U.N. Sanctions 3 N. Korean Firms Over Missile Launch
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Saturday, April 25, 2009
UNITED NATIONS, April 24 -- The U.N. Security Council agreed Friday to impose financial sanctions on three North Korean firms, marking the first time the United Nations has penalized individual companies linked to Pyongyang's nuclear- and ballistic-missile trade.
The action came in response to North Korea's April 5 rocket launch, which triggered international condemnation and renewed calls for U.N. sanctions. It also followed a call by President Obama to punish North Korea for launching a rocket in violation of U.N. resolutions.
The three state companies, Korea Mining Development Trading Corp., Tanchon Commercial Bank and Korea Ryongbong General Corp., have previously been sanctioned by the United States for trading missile technology with Iran, Yemen and Pakistan. Their customers included Abdul Qadeer Khan, a Pakistani physicist who is considered the father of his country's nuclear weapons program.
The Security Council also agreed to reinforce a trade ban on items that North Korea could potentially use in the development of missiles. Such items include "the latest technology related to ballistic missile technology," according to Turkey's U.N. ambassador, Baki Ilkin, who chairs the council's North Korea sanctions committee.
North Korea had responded harshly to threats of sanctions, ejecting international inspectors, restarting its nuclear facility and announcing its intention to forswear international talks aimed at the elimination of its nuclear weapons program. "We totally reject and do not recognize any sort of decision that has been made in the Security Council," said a senior North Korean diplomat, Pak Tok Hun, insisting that the launch was part of a peaceful effort to send a satellite into outer space.
Pyongyang announced Saturday that it has resumed reprocessing nuclear fuel rods at its plant that produces arms-grade plutonium.
Friday's agreement represented a qualified success for the United States, which had initially proposed targeting 11 North Korean companies with sanctions. But China pressed for a more measured response.
"We view today's action as a serious and credible response" to North Korea's launch, said Mark Kornblau, a spokesman for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations.
