Special meeting on Korea set at UN

Foreign Minister Wang Yi will attend a UN Security Council special ministerial meeting on the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue, the Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.

The meeting, chaired by U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, is being held on Friday to discuss ways to maximize the impact of existing sanctions on Pyongyang and show resolve to respond to further provocations with appropriate new measures, a U.S. State Department spokesman said at a briefing.

On Wednesday, the Trump administration said that after briefing senators on its policy toward Pyongyang, it aims to push the country into dismantling its nuclear and missile programs through tougher international sanctions and diplomatic pressure, and remained open to negotiations to bring that about.

Chinese has taken note of the briefing and recent remarks by senior U.S. officials, which project a message of hope that the situation on the peninsula can be resolved to peacefully through talks, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said on Thursday.

"We think the message is positive and should be affirmed," he said in a daily news conference in Beijing, hoping that all related parties could get the message.

Geng also said that since the U.S. is a major party to the issue, "We hope and welcome that Washington will assume the role and the responsibility that it should."

Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. Cui Tiankai said on Wednesday that China had a shared interest with the United States on the Korean Peninsula, where both want continued stability and progress toward denuclearization.

"The situation on the Korean Peninsula is a challenge to all of us－China, the U.S. and Russia and others－and we should work together to seek a diplomatic solution to the issue," Cui said in an interview with CNN.