TOKYO, July 21. /TASS/. Easing sanctions on North Korea should be discussed and maybe, should even be done, the head of the Russian Federation Council (upper house of parliament) International Affairs Committee, Konstantin Kosachev, told reporters on Saturday.
"Definitely, it requires discussing and, perhaps, even implementing," he told TASS stressing that Russia "can see that Pyongyang is making steps" to freeze, if not to scrap, its nuclear program.
"In our opinion, this should be followed by certain decisions on sanctions at the level of the United Nations Security Council," the senior lawmaker said.
Nevertheless, Kosachev pointed out that the sanctions should be eased relying on experts’ assessments which should include "the ones from the IAEA" (the International Atomic Energy Agency).
In December 2017, the United Nations Security Council unanimously passed a resolution toughening sanctions against North Korea. The document further restricts supplies of crude oil and oil products and insists all countries expel North Korean labor migrant in a span of 24 months. The resolution envisages other restrictions that concern exports of industrial equipment, heavy machinery and transport vehicles to North Korea and imports of North Korean commodity. In 2017, the UN Security Council approved imposing three sets of restrictions on Pyongyang in response to its missile and nuclear tests.
On June 12, Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un held a historic meeting - the first-ever between a sitting US president and a North Korean leader - in Singapore. They signed a joint statement, pledging to implement the stipulations in the document fully and expeditiously. North Korea committed to work towards denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in return for security guarantees from the United States.