US proposes sharp ramping up of North Korea sanctions at UN

“For the first time in history, all cargo going in and out of the DPRK (North Korea) would be subjected to mandatory inspection”, said U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power on Thursday after submitting the draft to the Security Council.

The U.S. has tabled a draft Security Council resolution that would impose unprecedented sanctions against North Korea as punishment for its recent nuclear tests, the U.S. envoy to the United Nations said Thursday.

The current crisis on the peninsula began with North Korea’s fourth nuclear test on January 6, followed a month later by a rocket launch that was widely seen as a test of ballistic missile technology that would allow Pyongyang to reach the continental US with a nuclear warhead.

The newest resolution has come after roughly seven weeks of negotiations led mainly by the United States and China, the North’s major ally who had apparently been reluctant to impose severe measures that could destabilize its neighboring country.

Under the draft proposals, United Nations members would be required to carry out inspections of all cargo passing through their territory to or from North Korea to search for illegal goods. “For the first time, all small arms and other conventional weapons would be prohibited from being sold to the DPRK”, she said.

She said the sanctions would also limit, and in some cases ban, exports of coal, iron gold titanium and rare earth minerals from North Korea and would forbid countries from supplying aviation fuel, including rocket fuel to the country.

Full arms embargo against North Korea, including a new ban on the transfer to North Korea of any item that could directly contribute to the operational capabilities of its armed forces, like trucks that can be modified for military purposes.

But Wang said THAAD’s powerful radar would threaten China’s national security.

The talk of THAAD has also drawn the ire of Russian Federation, where officials say it would be an unnecessarily aggressive USA military move in North Asia.

But a United Nations panel of experts said this month that a decade of sanctions had failed to prevent Pyongyang from scaling up its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

Separately, North Korean defectors in South Korea and conservative activists have frequently flown anti-Pyongyang leaflets for years to help encourage North Koreans to eventually rise up against the Pyongyang regime.

In its annex, the resolution doubles the number of people (17 in total) and entities (12) punished for their role in the nuclear and missile programs.

“There’s a great possibility that this is part of China’s economic sanctions against the North for carrying out a “rocket” launch”, the businessman said, adding this would pull the plug on 50 percent of China’s trade with the North, according to the report.

However, China may be signaling that its approach to North Korea has not been working.

A senior USA official said Friday that the deployment of an advanced anti-missile system in South Korea is not a “diplomatic bargaining chip” with China.

Reuters has details on the new draft, which is expected to go to a vote this weekend. It would ban all public and private financial trade support to North Korea if there are reasonable grounds to believe there is a link to proliferation.