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Category: Sanctions

July 31, 2009

Marcus Noland on Sanctioning North Korea

First, a note of congratulations to Mr. Noland on being named Deputy Director of the Peterson Institute.  Noland also has a paper out on the prospects for disarming North Korea though sanctions.  Here’s a teaser, and I’ll let you read the rest on your own: Given the extremely high priority the North Korean regime places on its military capacity, it is unlikely that the pressure the world can bring to bear on North Korea will be sufficient to induce the...
Categories China & Korea/NK Economics/Sanctions
July 27, 2009

Yachting the River Styx and the Lies of Christine Ahn

Several of you e-mailed me about the story of the luxury yachts that North Korea had attempted to purchase from the Italian manufacturer Azimuth-Benetti.  I started a post and didn’t finish it, partially because that post became something long-winded, disjointed, and unpublishable.  Meanwhile, a few more details have trickled in about the boats and the purchase.  Contrary to doubts expressed in earlier reports, Italian authorities have concluded that the boats were indeed for His Withering Majesty, although you have to...
Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid/Sanctions
July 22, 2009

John Kerry Tries, Fails to Stop Amendment Calling for N. Korea to be Re-Listed as Terror Sponsor (Update: Dems Defeat Amendment, 54-43)

Progress on ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons program is always tenuous and remains incomplete. But the regime’s nuclear declaration is the latest reminder that, despite President Bush’s once bellicose rhetoric, engaging our enemies can pay dividends…. Now the president must not prematurely close the books on North Korea’s alleged uranium enrichment activities and nuclear exports. We must ensure there are credible verification and monitoring procedures to ensure North Korea is out of the nuclear business for the long term. —...
Categories Appeasement/Ling/Lee Incident/Sanctions/Terrorism (NK)/U.S. Politics
July 20, 2009

Sanctions Upates

The big headline this week is the U.N.’s agreement on a list of entities to be sanctioned under UNSCR 1718 and 1874 (see links on my sidebar for the texts).  Frankly, I think that’s a story that’s getting a great deal more attention than it merits.  The sanctioned entities have largely been sanctioned under Executive Order 13,382 for years.  I doubt that the U.N. imprimatur is going to fend off many of North Korea’s WMD clients that the Treasury Department’s...
Categories "United" Nations/Axis of Evil/China/Missiles/Money Laundering/Proliferation/Sanctions/WMD
July 20, 2009

Seoul Should Join in Constricting North Korea’s Palace Economy

OFK favorite Sung-Yoon Lee, writing in the Far Eastern Economic Review, presses a point that the South Korean government ought to be ready to hear by now. After a sophisticated recitation of the U.S. Treasury Department’s own constriction of the North, he argues: The current ROK government now has its own chance to play a crucial role in determining the future of the Korean nation. As the self-professed sole legitimate government representative of the Korean people, Seoul must pursue a...
Categories An Alliance?/Sanctions/U.S. & Korea
July 15, 2009

Gary Samore on North Korea Policy

In addition to his comments on North Korea’s HEU program, Gary Samore talked about President Obama’s North Korea policy.  As someone who found Bush’s North Korea policy to be incoherent and disappointing, but who didn’t have high expectations for Samore’s boss, either, I could not be more pleased to read things like this: I think we have to create, in the case of both North Korea and Iran, a narrative by which, if the big powers work together, and if...
Categories "United" Nations/Diplomacy/Sanctions/Six-Party Talks/Uncategorized
July 13, 2009

Treasury Should Block “Arirang” Funds

I think it’s now fair to say that guiding groups of tourists through exhibitions of soul-crushing North Korean mind control has lost most of the arguments that justified its existence.  Rather than changing the character of the North Korean regime, it’s reenforcing it by making a profitable industry of it.  It’s become a source of hard currency to the regime, something that the world has collectively decided to cut off in the interest of the world’s security.  And finally, there’s...
Categories Propaganda/Sanctions/Sunshine
July 10, 2009

