordered an asset freeze on 75 companies, banks, organizations, and other entities.

North Korea’s mission said the US “again picked fault” with the country over the hacking incident at a closed sanctions committee meeting Monday.

It quoted what it described as “the US and hostile forces” saying “it is North Korea that has the biggest concern in the work of 1718 sanctions committee and owns the hacking capacity.” The mission added that the US urged the committee “to thoroughly probe the true state and take steps.”

North Korea reiterated that it has never recognized the Security Council’s sanctions resolutions and the 1718 committee, calling both “illegal and unlawful.” The mission added that it “is not interested in what the sanctions committee does.”

The mission said “the US and hostile forces” should be making an effort to help cooperation and the peace process on the Korean Peninsula rather than “manipulating plots with that hacking incident.”  /kga