North Korea supports Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territory, according to a foreign ministry statement released Tuesday, after the U.N. Security Council failed to condemn the takeover.

Russia moved to annex the east and southeast Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson through a referendum in late September that the EU, U.S. and others have condemned as illegitimate.

“We respect the will of the residents who aspired toward the integration into Russia and support the Russian government’s stand of making the above-said regions the composition of Russia,” writes Jo Chol Su, director of the foreign ministry’s Department of International Organizations.