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Australian MP calls for divestment from mining venture in N. Korea

”To maintain its iron-fisted hold over the North Korean population, the Pyongyang regime needs hard currency, and it is clear that these projects could provide billions of dollars to the North Korean leadership.” [Michael Danby, MP]

It won’t surprise you that I oppose any investment in an unreformed North Korea that continues to slaughter its own people and menace its neighbors. I believe that those who justify investment as a driver of reform have it completely backwards, that investing in the status quo only perpetuates and reenforces it, and that denying the regime the hard currency that sustains it is the only way to force change. As the North Korea human rights movement gains strength, I hope it will catalyze a divestment movement like the one that helped destroy apartheid.

But that’s not the only question I have about this particular investment. The Australian concern peddling this project is a British Virgin Islands-registered company called “SRE Minerals Limited,” which is doing so as part of a joint venture with a North Korean entity known as the “Natural Resources Trading Company of the DPRK,” or alternatively, as “Korea Natural Resources Trading Corporation.” North Korea watchers know that as a general matter, “North Korea’s mining resources are a major source of revenue for its nuclear and missile programs.” But what about this specific entity?

As the U.N. Panel of Experts recently reminded us, North Korean entities are notorious for their use of multiple similar aliases. Recalling something familiar about the name of that North Korean entity, I checked the SDN list and found several entities designated under executive orders 13382 or 13551 that have suspiciously similar names:

KU’MHAERYONG COMPANY LTD (a.k.a. CHO’NGSONG UNITED TRADING COMPANY; a.k.a. CHONGSONG YONHAP; a.k.a. CH’O’NGSONG YO’NHAP; a.k.a. CHOSUN CHAWO’N KAEBAL T’UJA HOESA; a.k.a. GREEN PINE ASSOCIATED CORPORATION; a.k.a. JINDALLAE; a.k.a. NATURAL RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT AND INVESTMENT CORPORATION; a.k.a. SAENGP’IL COMPANY), c/o Reconnaissance General Bureau Headquarters, Hyongjesan-Guyok, Pyongyang, Korea, North; Nungrado, Pyongyang, Korea, North [DPRK].

NATURAL RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT AND INVESTMENT CORPORATION (a.k.a. CHO’NGSONG UNITED TRADING COMPANY; a.k.a. CHONGSONG YONHAP; a.k.a. CH’O’NGSONG YO’NHAP; a.k.a. CHOSUN CHAWO’N KAEBAL T’UJA HOESA; a.k.a. GREEN PINE ASSOCIATED CORPORATION; a.k.a. JINDALLAE; a.k.a. KU’MHAERYONG COMPANY LTD; a.k.a. SAENGP’IL COMPANY), c/o Reconnaissance General Bureau Headquarters, Hyongjesan-Guyok, Pyongyang, Korea, North; Nungrado, Pyongyang, Korea, North [DPRK].

CHANGGWANG SINYONG CORPORATION (a.k.a. EXTERNAL TECHNOLOGY GENERAL CORPORATION; a.k.a. KOREA KUMRYONG TRADING COMPANY; a.k.a. KOREA MINING DEVELOPMENT TRADING CORPORATION; a.k.a. NORTH KOREAN MINING DEVELOPMENT TRADING CORPORATION; a.k.a. “KOMID”), Central District, Pyongyang, Korea, North [NPWMD].

To be clear, neither the “Korea Natural Resources Trading Corporation” nor the “Natural Resources Trading Company of the DPRK” is on the SDN list, but can anyone establish whether it is or isn’t an alias or subsidiary of one of the listed, blocked entities? I’ve put the question to Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control; in the end, it’s their job to clarify that.

Perhaps one of my journalist friends can pursue this further.

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1 Response

  1. I agree, companies shouldn’t be bankrolling the regime, we all know that Kim Jong-un won’t spend on his people, he’ll just use it for more military stuff.