Iran urges nuclear weapon-free Korean peninsula

Iran’s official news agency reports that President Hassan Rouhani is pushing for a Korean peninsula free of nuclear weapons.

IRNA reports that Rouhani met with visiting South Korean President Park Geun-hye and said Iran seeks a world free of weapons of mass destruction, “especially nuclear” weapons.

Park said she has asked for Iran’s help in implementing UN Security Council resolutions calling for the nuclear disarmament of the Korean peninsula.

The remarks were aimed at North Korea, which has been hit with tough UN sanctions over its nuclear weapons program. North Korea has conducted four nuclear bomb tests and tested a long-range rocket earlier this year.

South Koreans watch a TV news program with file footage of North Korea’s rocket launch plans, at Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, February 3, 2016. (AP/Ahn Young-joon)

Park arrived in Tehran on Sunday for the first visit by a South Korean president to Iran since 1962.

— AP