U.S. sanctions target Russia-North Korea financial conspiracy for illegal weapons
Reuters
The United States imposed sanctions on five entities and one individual for enabling payments between North Korea and Russia to support Moscow’s unprovoked war against Ukraine and Pyongyang’s illicit weapons programs, the U.S. Treasury Department said in mid-September 2024.
The measures, which target attempts to evade prior sanctions, demonstrate the U.S.’s commitment to disrupting networks that facilitate funding of North Korea’s “unlawful weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and ballistic missile programs and support Russia’s illegal war against Ukraine,” the Treasury Department said.
Growing financial cooperation between the authoritarian regimes “directly threatens international security and the global financial system,” U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said.
“Russia has become increasingly dependent on the DPRK as it faces mounting battlefield losses and increasing international isolation,” Miller said, referring to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the North’s formal name.
The new sanctions expose how Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government uses illegal financial schemes to help North Korea access the international banking system, in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions, the Treasury Department said.
The U.S. action came days after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian security official Sergei Shoigu discussed deepening the regimes’ strategic dialogue, North Korean state media reported.
Ukrainian and U.S. officials, as well as analysts, say Kim is supplying Moscow with rockets and missiles in return for economic and military assistance.
The sanctions target financial conspiracies by the North Korean state-run Foreign Trade Bank (FTB) and Korea Kwangson Banking Corp., both of which were previously sanctioned by the U.S.
In a scheme orchestrated by the Central Bank of Russia, the Georgia-based MRB Bank acted on behalf of a designated Russian bank to establish a secret banking relationship with the FTB.
A separate plot involved the Russian Financial Corporation Bank JSC, also already under U.S. sanctions, working with the FTB to establish a Moscow-based company to receive frozen North Korea funds held in defunct Russian banks.
