US Vice President Kamala Harris will jointly meet the leaders of Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and Canada on Friday after North Korea fired an intercontinental ballistic missile, a source said. American official.
Ms. Harris, who is attending an Asia-Pacific summit in Bangkok, will meet the five leaders on the sidelines of the summit “to consult on the recent launch of a ballistic missile by the DPRK” (North Korea, editor’s note), said the White House official.
The meeting will bring together Prime Ministers Fumio Kishida of Japan, Han Duck-soo of South Korea, Anthony Albanese of Australia, Jacinda Ardern of New Zealand and Justin Trudeau of Canada.
Japan said the missile fell in its waters and had the range to reach the American mainland.
The launch follows weeks of escalating tensions with North Korea, which US intelligence believes is planning a seventh nuclear test.
The White House called the latest launch a “brazen violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions” that “unnecessarily heightens tensions” in the region.
President Joe Biden met Mr Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol on the sidelines of a Southeast Asia summit in Cambodia on Sunday, and issued a joint warning against a nuclear test of North Korea. Pyongyang viewed the three-way encounter as evidence of US hostility.
Ms Harris is representing the United States at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Bangkok after Mr Biden returned to Washington for his granddaughter’s wedding.