The Chinese Foreign Ministry has responded to Washington's new sanctions against the DPRK, saying it is against any form of unilateral restrictions on its citizens or entities.

“As a member of the UN Security Council, China has always strictly implemented all the resolutions by the council,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang on Tuesday, “In principle, we are totally against any unilateral sanctions according to their own law."

The US Treasury Department issued new sanctions against the DPRK on Tuesday, a day after the Trump administration designated the DPRK as a state sponsor of terror.

The restrictions affect several DPRK fishing firms and Chinese trading companies.

“These designations include firms that have engaged in trade with North Korea [the DPRK] cumulatively worth hundreds of millions of dollars,” said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin in a statement. 

"We are also sanctioning the shipping and transportation companies, and their vessels, that facilitate North Korea's trade and its deceptive maneuvers."

“The Americans believe such kind of sanctions along with a large scale of joint military exercises can stop the DPRK from conducting nuclear tests and missile-launching activities,” said Zhang Junshe, Senior Captain of Naval Research Institute of China, adding “but in the past few years, we can see these actions never stopped the DPRK from doing so.”

“The sanctions will only make the lives of ordinary people in the DPRK even worse, and intensify the situation,” Zhang added, “Both the US and the DPRK should echo China’s call of ‘Double Suspension Plan’. China will fully implement the UN Security Council’s resolution concerning sanctions against the DPRK, and at the same time the county will try to persuade the US, the DPRK and the South Korea into consultations and negotiations to the peaceful resolution of the nuclear issue.”