U.S. SANCTIONS CHINESE, RUSSIAN ENTITIES
They are part of Washington’s effort to disrupt funding for weapon programmes
THE United States on Tuesday slapped sanctions on 16 Chinese and Russian individuals and companies, accusing them of supporting North Korea’s nuclear programme and attempting to evade US sanctions.
The sanctions were part of a broader US effort to disrupt the flow of cash funding North Korean weapon programmes and targeted companies that have dealt in natural resources, such as coal and minerals, or engaged in financial transactions for North Korean interests.
“It is unacceptable for individuals and companies in China, Russia, and elsewhere to enable North Korea to generate income used to develop weapons of mass destruction,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said.
The move followed a war of words between Washington and Pyongyang over missile tests that showed North Korea was capable of reaching the US mainland.
Earlier this month, Russia and China both voted to toughen United Nations sanctions on North Korea.
Trump had urged Beijing, North Korea’s only major ally, to bring greater pressure to bear in reigning in the reclusive state’s nuclear efforts, suggesting that the US may offer concessions on trade in return.
The sanctions effectively blocked those targeted from accessing much of the global financial system and freeze any US assets as well.
Among those hit by the sanctions was Russian national Ruben Kirakosyan and his Moscowbased company Gefest-M LLC, China’s Dandong Rich Earth Trading Co Ltd and Mingzheng International Trading Limited.
The department also sanctioned Dandong Zhicheng’s director Chi Yupeng, a Chinese national accused of moving cash for North Korean interests.
Federal prosecutors suspected the company might be involved in money laundering in support of Pyongyang, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The Treasury targeted three Russians — Mikhail Pisklin, Andrey Serbin and Irina Huish — accusing them of trading in fuel on behalf of North Korea through companies based in Sinagpore.
The sanctions also hit an affiliate of a Pyongyang company, Mansudae Overseas Project Group, accusing the subsidiary of exporting workers to build statues in foreign countries as a revenue source for the North.
In Seoul, North Korea revealed plans for the development of its missile programme yesterday, as leader Kim Jong-un ordered stepped-up production of rocket engines and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) nosecones.
Analysts said pictures released yesterday of Kim’s visit to the Chemical Material Institute of the Academy of Defence Science revealed major technological advances and ambitions.
Kim, in a black suit, was shown next to a large brown tube that Joshua Pollack of the US Middlebury Institute of International Studies said on Twitter was a “wound fibre cylinder, evidently a large-diameter solid-rocket motor casing in the making”.
Other pictures carried by the Rodong Sinmun, the official mouthpiece of the North’s ruling party, included missile schematics and what appeared to be production processes.
“We have diagrams and names on two apparent new solid fuel multistage North Korean nuclear capable missiles, one of them an ICBM and the other a medium- or intermediate-range device,” said independent missile and nuclear analyst George Herbert.
The Academy of Defence Sciences develops the North’s missiles, and the official Korean Central News Agency reported that Kim said it was “the pride of our Party to have such unassuming heroes”.
“He instructed the institute to produce more solid-fuel rocket engines and rocket warhead tips,” it added. Agencies