UNSC toughens sanctions on North Korea

Ahmadinejad's election win in Iran triggers international concerns over enrichment resolve

Unrest on Iranian streets over presidential election results

The UN Security Council has voted unanimously to adopt tougher sanctions targeting North Korea's atomic and ballistic missile programs.

All 15 members endorsed a resolution sponsored by Britain, France, Japan, South Korea and the United States.

The text, which does not authorise the use of force, calls on UN member states to expand sanctions on North Korea in response to its underground nuclear test and subsequent missile launches last month.

These include tougher inspections of cargo suspected of containing banned items related to North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile activities, a tighter arms embargo with the exception of light weapons and new financial restrictions.

US delegate to the UN Rosemary DiCarlo hailed the sanctions as 'innovative, robust and unprecedented" and said they send a "strong and international response" to North Korea's "unacceptable behaviour."

Britain's UN deputy ambassador Philip Parham also welcomed the unanimous adoption of the text which "show that the international community is united in condemning North Korea's proliferation activities."

"We urge North Korea to refrain from any further provocative actions," he added. "North Korea should return to the negotiating table and engage seriously with the international community."

The compromise resolution "condemns in the strongest terms" the North Korean nuclear test and "demands that the DPRK (North Korea) not conduct any further nuclear test or any launch using ballistic missile technology."

It declares that Pyongyang "shall abandon all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner and immediately cease all related activities."

But US intelligence officials have reportedly warned President Barack Obama that Pyongyang intends to respond to a UN resolution condemning its actions with another nuclear test.

Asked about how the Council would react to any new North Korean test, Parham said: "We would take it badly. But we can't speculate now (on the council response). Our emphasis has to be on implementing this resolution as effectively as possible."

Former South Korean foreign minister Song Min-Soon warned this month that the North would continue to test nuclear weapons.

He forecast that the communist state was likely to carry on test-launching missiles of various ranges in a bid to improve their accuracy.

Japan said that North Korea's only path to "survival" in the global community was to comply with the UN resolution expected later in the day and to cease its missile and nuclear programs.

A key question will be whether China, which maintains close economic ties with Pyongyang, will seriously implement the sanctions.

A Western diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that "the Chinese and Russians have greater concern about the risk of provoking North Korea" and moved to dilute some of the mandatory measures sought by the United States and its allies.

The resolution requires the Stalinist regime to "immediately retract its announcement of withdrawal from the NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty)" and return immediately to the six-party talks on a nuclear-free Korean peninsula without precondition.

It also calls on member states to prevent the transfer of financial or other assets that could contribute to North Korea's nuclear or ballistic missile programs.

And it gives 30 days to a UN sanctions panel to extend a list of North Korean entities, goods and individuals to be subjected to an assets freeze and travel ban decreed in a 2006 resolution.

North Korea launched a long-range missile in April, which was roundly condemned by the Security Council. Pyongyang then retaliated by announcing May 25 that it had staged a second nuclear weapons test, following one in 2006.

It also has declared the armistice ending the 1950-53 Korean War as void.

In Tehran, Iran cracked down on reformist leaders after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s landslide election win sparked riots across Tehran and complaints of vote-rigging by his defeated rival.

The hardliner president appeared on television to declare his victory over moderate challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi was “completely free” after thousands of angry opposition supporters took to the streets in protest, triggering violence on a scale not seen in Iran for a decade.

Amid the turmoil, Iranian security forces arrested at least 10 leaders of two reformist groups who backed former-premier Mousavi in last week's vote, an official from one of the factions told Agence France-Presse.

Among them are several people who served under two-time reformist President Mohmmad Khatami, a key Mousavi supporter.

The official news agency IRNA said two of those arrested were involved in orchestrating last week's protests after final results showed Ahmadinejad winning almost 63 percent of the vote against 34 percent for Mousavi.

Thousands of Mousavi supporters swept through Tehran shouting “Down with the Dictator” as baton-wielding riot police firing tear gas clashed with protestors who pelted security forces with stones and set rubbish bins and police vehicles ablaze.

An Agence France-Presse reporter touring the riot-hit areas said there was a heavy police presence around the interior ministry building, while a bank building had been burnt to a shell and the road leading to the student dormitory and Tehran University’s students dormitory locked down.

