A top United Nations official advocated for the “denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” on Tuesday, shortly after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister slammed Seoul and Washington for their joint military exercises.

“The Secretary-General’s position on the situation on the Korean Peninsula remains the same,” Stéphane Dujarric, a spokesperson for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, said during a press briefing on March 16. “He wants dialogue. He wants to see tensions lowered, whether those tensions are military or rhetorical tensions.”

The U.N. spokesperson’s remarks came after North Korea’s state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper publisheda statement from North Korean leader