Brownback Introduces Sanctions Bill in the Senate

Thomas still doesn’t have the text for S.1416, though it summarizes the bill as follows: Title: A bill require [sic] the redesignation of North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism, to impose sanctions with respect to North Korea, to require reports on the status of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and counterproliferation efforts, and for other purposes. The bill has two co-sponsors, Kyl and Gregg, both Republicans, although it’s not clear how Democrats will react, given the administration’s mood:...
Categories Ling/Lee Incident/Sanctions/U.S. Politics
July 8, 2009

High-Level Defector Describes Regime’s Illicit Income

I’d previously mentioned that I recently had the opportunity to meet Kim Kwang Jin, a high-level North Korean defector with detailed knowledge of North Korea’s illicit financing and money laundering.  Now, Kim adds much to our understanding of how North Korea pays for all those Mercedes-Benzes and missiles.  Having guessed that most of the cash came from flipping houses and the inventing some of the novel kitchen applicances I’d seen Billy Mays selling on my TV, this was a cruel...
Categories Deprogramming/Money Laundering/NK Military/North Korea/Refugees/Regime Change/Religion/Uncategorized
July 6, 2009

Malaysian Bank Linked to North Korean WMD; Happy 5th to GI Korea (Updated)

GI Korea explains what Philip Goldberg was doing in Malaysia. By the way, let me add my belated good wishes to GI Korea on the fifth anniversary of the founding of his blog.  The fact that it’s one of two with feeds on my sidebar should be some testament to my high regard for the amount and quality of information he posts (NKEconWatch would be the third if its RSS worked there).  It’s one of my daily reads, and the...
Categories Blogs & Blogging/Money Laundering/Proliferation/Sanctions/WMD
July 2, 2009

Plan B Watch

Philip Goldberg, the head of President Obama’s new inter agency task force charged with squeezing Kim Jong Il’s palace economy, visits China and Malaysia: The China visit, which State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said will include talks with officials from the foreign and other ministries, makes sense given China is a neighbour of the North, its largest trading partner and a long-time benefactor. It was not immediately clear why Goldberg was going to Kuala Lumpur before returning to Washington on...
Categories Money Laundering/Sanctions
July 1, 2009

Plan B Watch: Treasury Sanctions Iranian, N. Korean Companies for WMD Financing

Treasury has sanctioned an Iranian company under Executive Order 13382 for its dealings with previously sanctioned North Korean entities suspected of involvement in WMD development and proliferation.  It has also designated a new North Korean entity, Namchongang Trading Company.  Treasury’s full announcement itself is interesting and worth reading.  I’ve posted the full text below the jump, interlaced with a few editorial comments of my own.
Categories Axis of Evil/Money Laundering/Proliferation/Sanctions/WMD
June 30, 2009

Kang Nam I Turns Around, Heads North

U.S. officials said Tuesday that a North Korean ship has turned around and is headed back in the direction it came from, after being tracked for more than a week by American Navy vessels on suspicion of carrying illegal weapons. The move keeps the U.S. and the rest of the international community guessing: Where is the Kana Nam going? Does its cargo include materials banned by a new U.N. anti-proliferation resolution?  [AP, Pauline Jelinek] The ship apparently turned around last...
Categories "United" Nations/Proliferation/Sanctions
June 30, 2009

Plan B Watch

A year ago, who would have suspected that we’d be celebrating the replacement of a liberal accommodationist named George W. Bush with a hard line neocon named Barack Obama, who would finally show signs of grasping not just the reality of North Korea’s bad faith, but some of the very best tools for breaking it?  Christine Ahn’s misery (and Selig Harrison’s, and Leon Sigal’s) is my pleasure: The Treasury Department’s 2005 blacklisting of Macau’s Banco Delta Asia, which held a...
Categories Money Laundering/Sanctions/Washington Views
June 29, 2009

Obama Forms Team Plan B

The Washington Post is reporting that President Obama is forming an inter-agency team, much like the Illicit Activities Initiative that David Asher headed in G.W. Bush’s first term, to coordinate sanctions against North Korea: The White House is forming an interagency team to coordinate sanctions efforts against North Korea with other nations, senior administration officials said yesterday.  The team will be led by Philip S. Goldberg, a former ambassador to Bolivia who is slated to leave for China in the...
Categories Diplomacy/Money Laundering/Sanctions/U.S. Politics/Washington Views