Category: North Korea

Some more companies have been hit with sanctions after violating United Nations sanctions on North Korea:

The United States on Friday sanctioned three shipping firms for allegedly engaging in illicit ship-to-ship transfers of refined petroleum goods to North Korea.

The U.S. Treasury Department announced the measures on its website, adding that the companies are based in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

The department also sanctioned two Taiwanese individuals and designated a Panama-flagged vessel as blocked property for engaging in related activity.

“Treasury will implement and enforce existing U.S. and U.N. sanctions on individuals, entities and vessels involved in illicit ship-to-ship transfers with North Korean flagged vessels,” she added.

The United States on Friday sanctioned three shipping firms for allegedly engaging in illicit ship-to-ship transfers of refined petroleum goods to North Korea.

The U.S. Treasury Department announced the measures on its website, adding that the companies are based in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

The department also sanctioned two Taiwanese individuals and designated a Panama-flagged vessel as blocked property for engaging in related activity.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but I wonder at some point if ships will start being seized to more forcibly enforce sanctions on North Korea?

I don’t think anyone doubts North Korea’s economic potential, the real question is if their economic potential can be reached and the Kim regime still remains in power:

U.S. President Donald Trump again touted North Korea’s “tremendous” economic potential on Monday, seemingly urging the regime to return to denuclearization talks.

The negotiations have yet to resume despite Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s agreement to do so within several weeks after their impromptu meeting on the inter-Korean border on June 30.

“I think that North Korea has tremendous economic potential, and I think that Kim Jong-un sees that,” Trump said at a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron at the conclusion of a Group of Seven summit in Biarritz, France.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

The North Koreans are unhappy about comments Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently made:

 North Korea’s foreign minister on Friday called U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo a “poisonous plant of American diplomacy” and vowed to “shutter the absurd dream” that sanctions will force a change in Pyongyang.

The North’s blistering rhetoric may dim the prospect for an early resumption of nuclear negotiations between the countries. A senior U.S. diplomat said earlier this week that Washington was ready to restart the talks, a day after U.S. and South Korean militaries ended their regular drills that Pyongyang called an invasion rehearsal.

North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho made the comments to protest Pompeo’s remarks in an interview in which he said that Washington will maintain crippling sanctions on North Korea unless it denuclearizes.

Ri said he couldn’t just let the “reckless remarks” by Pompeo pass by him because they came amid a possible restart of the nuclear talks. Ri said Pompeo is a “brazen” man because he “had begged for” North Korean denuclearization and improved bilateral ties when he visited Pyongyang and met leader Kim Jong Un several times.

Associated Press

You can read more at the link, but I don’t put too much stock into this tit-for-tat exchange; they have wanted Pompeo gone since this past April. This is all posturing for negotiations on a denuclearization deal. Once the North Koreans start going after President Trump that is when you know the negotiations are officially over because Trump will respond in kind. I don’t see this happening until next year which is the timeframe Kim Jong-un has given to try and work out a deal.

This all comes down to if the Trump administration wants to sign a “pretend denuclearization” deal to make the North Korea problem go away for the next election cycle or have it dominate headlines next year when Kim Jong-un restarts long range missile testing because a deal isn’t reached.

It appears that the North Koreans have yet more features of their new missile systems to test:

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff says that North Korea fired two unidentified projectiles believed to be short-range ballistic missiles into the East Sea Saturday morning from the eastern town of Sondok in South Hamgyong Province.

The JCS said the missiles were fired at 6:45 and 7:02 a.m. and both flew about 380 kilometers at a maximum altitude of 97 kilometers and a top speed of over Mach six-point-five.

The JCS also said it will share information on the latest launches with Japan following Tokyo’s request as the bilateral intelligence-sharing pact of the General Security of Military Information Agreement, or GSOMIA, is still in effect. 

The South Korean military is monitoring the situation in case of additional launches.

According to Japan’s Kyodo news agency, the Tokyo government also announced North Korea appears to have fired a ballistic missile but the projectiles did not reach Japanese waters or its exclusive economic zone.

Saturday’s launch comes eight days after the regime’s last firing on August 16th but it’s the first since a South Korea-U.S. joint military exercise ended this past Tuesday.

KBS World Radio

You can read more at the link, but you have to love the irony of South Korea pushing for a boycott of Japan over a trade dispute while wanting to reopen the Kaesong Industrial Park despite North Korea regularly firing missiles designed to destroy the ROK.

Here is the latest information on the new weapon system that North Korea is believed to have tested:

North Korea said Saturday that it has tested a “new weapon” under the guidance of its leader, Kim Jong-un, in the launch of two projectiles the previous day.

Kim “guided the test-fire of (a) new weapon again on Friday morning,” the Korean Central News Agency said. “The national defense scientists showed a perfect result in the test-fire, too, and helped cement bigger confidence in this weapon system.”

“It is our party’s goal of defense building to possess invincible military capabilities no one dare provoke and to keep bolstering them,” Kim was quoted as saying. “Everyone should remember that it is the party’s core plan and fixed will for defense building to possess such a powerful force strong enough to discourage any forces from daring to provoke us.”

The KCNA did not provide other details on the weapon, including its name.

The report came a day after South Korea’s military said that the North fired two projectiles presumed to be short-range ballistic missiles off its east coast. It said that they flew around 230 kilometers at a maximum altitude of 30 km.

Military experts say that the projectiles bear outward similarities to the U.S.’ Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), a surface-to-surface missile system.

