Seoul to unveil new individual NK sanctions Friday

The government said Thursday it plans to introduce a new set of unilateral sanctions on North Korea on Friday in a bid to ramp up pressure over its nuclear and missile programs and complement the latest UN Security Council resolution.

The announcement will be made by Lee Suk-joon, minister of the Office for Government Policy Coordination, who will be joined by senior officials from the foreign and unification ministries and other agencies, the office said. 

The forthcoming sanctions will be intended to further tighten Seoul‘s squeeze on the financial and maritime sectors and expand export controls and entry bans on Pyongyang officials. They will also include an expanded blacklist of North Korean entities and individuals, Foreign Ministry officials said. 

“We have formulated intra-agency measures in various areas, including blacklist expansion, shipping control, export and import control and immigration,” ministry spokesperson Cho June-hyuck said at a news briefing, declining to elaborate.

In a similar vein, Washington and Tokyo are expected to impose additional standalone sanctions as early as this week.

The three countries have been exploring ways to support the UNSC resolution approved Wednesday. The text calls for sharply curbing the communist state’s exports of coal and other minerals, a major source of hard currency for the country, while further reducing its financial, maritime and diplomatic networks.

After imposing the respective sanctions, the countries’ top nuclear negotiators agreed to meet later this month in Seoul. They will trade views on how to boost enforcement of the UNSC resolution and reaffirm their partnership given the US’ looming transition to the Donald Trump administration, Cho noted.

“I can’t provide a specific timing for other announcements given required internal procedures in each country, but we’re hoping (the sanctions) will lend impetus to one another and amplify their effects altogether,” Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se told reporters earlier in the day.

“(The unilateral measures) are usually one step ahead of the UNSC sanctions, and especially so in the US case. They might be more bruising than the UNSC resolution.”

Days after the last UNSC resolution was adopted in March, Seoul levied a host of unilateral penalties against its recalcitrant neighbor. It barred foreign-flag vessels and flag-on-convenience ships from entering the South if they had visited the North within 180 days. It also newly designated 30 North Korean and foreign organizations and 40 persons subject to an asset freeze and ban on financial and property transactions with South Koreans. 

With inter-Korean business and people-to-people exchanges at a standstill, Seoul has few options that could have a substantial impact on the already crumbling North Korean economy.

At issue is whether the US will sanction other companies of a third country in addition to its blacklisting last September of Dandong Hongxiang Industrial Development, a Chinese industry machinery wholesaler suspected of having provided financial services and illicit supplies to the Kim Jong-un regime.

Tokyo is scheduled to hold a meeting of the National Security Council on Friday to discuss its own steps.

The Shinzo Abe government is reportedly considering increasing its re-entry ban roster to include executives of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, a pro-North organization better known as Chongryon, and foreign nationals engaged in illicit nuclear and missile development activities.

“Japan might add to its blacklist some other Chongryon personnel or toughen tax inspections on the organization but there isn’t much they can do because they, too, have little economic relations with the North,” a Seoul official said, requesting anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.

By Shin Hyon-hee(heeshin@heraldcorp.com)