The Trump administration is sanctioning two Chinese shipping companies that have helped North Korea evade international sanctions on the regime’s nuclear weapons program, the Treasury Department announced Thursday.
“The United States and our like-minded partners remain committed to achieving the final, fully verified denuclearization of North Korea and believe that the full implementation of North Korea-related UN Security Council resolutions is crucial to a successful outcome,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said.
Mnuchin’s team punished one shipping company for working with an entity “subordinate to” a North Korean spy agency. A second shipping company “routinely used deceptive practices” to help North Korean officials to purchase goods in the European Union. U.S. officials made the announcement while emphasizing their awareness of other illicit support for the regime.
The designation of Dalian Haibo International Freight Co. Ltd. and Liaoning Danxing International Forwarding Co. Ltd. under two different Executive Orders means U.S. citizens are prohibited from dealing with the companies, and their U.S.-based assets are blocked.
“In 2018, North Korean ports received at least 263 tanker deliveries of refined petroleum procured from UN-prohibited ship-to-ship transfers,” the Treasury Department reported. “If these tankers were fully laden when they made their delivery, North Korea would have imported 3.78 million barrels, or more than seven and a half times the allowable amount of refined petroleum [that UN sanctions allow the regime to import].”
North Korea is allowed to import no more than 500,000 barrels of refined petroleum annually, according to the UN sanctions. The Security Council adopted that measure in 2017, when President Trump’s administration was intensifying economic pressure in an effort to force dictator Kim Jong Un to begin negotiating over the dismantlement of his nuclear arsenal. China and Russia have refused to agree that the import cap has been breached, a finding that would trigger a total oil embargo on the regime.
Mnuchin’s team identified “dozens” of ships involved in the transfers and hinted at additional sanctions to come. The United States released graphics that show the general areas on the high seas where the transfers take place, as well as the port cities where the ships dock. The list includes China and Russia, but also South Korea — the American ally technically still at war with North Korea — and Taiwan, which relies on unofficial U.S. support to resist Beijing’s domination.
“Treasury will continue to enforce our sanctions, and we are making it explicitly clear that shipping companies employing deceptive tactics to mask illicit trade with North Korea expose themselves to great risk,” Mnuchin said.
