U.S. President Donald Trump will urge President Xi Jinping to make good on his commitments to pressure North Korea when he visits China next month, a senior White House official said on Monday, stepping up a strategy to have Beijing help rein in Pyongyang, The Nation reports.
Isolating North Korea further over its nuclear and ballistic missile tests is a key goal for Trump on what will be his longest foreign trip to date.
Trump will call on Xi to fully implement U.N. Security Council resolutions against Pyongyang and take other steps to pressure North Korea.
China, North Korea’s sole major ally, accounts for more than 90 percent of trade with the isolated country.
China has said it will strictly enforce U.N. Security Council sanctions banning imports of coal, textiles and seafood, while cutting off oil shipments to the North.
But a senior White House official who briefed reporters ahead of Trump’s trip said China needs to do more to comply with two U.N. Security Council resolutions that were approved unanimously, including with China’s support.
“We would like to see China follow through on those commitments. We would like to see China do things bilaterally as well that might even go beyond things that are mandated by those U.N. Security Council resolutions,” the official said.
Though China has been angered by North Korea’s repeated nuclear and missile tests and demanded they stop, Beijing also sees the United States and South Korea sharing responsibility for rising tensions because of military drills they carry out in the region.