North Korea lashes out at U.N. Command over meeting in Seoul

FILE PHOTO: A North Korean flag flutters at the propaganda village of Gijungdong in North Korea, in this picture taken near the truce village of Panmunjom inside the demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating the two Koreas, South Korea, July 19, 2022. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji/Pool/File Photo

SEOUL (Reuters) -North Korea on Monday called for the United Nations Command to be dissolved calling it an "illegal war organization" over a meeting which is scheduled to take place between the member states in South Korea later this week, state media KCNA reported.

The U.S.-led United Nations Command (UNC) is a multinational military force and oversees affairs in the heavily fortified Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between the two Koreas, which remain technically at war.

Seoul's defence ministry said last week that South Korean and U.S. defence chiefs along with the member states of the U.N. Command will meet on Tuesday in Seoul to call on Pyongyang to stop what it said was "illegal activities" and enforce U.N. security resolutions.

The KCNA report, citing the Institute for Disarmament and Peace (IDP) of the DPRK Foreign Ministry, also criticized a joint declaration which is set to be adopted for contingency in the Korean peninsula.

The DPRK stands for North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

North Korea's criticism comes a day after U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin met his South Korean counterpart Shin Won-sik in Seoul on Sunday with Japanese Defence Minister Minoru Kihara for a trilateral meeting.

They agreed to start as planned a real-time data sharing scheme on North Korean missiles in December and condemned growing military cooperation between North Korea and Russia as a violation of U.N. resolutions during the meeting.

(Reporting by Hyunsu Yim; Editing by Sandra Maler)