Dana Bash: This is so telling about where the Republican party is NEW YORK, NY - AUGUST 24: Trump Tower stands on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on August 24, 2018 in New York City. Following new allegations over hush money that former Trump attorney Michael Cohen paid to an adult-film actress, the Manhattan district attorneyÕs office in New York City may seek criminal charges against the Trump Organization in the coming days. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images) Why GOP is standing in the way of Capitol riot investigation WASHINGTON - NOVEMBER 08: US Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-VA) remarks on the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at the US Capitol November 8, 2006 in Washington, DC. Warner said he supports President George W. Bush's nomination of former CIA Director Robert Gates for Secretary of Defense. Warner said he anticipates Gates' confirmation before the end of the year. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), joined by Senate Assistant Minority Leader John Thune (R-SD) (L) and Senate Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO), speaks following a Senate Republican Policy luncheon at the Russell Senate Office Building on May 18, 2021 in Washington, DC. This Saturday, May 4, 2019, photo provided on Sunday, May 5, 2019, by the North Korean government shows North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, equipped with binoculars, observing tests of different weapons systems, in North Korea. North Korean state media on Sunday said leader Kim observed live-fire drills of long-range multiple rocket launchers and unspecified tactical guided weapons, a day after South Korea's military detected the North launching several unidentified short-range projectiles into the sea off its eastern coast. Independent journalists were not given access to cover the event depicted in this image distributed by the North Korean government. The content of this image is as provided and cannot be independently verified. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: "KCNA" which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP) (CNN) — The United States has seized a North Korean cargo ship, alleging sanctions violations by the country, the Justice Department said Thursday. The seizure is likely to heighten tensions between the two countries at a time when US efforts to dissuade North Korea from pursuing its nuclear weapons program have stalled following the failure of the Hanoi summit in February. The ship, the M/V Wise Honest, was used to haul valuable coal from North Korea that was sold in other countries, including China, according to the Justice Department. The US and the United Nations have said that North Korea has used illicit sales of its coal to fund the country’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles program. In a statement, senior Justice Department officials called the seizure the first of its kind, and said it was part of the US campaign of “maximum pressure” against the North Korean government. “This sanctions-busting ship is now out of service,” said Assistant Attorney General John Demers, the head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “We are deeply committed to the role the Justice Department plays in applying maximum pressure to the North Korean regime to cease its belligerence.” The Wise Honest was North Korea’s second largest merchant ship and was capable of carrying tens of thousands of tons of cargo. Prosecutors said the ship was also used to haul heavy machinery into North Korea, including 412,584 kilograms of “steel plate.” The ship is on its way to American Samoa, according to Geoffrey Berman, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York, who spoke to reporters from the Justice Department Thursday. Berman said the ship was “recently taken into custody” but declined to provide an exact date for the transfer of custody. The ship was originally seized from the North Koreans by Indonesian maritime authorities in April 2018 and a US judge in July of that year issued a warrant authorizing the seizure of the ship. Berman denied that the timing of the unsealing Thursday of the seizure warrant had anything to do with the deterioration of nuclear trade talks between the US and North Korea, and the news out of South Korea that North Korea had launched two short range missiles. “There is no connection at all between the recent activities by North Korea and the unsealing of our seizure warrant. We have been pursuing this for months as indicated in the complaint,” Berman said. The complaint documents multiple shipments of coal delivered from North Korea to China as well as one instance where the ship was scheduled to make a stop in a Russian port, where cargo documents would be prepared to try and conceal the haul’s origin. According to the Justice Department, payments for maintenance and equipment to the ship were made in US dollars through “unwitting US banks.” Indonesian maritime authorities intercepted and detained the ship on April 2, 2018, as it sailed south with safety tracking equipment turned off and a load of coal it had picked up in Nampo, North Korea, one month earlier in its cargo, according to the complaint. A satellite photograph from March 2018 included as evidence in the complaint shows a ship that appears to be the Wise Honest tied alongside a dock in North Korea with “large quantities of what appears to be coal piled alongside the dock and in warehouses adjacent to it.” “There are also cranes and other equipment that appear consistent with what would be used to load coal into M/V Wise Honest,” the complaint says. The North Korean captain of the ship was arrested and charged with violations of Indonesian maritime law, according to the complaint, which says he was convicted by an Indonesian court in November 2018 of “offenses related to improper documentation for the ship.”<doc-sep>North Korea on Tuesday said that a U.S. seizure of one of its cargo ships last week was illegal, and demanded the vessel's return while calling the incident a violation of the "spirit" of President Trump Donald TrumpTrump lashes out after grand jury seated for New York criminal probe Schumer tees up vote on Jan. 6 commission bill Senators struggle to save Jan. 6 commission MORE's summit with Kim Jong Un Kim Jong UnWith denuclearization stalled, Biden should focus on human rights reform in North Korea Bad Moon falling: South Korean leader falters in summit with Biden Biden appoints special envoy to North Korea MORE earlier this year. An unnamed North Korean foreign ministry spokesperson said on state television that the seizure was an "outrageous" step for the U.S. to take months after the second meeting between Trump and Kim ended without a major agreement on denuclearization or sanction relief, according to Reuters. ADVERTISEMENT “The United States committed an unlawful and outrageous act of dispossessing our cargo ship,” the official said, according to KCNA news agency. “The latest U.S. act constitutes an extension of the American method of calculation for bringing the DPRK to its knees by means of ‘maximum pressure’ and an outright denial of the underlying