The UN Security Council approved these sanctions following the North Korean army's sixth and strongest nuclear test on September 3, which Pyongyang said was a hydrogen bomb.

Pyongyang will take measures to retaliate against new UN Security Council sanctions to plunge the US into the "most difficult situation" in its history, North Korea ambassador to Russia

China supports the UN Security Council's "necessary measures" to resolve tension in the Korean Peninsula after Pyongyang conducted nuclear tests, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang said on Tuesday.

The Security Council was poised on Monday to vote on weakened sanctions to punish North Korea for its nuclear and missile programmes after a week of negotiations that pitted the US against China and Russia.

Vladimir Putin, speaking at a press conference following a BRICS meeting in Xiamen in China, struck a discord with Washington's approach to the North Korea crisis when he criticized the pursuit of further sanctions as useless and denounced military threats against the regime of Kim Jong-Un as dangerous

The US Treasury Department on Tuesday said it was imposing economic sanctions on more than a dozen Chinese and Russian individuals and firms for doing business with North Korea's government.