North Korea-New Zealand: Winston Peters hits back at North Korea’s ‘aggressive rhetoric’

Foreign Minister Winston Peters has hit back at North Korea. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Foreign Minister Winston Peters has hit back at North Korea, saying he rejected the country’s aggressive rhetoric towards New Zealand and saying the country’s people would be better served if its leadership re-engaged with the international community diplomatically.

The North Korean Government included New Zealand on a list of countries it accused of conducting “military interference” in the region. North Korea attacked the increased surveillance of the country by American allies.

The country singled out the UK, Canada, Germany, France, Australia and New Zealand. In April, New Zealand deployed a P-8 Poseidon to Japan as part of a mission to enforce UN Security Council sanctions against North Korea.

Commander Joint Forces New Zealand, Rear Admiral Jim Gilmour, said at the time the P-8 would conduct “maritime surveillance and reconnaissance patrols will be over international waters looking for violations of the sanctions resolutions, including illicit ship-to-ship transfers of banned goods such as oil and coal”.

The P-8s were purchased by the last Labour-led Government in coalition with NZ First, which then held the Defence portfolio. Part of the rationale for purchasing the P-8s was to improve New Zealand’s ability to participate in international missions.

“New Zealand proudly stands with the international community in upholding the rules-based order through its monitoring and surveillance deployments, which it has been regularly doing alongside partners since 2018,” Peters said.

“North Korea, through its aggressive rhetoric and its supply of military-related technologies to Russia in support of the illegal invasion of Ukraine, once again threatens peace and stability in our region,” he said.

“North Korea would better serve its people by meaningfully re-engaging with the international community through diplomacy rather than threats.”

Peters said that in the 2000s, during his first stint as Foreign Minister, he had supported Six Party talks aimed at negotiating an end to North Korea’s nuclear programme. He even travelled to Pyongyang.

“The window existed then for a diplomatic solution that had the potential to see North Korea abandon its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes. If it had taken that sensible step then, North Korea and its citizens would today be a more secure and prosperous nation,” Peters said.

“Instead, North Korea continues to defy UN Security Council [UNSC] Resolutions. The UNSC sanctions regime is a key element of the global effort to peacefully apply pressure on North Korea to denuclearise and abandon its ballistic missile programme,” he said.

“It is never too late for diplomacy to achieve what Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programmes never will, namely the reintegration of North Korea into the peaceful community of nations. Only then will its people have the full opportunity for the security and prosperity that a stable and peaceful region can offer.”

Thomas Coughlan is Deputy Political Editor and covers politics from Parliament. He has worked for the Herald since 2021 and has worked in the press gallery since 2018.