The Japanese government decided Friday to freeze the assets of 19 more North Korean companies as part of its unilateral sanctions in response to the North's repeated defiance of a U.N. ban on nuclear and ballistic missile tests.

The 19 firms deal in financial services, trade in coal and oil, shipping and the dispatch of workers overseas, according to the Foreign Ministry.

After a roughly two-month hiatus in launches, North Korea fired a missile on Nov. 29 that it said was a new type of intercontinental ballistic missile capable of hitting any target on the U.S. mainland.

The Japanese government's top spokesman said the expanded sanctions, effective Friday, are in response to that launch, North Korea's continued "provocative words and actions," and a "lack of concrete progress" on the issue of Japanese nationals abducted by the North in the 1970s and 1980s.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga also said the move is timed to coincide with a U.N. Security Council ministerial meeting on North Korea's nuclear program, to be chaired by Foreign Minister Taro Kono in New York later in the day.

Separately in Tokyo on Friday, Japan's minister for the abduction issue, Katsunobu Kato, urged the visiting U.N. special rapporteur on North Korean human rights to work for the prompt resolution of the matter.

Tomas Ojea Quintana replied at the outset of their talks that he will continue to focus on the abduction issue and mention it in his report to the U.N. Human Rights Council.

According to a Foreign Ministry official, all the newly sanctioned companies are already subject to U.S. sanctions, starting from January last year.

Among them is Korean Computer Center, which the ministry said is involved in dispatching workers and has a presence in Germany, China, Syria, India and the United Arab Emirates.

The official was unable to confirm which countries are destinations for workers from the four companies involved in dispatching.

He also said the expanded sanctions are not directly linked to the U.S. decision last month to return North Korea to its list of state sponsors of terrorism.

The new additions bring the total subject to Japan's unilateral sanctions to 56 companies or groups and 62 individuals, some of which are also covered by U.N. Security Council resolutions, the official said.