US seizes North Korean coal ship for violating sanctions Published 9 May 2019 image copyright AFP image caption The Wise Honest was said to have been used to transport coal and heavy machinery The US says it has seized a North Korean cargo ship, accusing it of violating international sanctions. The justice department said the ship was used to transport coal, North Korea's largest export but subject to a UN export ban. The vessel was initially impounded in Indonesia in April 2018. It is the first time the US has seized a North Korean ship for breaching sanctions and comes amid worsening relations between the two. A meeting between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump ended without agreement in February with the US insisting North Korea give up its nuclear programme and Pyongyang demanding sanctions relief. North Korea has carried out two weapons tests in the space of the past week in what is widely seen as an attempt to increase pressure on the US over its failure to make concessions. What do we know about the ship? The vessel, the Wise Honest, was first seized last year and the US filed a seizure warrant in July 2018. Indonesia has handed over the ship, and it is now on its way to the US. US officials stressed that the announcement had nothing to do with the North Korean tests. "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," said US prosecutor Geoffrey S Berman. media caption President Trump: "Nobody's happy" about North Korean tests "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." Payments for the maintenance of the Wise Honest were allegedly made in US dollars through unsuspecting US banks - giving the US authorities the opportunity to mount an unusual civil forfeiture legal action. North Korea has been the subject of a series of US and international sanctions over Pyongyang's development of nuclear weapons and missile tests. Can the US and North Korea get back on track? Most of the developments concerning the two countries point to a return to animosity but the US Special Representative on North Korea Stephen Biegun is currently in South Korea to discuss ways of restarting denuclearisation talks. President Trump has said "nobody's happy" about the latest North Korean tests. "I know they want to negotiate, they're talking about negotiating. But I don't think they are ready to negotiate," he said. He became the first sitting US president to meet his North Korean counterpart when they met last year but despite this, and a follow-up meeting, there has been little tangible progress towards the stated goal of ridding the Korean peninsula of nuclear weapons. Last year, Mr Kim said he would stop nuclear testing and would no longer launch intercontinental ballistic missiles but nuclear activity appears to be continuing.<doc-sep>Separately on Thursday, U.S. military officials conducted a scheduled launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile from an Air Force facility in California. It was the second test of the U.S. Minuteman III missile this month and the third this year, though the Air Force maintains that such activity is scheduled years in advance and not in response to world events.<doc-sep>An undated photo released on Thursday shows the North Korean cargo ship Wise Honest. Photo: US Justice Department via AP<doc-sep>U.S. authorities seized a North Korean ship they allege Pyongyang used to illicitly transport coal in violation of U.S. and international sanctions, the Justice Department said. Officials said the seizure, which was disclosed on Thursday, was the first such U.S. action against North Korea for sanctions violations. The announcement came hours after North Korea launched two suspected short-range missiles, marking the Kim regime’s second weapons test in less than a week amid stalled nuclear talks with Washington. Justice Department officials said there was no connection between the timing of the ship seizure and themissile launches. Defying tight sanctions, vessels linked to Pyongyang use a large toolbox of tactics to import and export goods like oil and coal—and keep North Korea’s economy afloat. Illustration: Crystal Tai The 17,000-ton ship known as Wise Honest, which Indonesian maritime authorities detained off the island-nation’s coast in April 2018 and held since then, is on its way to American Samoa, officials said, after months of U.S. negotiations with international authorities. A U.S. federal judge in New York issued a sealed warrant for the ship’s seizure last July, and the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan filed a civil complaint on Thursday seeking the formal forfeiture of the ship. North Korea has 60 days to respond to the shipment allegations in the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York. An official at North Korea’s mission to the United Nations declined to comment. The Wise Honest, the second-largest of North Korea’s fleet, was also used to deliver heavy machinery back to North Korea, the complaint said. It was carrying a load of coal when Indonesian authorities intercepted it about 2,800 miles south of a North Korean port, the document said, where it was caught with the system that transmits information about its location turned off. U.S. dollars were used, in violation of U.S. sanctions, to make payments to vendors to maintain the ship, the Justice Department alleged, as the agency has stepped up efforts to try to block Pyongyang’s ability to circumvent sanctions and access the international financial system. “This sanctions-busting ship is now out of service,” said John Demers, who runs the Justice Department’s national-security division. The ship helped North Korea “continue its cycle of sanctions evasion,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman said. “With this seizure, we have significantly disrupted that cycle.” Pyongyang has ratcheted up military provocations over the past month as it contends with an economy hobbled by sanctions and a widespread food shortage. This past weekend, the North launched several projectiles off its east coast, including what many weapons experts believe was a short-range ballistic missile. Share Your Thoughts What are the U.S.’s best options for dealing with North Korea’s sanctions violations and recent missile tests?Join the conversation below. A weapons launch featuring ballistic capabilities would defy United Nations Security Council resolutions that block Pyongyang from conducting such tests, nuclear experts said. Washington and Seoul haven’t said whether the short-range missile last week was ballistic. North Korea’s ability to evade sanctions on the export of coal and the import of petroleum products has been a major problem for the Trump administration, as it has sought to use economic pressure to persuade Pyongyang