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A nongovernmental organization(NGO) that keeps tabs on the United Nations announced plans to stage a large rally in protest of North Korea taking the rotational presidency of the UN Conference on Disarmament in late May.
Speaking to Voice of America(VOA) on Thursday, UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer said it is unconscionable for the North to chair the UN-backed body that calls itself "the single multilateral disarmament negotiating forum of the international community."
Calling the North "the world's foremost weapons proliferator," Neuer accused the regime of selling its missile and atomic know-how to other rogue regimes in violation of UN sanctions.
Aside from organizing the protest with 100 other NGOs, Neuer said his group is urging the U.S., Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Australia and other free democracies to boycott the conference when the North becomes the chair.
North Korea is among six countries, along with China, Colombia, Cuba, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ecuador, that will assume this year's chairmanship in alphabetical order. Its rotation is set to run from May 30 through June 24.
Pyongyang previously assumed the presidency in 2011, and Canada boycotted the conference in protest.