South Korea has urged North Korea to halt its nuclear activities and military cooperation with Russia in a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA). 

South Korea’s Ambassador to Austria Ham Sang-wook made the call on Wednesday in a meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors in Vienna, Austria, calling on the North to immediately halt its illegal nuclear development and comply with the IAEA’s safeguards.  

Ham continued to say that North Korea is seriously undermining the peace and stability of not only the Korean Peninsula but also the international community by enshrining its policy of strengthening nuclear forces into its constitution and threatening a preemptive nuclear strike.

The ambassador urged the IAEA member states to collectively state that the international community will not tolerate North Korea’s nuclear development and will never recognize it as a nuclear weapons state.

Ham also called on North Korea and Russia to stop violating the UN Security Council resolutions, saying that growing military cooperation between the two nations clearly shows that the security of the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asia is inseparable from the security of Europe and the international community.

In the meeting, South Korea, as well as major countries such as the U.S., Japan, France and Germany, expressed deep concerns over the North’s increased nuclear activities and called on the North to implement the Security Council resolutions.