US Democrats to introduce legislation barring Trump from preemptive strike on N. Korea
Shares
NEW YORK: A U.S. lawmaker has said that he and two other Democratic senators will introduce a bill barring President Donald Trump from launching a preemptive strike on North Korea without congressional consent. In a string of tweets, Senator Chris Murphy, also a Democrat, said Wednesday that the bill would aim to prevent the president from carrying out a strike either "nuclear or conventional" unless Congress first approves such a measure.
"Trump's North Korea threats are real. I will intro bill w brianschatz & CoryBooker to prohibit any preemptive action w/o vote by Congress," Murphy tweeted, referring to Senators Brian Schatz and Cory Booker.
He also called on Republicans to support the measure to constrain the presidents "most dangerous power “ to make war, warning such a strike "could kill hundreds of thousands" of people on the Korean Peninsula.
Tensions between the US and North Korea have dramatically increased following a series of weapons tests by Pyongyang and a sharp war of words between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
North Korea has stepped the pace of its missile tests and tested what its government claimed was a hydrogen bomb. The North Korean leader ordered the production of more rocket warheads and engines in August, shortly after the United States suggested that its threats of military action and sanctions were having an impact on Pyongyang's behaviour.
Pyongyang says it will not give up on its nuclear deterrence unless Washington ends its hostile policy toward the country and dissolves the US-led UN command in South Korea.
Thousands of US soldiers are stationed in South Korea and Japan. In a speech before the United Nations General Assembly last month, Trump warned that the United States would totally destroy the country of 26 million people if necessary. In a letter to international leaders, a North Korean parliamentary committee has said Trumps threat constitutes a declaration of war against Pyongyang.
The letter described Trump's comments as an intolerable insult to the Korean people, a declaration of war against North Korea and grave threats to the global peace. If Trump thinks that he would bring North Korea, a nuclear power, to its knees through nuclear war threat, it is a big miscalculation and ignorance, the letter said.
