KARACHI, Pakistan

North Korea warned Monday that it will take "resolute action" after a South Korea-led monitoring group implementing UN sanctions against Pyongyang over its nuclear and missile programs launched official activities.

The warning came after the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team (MSMT), established in October by 11 countries, including South Korea, the US and Japan, vowed to ensure the full implementation of UN sanctions against North Korea at the inaugural meeting last week of its steering committee, the Seoul-based Yonhap News Agency reported.

The chief of the external policy office at North Korea's Foreign Ministry dubbed the MSMT an "illegal and criminal ghost group," warning that the hostile forces will have to "pay a steep price" for their attempt to block the exercising of North Korea's sovereign rights, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported.

"The DPRK (the Democratic People's Republic of Korea) will never thirst for a lifting of sanctions but will never overlook the provocations of the US and its followers to encroach upon the legitimate sovereignty of the DPRK under the pretext of implementing sanctions and strongly counter them with resolute actions," the official said.

"Sanctions waiver through negotiations is not a matter of concern from long ago for the DPRK, which has no sanctions to be canceled and to be added, and it is not on the agenda of the DPRK," the official added

The MSMT was established to continue sanctions monitoring against North Korea following the disbandment of a UN monitoring panel in April last year due to a Russian veto.