USA-NORTH KOREA/STATE State Department says North Korea assertion on anthrax targeting is "ridiculous"

Record ID: 151015

  • Title: USA-NORTH KOREA/STATE State Department says North Korea assertion on anthrax targeting is "ridiculous"
  • Date: 12th June 2015
  • Summary: WASHINGTON, D.C., UNITED STATES (JUNE 12, 2015) (STATE TV) U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN JEFF RATHKE AT NEWS BRIEFING (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN JEFF RATHKE, IN AN EXCHANGE WITH A REPORTER, SAYING: REPORTER: "North Korea has written to the U.N. Security Council and asked it to open an investigation into what it says are the U.S. targeting it wi
  • Embargoed: 27th June 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA5KDXC88GIG5210PVSHVRY567S
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: The United States on Friday (June 12) rejected as "baseless" an assertion by North Korea that the U.S. was targeting it with anthrax following a report that live samples of the bacteria was sent inadvertently to an American military base in South Korea.
    "The allegations are ridiculous; they don't merit a response," State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke said.
    Live anthrax samples, which can be used as a biological weapon, were inadvertently sent to Australia, Canada, Britain, South Korea and laboratories in 19 U.S. states and Washington, D.C., the Pentagon said recently.
    Pyongyang ambassador to the U.N, Ja Song Nam, wrote in a letter to the U.N. Security Council and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon asking that an investigation be undertaken into "biological warfare schemes" against North Korea.
    Ambassador Ja, in a letter dated June 4, attached a statement by North Korea's National Defence Commission, which urged the world to consider the anthrax shipment "the gravest challenge to peace and a hideous crime aimed at genocide."
    North Korea is under U.N. sanctions for carrying out nuclear tests and missile launches. In addition to an arms embargo, Pyongyang is banned from trading in nuclear and missile technology, and is not allowed to import luxury goods.
    The U.N. Security Council also added the issue of human rights in North Korea to its agenda in December, after a U.N. Commission of Inquiry report last year detailed abuses in the impoverished Asian state that it said were comparable to Nazi-era atrocities.
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