North Korea criticized the US suspension of food aid over a planned

North Korea criticized the US suspension of food aid over a planned missile launch as an “overreaction”, saying it would render a nuclear deal reached last month null and void.

He said that Washington had previously insisted that it made no link between humanitarian and political issues.

Under the deal, North Korea had agreed to a partial nuclear freeze and a missile test moratorium in return for 240,000 tonnes of US food aid.

But not long afterwards, the North announced it planned to launch a satellite between April 12-16 to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of founding president Kim Il-Sung.

The United States said Wednesday it would suspend food aid. It had said the exercise was a disguised long-range missile test which would breach UN resolutions as well as last month’s agreement.

A Pentagon official said the US had “no confidence” that it was possible “to ensure that the food assistance goes to the starving people and not the regime elite”.

Source AP