The United Nations Security Council's push to adopt a statement to denounce North Korea's recent ballistic missile launches has fizzled out because China demanded the statement also include its opposition to South Korea's deployment of a U.S. defense system, sources here said Wednesday.

As the United Nations Security Council discussed issuing the statement critical of North Korea's defiant launch of two ballistic missiles on Aug. 3, China insisted that the document should also state Beijing's opposition to the U.S.-led plan to deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system in South Korea, the U.N. sources said.

China had wanted the statement to say that a new ballistic missile interception base should not be deployed on the Korean Peninsula on the pretext of North Korea's military provocations, according to sources.

The Chinese demand, however, was rejected by veto-wielding U.S., raising the possibility that the statement will wane, the sources said. 

Adoption of a UNSC statement requires a consensus among all member countries, including the five permanent members like the U.S. and China.

The latest U.S.-China confrontation at the UNSC reflects growing concerns that their diplomatic feuds over the THAAD deployment plan would undermine efforts to present a united front against North Korea's broadening military provocations and nuclear weapons ambition.

South Korea and the U.S. have insisted that the THAAD deployment, scheduled by the end of 2017, is defensive in nature and is being undertaken in the face of North Korea's worsening nuclear and missile threats. China vehemently counters the allies' arguments and argued the deployment of the missile shield impairs its strategic interest in the region.

Briefly following North Korea's two ballistic missile launches last week, the Security Council convened an emergency meeting, but failed to swiftly come up with a statement to condemn the provocations.

In the absence of joint action, U.N. envoys of South Korea, the U.S. and Japan held an ad hoc press conference to voice their joint criticism of the North Korean missile launches.

One of the missile fired on Aug. 3 landed in the waters near Japan, causing security jitters in the island nation (Yonhap)