North Korea Warns Denuclearisation Off the Table - Tensions with Washington Set to Rise

North Korea’s ambassador to the United Nations Kim Song has stated that his country was no longer willing to discuss denuclearisation with the United States, criticising Washington’s ‘time saving trick’ of drawing out negotiations while failing to offer viable terms. “We do not need to have lengthy talks with the U.S. now and denuclearization is already gone out of the negotiating table,” he stated, with President Donald Trump shortly afterwards responding “we’ll see.” The nature of the American response to this development remains to be seen. Pyongyang in April demanded that the United States return to peace talks with reasonable terms for step by step disarmament in exchange for relief from economic sanctions, and set the end of the year 2019 as a deadline. The Northeast Asian state has suspended testing of strategic ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads since November 2017, and while it began testing of short ranged tactical ballistic missiles from early 2019 following the collapse of talks with the Untied States in Hanoi, it has yet to escalate to previous levels of testing.

Ambassador Kim Song notably slammed statements by European members of the United Nations Security Council criticising Pyongyang and supporting the American position, calling it a serious provocation. He accused European states of playing the role of the ‘pet dog’ of the United States. Rhetoric between Pyongyang and Washington has escalated to levels not seen since 2017, and a major escalation of tensions to levels similar to those seen two years ago remains likely. 

For the Donald Trump administration, which has hailed improving relations with Pyongyang as one of its primary foreign policy successes, the potential for a complete collapse in dialogue and re-escalation to prior levels of tension could be devastating particular with 2020 being an election year. Pyongyang is likely to be considerably more confident in asserting its position should tensions re-escalate, with the country's arsenal of intercontinental range ballistic missiles developed in 2017 allowing it to deliver nuclear warheads to targets across the American mainland - a highly potent deterrent capability.