The election results dashed Western hopes of change after four years under the combative Ahmadinejad, who set the country on a collision course with the West over its nuclear drive and his anti-Israeli tirades.

Ahmadinejad, 52, described it as a “great victory,” and called on his supporters to gather in a Tehran square where many of the clashes occurred.

“Today, the people of Iran have inspired other nations and disappointed their ill-wishers,” Ahma¬dinejad said in his television address.

But Mousavi, who has not been seen in public since the vote results, cried foul over what he branded a “rigged” vote and a “charade” and said it could lead to tyranny in the Shiite-dominated nation, which has lived under clerical rule since the Islamic revolution three decades ago.

As the protests intensified, Iran's main cellular phone network was cut and social networking site Facebook was also blocked. The phone network was back in some parts of Tehran.

The election highlighted deep divisions in Iran, with massive support for Ahmadinejad in the rural heartland and among the poor, while in the big cities young men and women threw their weight behind Mousavi.

The election campaign, with its mudslinging candidate debates and mass street rallies, appears nevertheless to have galvanized a grass-roots movement for change in the Islamic republic, where 60 percent of the population was born after the revolution.

Iran’s all-powerful supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hailed Ahmadinejad’s victory and urged the country to unite behind him after the most heated election campaign since the Islamic revolution in 1979.

The international community reacted cautiously to the vote outcome and the allegations of vote irregularities.

“The United States has refrained from commenting on the election in Iran. We obviously hope that the outcome reflects the genuine will and desire of the Iranian people,” US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.

New US President Barack Obama has called for dialogue with its arch-foe after three decades of severed ties, a clean break from the approach of his predecessor George W. Bush who once labeled Iran part of an “axis of evil.”

In Washington, however, analysts warned that Ahmadinejad’s re-election would complicate efforts to resolve the long-running standoff over Iran’s nuclear drive.

The West fears it is a cover for ambitions to build atomic weapons but Tehran insists it is for peaceful purposes only and has defied international demands to halt uranium enrichment despite a series of UN sanctions.

The European Union said it was “concerned about alleged irregularities during the election process and post-election violence.”

Israel voiced concern over the return of Ahmadinejad, who has caused international outrage by repeatedly describing the Holocaust as a myth and calling for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map.

“The results of the election show, now more than ever, how much stronger the Iranian threat has become,” Israeli deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon said.

One pro-democracy protestor has been shot and killed in Iran overnight, as unrest grows following the weekend's election.

Hundreds of thousands of angry protestors have flooded the streets of Tehran in the largest public uprising of its kind in Iran since the revolution 30 years ago.

One protester was shot dead and several others wounded during the rally staged by hundreds of thousands of people demonstrating against the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The anger has mounted in the last day after speculation the election was rigged.

Shooting reportedly broke out at the end of an unofficial public gathering in one of the city's largest squares. Iranian police clashed with the crowds as vehicles were set on fire.

One witness said a man was shot in the head by a group of armed men, wearing helmets and casual clothes, who had been pointing guns at the crowds from the rooftop of the Basij base.

A plume of thick black smoke billowed into the sky above the square. Police also fired tear gas as dozens of protesters set vehicles alight.

Iranian state television said the “main agents” in post-election unrest were arrested with explosives and guns.

Iran’s English-language Press TV reported the arrests in a breaking news headline, but gave no details of how many people had been arrested or when.

The semi-official Fars News Agency quoted a senior police official as saying some “anti-revolutionary” people had been arrested with bomb material and weapons, in what appeared to be the same police operation.

Last week's announcement of official election results showing hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had won a landslide against moderate Mirhossein Mousavi sparked running street battles between Mousavi supporters and riot police.

Intelligence Minister Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said his ministry was chasing two categories of people seeking to create instability in the Islamic Republic, one of them backed from abroad.

“One wanted to achieve its goal through explosions and terror and in this connection 50 people were arrested and more than 20 explosive consignments were discovered. They were supported from outside the country,” he told state radio.

“The second category was made up of counter-revolutionary groups who had penetrated election headquarters (of the election candidates ... some 26 such elements have been arrested,” Mohseni-Ejei said.

Iran often accuses its Western foes of trying to stir instability inside the country.

Earlier this week, a leading reformer said police had detained more than 100 reformers, including a brother of former President Mohammad Khatami. Police denied Khatami’s brother had been arrested. Leading reformist Mohammad Ali Abtahi was arrested, his office said.