to give up its nuclear arsenal and forces. A March report to the U.N. Security Council by a panel of international experts noted that North Korea has managed to transport “large quantities of coal” through a variety of deceptive practices. One common procedure to dodge sanctions is “double-flagging,” essentially registering the vessel under two jurisdictions. In the case of the Wise Honest, documents were registered under the flag of Sierra Leone and North Korea, the U.N. report noted. Another deceptive practice is to turn off the Automatic Identification System, or AIS, a transmission device that identifies a ship’s location to other vessels, satellites and land-based tracking systems. According to the U.N. report, the Wise Honest turned off the tracking system when it entered Indonesia’s waters. The report said the contract for the seized shipment carried by the Wise Honest was valued at $2.9 million. The U.N. investigators said cargo documents recovered by Indonesian authorities named the sellers of the coal as Hong Kong Nova International Trade Co., a Chinese firm that sells cigarette-manufacturing machinery with an office in Kiev, Ukraine. The company told U.N. investigators that it had no idea where the contract came from. A person answering the phone at the company’s Beijing office didn’t immediately comment. The U.N. investigators also said a key figure in the coal shipment was an Indonesian commodity trader named Hamid Ali, who had regular meetings at North Korea’s embassy in Jakarta. Those diplomats, the U.N. officials said, introduced Mr. Ali to the president of the Jinmyong Trading Group and the Jinmyong Joint Bank of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Wise Honest is owned by Korea Songi Shipping Co., the complaint alleged, referring to a company that was designated by the Treasury Department in 2017 as a supplier of North Korean coal. The company’s representative, Kown Chol Nam, would arrange U.S. dollar payments for the ship’s services, the document alleged. The payments were routed through three banks in the U.S. who were unwitting participants, officials said. A representative for the company couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. The new case comes as prosecutors have brought a series of cases seeking to forfeit funds related to North Korean sanctions violations that allegedly passed through the U.S. financial system. A federal court in April disclosed prosecutors had sought documents from three Chinese banks in connection with a related investigation, relying on a almost-never-used tool from the Patriot Act. —Ian Talley, Timothy W. Martin and Andrew Jeong contributed to this article. Write to Aruna Viswanatha at Aruna.Viswanatha@wsj.com and Michael R. Gordon at michael.gordon@wsj.com<doc-sep>
A North Korean cargo vessel used to transport coal -- in violation of international sanctions against the rogue regime -- was seized, the U.S. Justice Department announced Thursday, just hours after the hermit kingdom fired two suspected short-range missiles. The 17,061-ton vessel, called the Wise Honest, is one of North Korea’s largest bulk carriers used to illicitly ship coal from North Korea and deliver heavy machinery to the Hermit Kingdom, officials said. U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman said this is the first time a North Korean cargo ship was seized for violating international sanctions. “This sanctions-busting ship is now out of service,” Assistant Attorney General Demers said in a news release. “North Korea, and the companies that help it evade U.S. and U.N. sanctions, should know that we will use all tools at our disposal — including a civil forfeiture action such as this one or criminal charges — to enforce the sanctions enacted by the U.S. and the global community." JAMES CARAFANO: NORTH KOREAN MISSILE TEST - HERE'S THE CRITICAL THING TRUMP NEEDS TO DO NOW Berman said Thursday that Kim's regime was evading sanctions by “concealing” Wise Honest’s origin. The ship was used by Korea Songi Shipping Company between November 2016 and April 2018 to export coal from North Korea in exchange for machinery, court documents stated. Those who worked with the company would allegedly then lie about the origin of the vessel and where the coal came from by listing different countries for its nationality in shipping documentation. “We are willing and able to deploy the full array of law enforcement tools to detect, deter, and prosecute North Korea’s deceptive attempts to evade sanctions,” Berman said. The shipping company would pay for repairs and equipment using American dollars obtained through “unwitting” U.S. financial institutions, which violated sanctions barring North Korean citizens or entities from the U.S. financial system. Foreign maritime authorities intercepted a coal shipment in April 2018, court documents stated, and officials later discovered more than $750,000 in payments were made through American banks. The ship is in U.S. custody as of Thursday and heading to American Samoa. David Maxwell, a retired Army Special Operations Colonel with more than 20 years served in Asia, said the U.S. had been tracking the vessel. “The United States has certainly been tracking the Wise Honest, and others, and may have been waiting for it to be in the right location or the right time to have the best political effect. It takes considerable intelligence work and the right assets in the right location to make a seizure like this.” NORTH KOREA FIRES 2 SHORT-RANGE MISSILES, 5 DAYS AFTER PREVIOUS LAUNCH; US TESTS LONG-RANGE MISSILE WITHIN 10 MINUTES On Thursday, at least one projectile the Hermit Kingdom launched was from the Sino-ri area of North Pyongan province, an area known to have one of North Korea's oldest missile bases where a brigade operates mid-range Rodong missiles, South Korea's military said, adding later that there were two launches from the nearby town of Kusong. The town is the same location where North Korea conducted its first successful flight tests of its Hwasong-12 intermediate-range missile and Hwasong-14 intercontinental ballistic missile, both in 2017. The U.S. Air Force on Thursday also tested a Minuteman 3 intercontinental ballistic missile from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California as part of a scheduled ICBMs test. Officials said the launch was unrelated to current events. Trump, who met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in late February for the second U.S.-North Korea summit, told reporters at the White House on Thursday that "nobody's happy" about the recent rocket launches. He added that "we're looking" at the situation "very seriously right now." CLICK HERE FOR THE FOX NEWS APP Fox News' Jake Gibson and The Associated Press contributed to this report.