spirit of the June 12 DPRK-U.S. Joint Statement," the statement continued. U.S. authorities announced the seizure of the North Korean vessel "Wise Honest" last week, accusing the ship's operators of seeking to violate U.S. sanctions by transporting North Korean coal for sale to "unwitting" U.S. buyers while also attempting to transport heavy machinery back to North Korea. “Today’s civil action is the first-ever seizure of a North Korean cargo vessel for violating international sanctions. Our Office uncovered North Korea’s scheme to export tons of high-grade coal to foreign buyers by concealing the origin of their ship, the Wise Honest," Geoffrey Berman, a U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY), said in a statement last week. "This scheme not only allowed North Korea to evade sanctions, but the Wise Honest was also used to import heavy machinery to North Korea, helping expand North Korea’s capabilities and continuing the cycle of sanctions evasion. With this seizure, we have significantly disrupted that cycle." U.S. officials maintain that the seizure is justified under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act of 2016, which bar countries and private entities tied to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction from accessing the U.S. economy.<doc-sep>SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea on Tuesday called the U.S. seizure of a North Korean cargo ship involved in banned coal exports a "robbery" and demanded that the vessel be returned immediately. The North's official Korean Central News Agency, or KCNA, carried a statement by an unidentified foreign ministry spokesman who accused the United States of betraying the spirit of a summit agreement last June between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump. Kim and Trump agreed then to a vague statement calling for a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula and improved bilateral ties, but a second meeting between the leaders collapsed in February over mismatched demands in sanctions relief and disarmament. The seizure of the cargo ship, which was announced last week, came at a delicate moment in U.S.-North Korean ties, with North Korea resuming weapons tests that seem meant to force the United States to ease sanctions. "The U.N. Security Council resolutions the United States mentioned as one of the reasons for robbing our trade vessel equate to a violent infringement of the sovereignty of our country and we have been entirely rejecting them," the KCNA statement said. "The United States should carefully consider what kind of consequences their daylight robbery could bring to the political situation and should send back our vessel without hesitation." Before the United States seized the cargo ship, the 581-foot vessel, named the Wise Honest, had first been detained by Indonesia in April 2018 while transporting a large amount of coal. It was brought Saturday to American Samoa, where it will undergo inspections. The Wise Honest. Department of Justice North Korea is banned from exporting coal under U.N. sanctions toughened in 2017 to punish increasingly powerful weapons tests that year. Experts believe coal and other mineral exports help finance the North's weapons industry.<doc-sep>
The U.S. said Thursday that it has seized a North Korean cargo ship that was used to violate international sanctions, a first-of-its kind enforcement action that comes amid a tense moment in relations between the two countries. The "Wise Honest," North Korea's second largest cargo ship, was detained in April 2018 as it traveled toward Indonesia. It's now in the process of being moved to American Samoa, Justice Department officials said. Officials made the announcement hours after North Korea fired two suspected short-range missiles toward the sea, the second weapons launch in five days and a possible signal that stalled talks over its nuclear weapons program are in trouble. The public disclosure that the vessel is now in U.S. custody may further inflame tensions, though U.S. officials said the timing of their complaint was not a response to the missile launch. Justice Department lawyers laid out the case for confiscating the ship in a complaint filed in New York, arguing that payments for maintenance and operation of the vessel were channeled through unwitting U.S. financial institutions in violation of American law. The coal trade itself is also believed to fund the isolated country's nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs. "This sanctions-busting ship is now out of service," Assistant Attorney General John Demers, the Justice Department's top national security official, told reporters. He later added: "The U.S. sanctions against North Korea reflect the threat these programs pose to U.S. national security." The 581-foot (177 meters) Wise Honest was used for coal transports to ports abroad, according to the complaint, generating badly needed revenue to a country that is under U.N. sanctions because of its nuclear weapons program. The ship also delivered heavy machinery back to North Korea. The vessel was owned by a subsidiary of a North Korean shipping company that is controlled by the country's military and is on a Treasury Department sanctions list, officials said. North Korea sought to disguise the nationality of the ship and the origin of its cargo, according to the complaint. The ship, in what U.S. officials say was a clear act of concealment, also turned off an automatic signal system intended to alert other ships of its course and location. The ship had not broadcast a signal since August 2017 despite having made at least one voyage since then, according to the complaint. Indonesian authorities intercepted and seized the Wise Honest in the East China Sea a month after it was photographed at the port of Nampo, North Korea, where it took on a load of coal. The captain of the ship was charged in Indonesia with violating that country's maritime laws and convicted, the complaint says. It was not immediately clear what happened to the rest of the crew, which at least at one time totaled two dozen members. The U.S. has prosecuted people and businesses for violating sanctions but has never before seized a North Korean ship. The country will have an opportunity to contest the seizure in court. If the U.S. prevails, it will be able to sell the vessel. "When nations who have stated an intent to do harm to the United States evade international sanctions, Americans become less safe," said Geoffrey Berman, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. Asked whether North Korea's largest merchant ship was similarly involved in illegal coal exports, Demers said that he did not know, but added, "If it is, we'd love to get our hands on it." President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un have held two summits focused on the North's nuclear program but have made no discernible progress toward a deal that would eliminate its weapons. At the White House on Thursday, Trump said the U.S. was looking "very seriously right now" at North Korea's recent military tests. "Nobody's happy about it." ___ Follow Eric Tucker on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/etuckerAP