Reuters — North Korea denounced on Wednesday (November 22) United States President Donald Trump’s decision to relist it as a state sponsor of terrorism, calling it a “serious provocation and violent infringement,” North Korean state media reported.
Trump put North Korea back on a list of state sponsors of terrorism on Monday (November 20), a designation that allows the US to impose more sanctions and risks inflaming tension over North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile programs.
In North Korea’s first reaction to the designation, a spokesman for the foreign ministry denied in an interview with the state’s official news agency KCNA, that his government engaged in any terrorism.
The designation came a week after Trump returned from a 12-day, five-nation trip to Asia in which he made containing North Korea’s nuclear ambitions a centerpiece of his discussions.