North accuses China, Russia of cozying up to the U.S.

North Korea on Friday accused China and Russia of currying favor with the United States, claiming they colluded with each other to distort the truth and churn out unjust sanctions against Pyongyang.

The communist nation is up in arms about the U.S.-led international sanctions for its nuclear and missile programs, most recently highlighted by the test-firing of two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) in July.

Earlier this month, the UN Security Council voted unanimously to adopt another resolution aimed at cutting the North’s annual export revenue by a third.

While there are some indications of a let-up in provocations and war threats by the North’s military and state agencies in recent weeks, its propaganda media have continued to blame the U.S. and other regional powers, including China and Russia, for escalating tensions.

“The U.S. and its vassal forces stress that [North] Korea is liable for the situation on the Korean Peninsula inching close to a war phase,” Jong Myong-chol, researcher at the Institute of International Studies of Korea, said in an English-language article carried by the state news agency KCNA.

“Some big powers around Korea are asserting that both the DPRK and the U.S. are to blame for the current aggravated situation on the peninsula,” he added. “But the DPRK is strong and firm in its stand that the responsibility for the current tense situation entirely rests with the U.S. and its vassal forces.”

The DPRK is the acronym for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Jong did not mention China and Russia by name, but he alluded to the countries that approved the UN sanctions.

“Even some big neighboring countries, which used to maintain principles at the UN arena with their own view in the past, now lie down flat before the U.S., frightened by its high-handed practices and bluffing,” he argued.

He pointed out that Pyongyang extended “full support” for them when they were under pressure from the U.S. and other Western countries. Yonhap