President Donald Trump's blunt talk at the United Nations is letting the world know that there will be consequences "for the destabilizing activities of North Korea," State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said on Sunday.
Speaking to host John Catsimatidis on his radio show "The Cats Roundtable" on AM 970 in New York, Nauert said about the president's speech at the UN General assembly, "I think some of the other nations are a little bit surprised by the president's plainspokenness. Here in the United States we think of that as a good thing… but these diplomats aren't necessarily used to that kind of blunt talk. It's helping the world to now better understand exactly where we stand" on many issues, including holding North Korea to account for its actions.
When asked why after so many decades of sanctions against Pyongyang that more of the same would bring a successful result, Nauert said, "The world is coming together and imposing sanctions upon North Korea at really an unprecedented rate."
As proof of that claim, she said that "North Korea started to stock up on lots of supplies earlier this year. We believe they were doing that knowing that there would be more sanctions instituted. We believe they are starting to run low on some of those supplies. To the extent that we can starve them… of money… they'll start to really feel the pinch."
As part of what she called a strategy to push forward with a "peaceful pressure campaign," Nauert said that as a result of Trump's phone conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping in which they talked about Beijing "fulfilling its obligations in terms of issuing sanctions against North Korea," China announced "it was going to be doing more to try to crack down on North Korea."
She also said that not much should be read into the fact that Russian President Vladimir Putin did not attend the General Assembly, saying that productive diplomacy took place with Moscow when Secretary of State Rex Tillerson met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov twice this past week in Washington.
Regarding ties with Russia, Nauert said, "That relationship has been at a low point… but we are trying to get that relationship back to a place where we can do some sort of work together," citing the cease-fire in parts of Syria as an example.
She also dismissed any talk of friction between Trump and Tillerson, stressing that they get along "very well" and meet about three times a week.
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