Inner City Press -- Investigative Reporting From the United Nations to Wall Street to the Inner City

As Draft on DPRK Launch Is Circulated, Must be Proportionate, China Says

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 21 -- North Korean launch response was the primary topic outside the UN Security Council Monday morning, not the "multidimensional peacekeeping" debate droning on inside the Council.

  Russian Permanent Representative Vitaly Churkin stopped and told the Press "at this point it's a draft resolution," on which the discussants are "a broader range of delegations than the US and China."

  China's Permanent Representative Li Baodong told the Press forthrightly that it would be circulated to all 15 Council members at 12:30 pm.

   The UK's Permanent Representative Mark Lyall Grant said the meeting would be of Deputy Permanent Representatives, then of experts to negotiate line by line. He still said he expects adoption later this week.

  Just before 1 pm, a Council Deputy Permanent Representative confirmed to Inner City Press that it had been circulated inside.

  On the substance, China's Li Baodong said the final outcome will have to be "proportionate." US Permanent Representative Susan Rice was not at the Security Council, presumably at President Barack Obama's inauguration in Washington.

  France's Permanent Representative Gerard Araud was at the Council, but declined to speak about DPRK. His focus was on Mali. He told Inner City Press that there will be an open briefing, by Jeffrey Feltman, on January 22.

  Security Council President Masood Khan later confirmed this to Inner City Press. So, the bombing of Timbuktu in the present, alongside a belated response to the DPRK launch. Watch this site.