Photos released by the North’s media showed missiles that were launched from a transporter erector launcher (TEL) hitting a faraway target on a small rocky islet in the East Sea.

Friday’s firing came six days after North Korea flew two projectiles believed to be short-range ballistic missiles, though the North said later it tested a “new weapon.” It also was the sixth such launch since late July.

North Korea’s version of ATACMS is assessed as one of its three newly-developed weapons, including a large-caliber multiple launch guided rocket system and short-range missiles known as KN-23s, its version of the Russian Iskander.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Like I have always said, the Kim regime was just using the joint US-ROK exercise as an excuse to test their new short range ballistic missile:

U.S. President Donald Trump said Saturday that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un expressed his will to restart negotiations on its nuclear program with the United States “as soon as” the joint military exercise between Seoul and Washington is over.

The North Korean leader also pledged to stop missile launches when the combined exercise ends, according to the president.

“In a letter to me sent by Kim Jong Un, he stated, very nicely, that he would like to meet and start negotiations as soon as the joint U.S./South Korea joint exercise are over,” Trump said on Twitter. 

On Friday, the president told reporters that he had received another “very beautiful” letter from Kim the previous day, in which the leader expressed his displeasure with the allied exercises.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but it appears that talks will restart and probably center on what a “freeze deal” will look like because the Trump administration seems to have realized that Kim Jong-un will not denuclearize.

It appears that North Korea is continuing to test their new short range missile and using the US-ROK joint exercise as cover to do so:

North Korea fired yet more unidentified projectiles into the East Sea on Saturday, South Korea’s military said, the latest launch in a series of saber-rattling moves against the current joint exercise between Seoul and Washington.

Two projectiles were fired from near its eastern coastal city of Hamhung in South Hamgyong Province earlier in the day, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). No other details were immediately known, including their type, flight range and maximum altitude.

“Our military is monitoring the situation in case of additional launches while maintaining a readiness posture,” the JCS said in a brief release.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

The Kim regime steals $2 billion and yet they supposedly don’t have enough money to buy food for their own people. When are the North Korea apologists going to realize that the Kim regime wants to keep a portion of their population poor and undernourished:

United Nations (United States) (AFP) – North Korea has stolen up to $2 billion from banks and cryptocurrency exchanges through cyberattacks to fund its nuclear missiles program, according to a United Nations report seen by AFP Wednesday.

The UN is investigating at least 35 reported instances of Pyongyang “attacking financial institutions, cryptocurrency exchanges and mining activity designed to earn foreign currency,” it said.

“Large-scale attacks against cryptocurrency exchanges allow the DPRK to generate income in ways that are harder to trace and subject to less government insight and regulation than the traditional banking sector,” the report added.

AFP

You can read more at the link.

Exactly. I do not understand why more people do not grasp this. https://t.co/r6tUBz2raD

— David Maxwell (@DavidMaxwell161) August 6, 2019

North Korea is still using the US-ROK joint exercise as an excuse to continue test their short range missile systems:

North Korea conducted its fourth weapons test in two weeks early Tuesday morning with a pair of unidentified projectiles launched into the East Sea, justifying the act as an “essential and powerful physical means” in a statement from its foreign ministry. 

The projectiles, which South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said appeared to be short-range ballistic missiles, were fired at 5:24 a.m. and 5:36 a.m. from an area around Kwail County in South Hwanghae Province. They each flew a distance of around 450 kilometers (280 miles) with peak altitudes of 37 kilometers at Mach 6.9, according to a JCS spokesman. 

South Korean and U.S. intelligence officials believe the rockets displayed a flight pattern similar to the short-range ballistic missiles launched on July 25, the first in a series of four tests that all involved projectiles launched into the East Sea. The North’s state media followed up each of the previous three tests – on July 25, July 31 and last Friday – with reports saying the country had tested new types of ballistic missiles and rocket artillery, all under the personal direction of its leader, Kim Jong-un. (…..)

“Despite our repeated warnings, the United States and South Korean authorities have finally started the joint military exercise targeting the DPRK,” read the English-language release, using the acronym for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. “This is an undisguised denial and a flagrant violation of June 12 DPRK-U.S. Joint Statement, Panmunjom Declaration and September Pyongyang Joint Declaration, all of which are agreements to establish new DPRK-U.S. relations and build a lasting and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula.”

Saying the North had no reason to keep its promises while the United States and South Korea ignored theirs, the statement stressed the regime was “compelled to develop, test and deploy the powerful physical means essential for national defense.”North Korea conducted its fourth weapons test in two weeks early Tuesday morning with a pair of unidentified projectiles launched into the East Sea, justifying the act as an “essential and powerful physical means” in a statement from its foreign ministry. 

The projectiles, which South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said appeared to be short-range ballistic missiles, were fired at 5:24 a.m. and 5:36 a.m. from an area around Kwail County in South Hwanghae Province. They each flew a distance of around 450 kilometers (280 miles) with peak altitudes of 37 kilometers at Mach 6.9, according to a JCS spokesman. 

South Korean and U.S. intelligence officials believe the rockets displayed a flight pattern similar to the short-range ballistic missiles launched on July 25, the first in a series of four tests that all involved projectiles launched into the East Sea. The North’s state media followed up each of the previous three tests – on July 25, July 31 and last Friday – with reports saying the country had tested new types of ballistic missiles and rocket artillery, all under the personal direction of its leader, Kim Jong-un. (…..)

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.