Quad leaders urge North Korea to engage in dialogue

Washington/Seoul: The leaders of the Quad nations -- US, Australia, Japan and India -- have called on North Korea to engage in dialogue and abide by the UN Security Council resolutions that prohibit its ballistic missile tests.

The call came on Friday at the end of the first in-person summit of the four countries in Washington, reports Yonhap News Agency.

"We reaffirm our commitment to the complete denuclearisation of North Korea in accordance with UN Security Council resolutions, and also confirm the necessity of immediate resolution of the issue of Japanese abductees," the leaders said in a joint statement.

"We urge North Korea to abide by its UN obligations, refrain from provocations. We also call on North Korea to engage in substantive dialogue," they added.

US President Joe Biden, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga held their first-ever Quad summit virtually in March and reaffirmed their "commitment to the complete denuclearisation of North Korea in accordance with UN Security council resolutions".

Their latest call for dialogue comes after North Korea test-fired a new short-range ballistic missile earlier this month in violation of the resolutions.

Pyongyang has maintained a self-imposed moratorium on nuclear and long-range ballistic missile tests since late 2017.

The Biden administration has made several overtures for dialogue with Pyongyang since taking office in January, but the North remains unresponsive.