“Like a siege in castle warfare from ages ago, the goal is to starve North Korea into compliance.”
The House voted Thursday for new sanctions on North Korea. Shutting down the North Korean economy is part of the strategy to bring Kim Jong-un in line with UN sanctions. Currently, North Korea circumvents UN sanctions by shipping workers to other countries using ships that are erroneously flagged as other nation’s vessels and dealing with countries not in compliance with the UN and the rest of the world.
The vote, which came in at 419-1, targets North Korea’s shipping industry, slave labor, and product export. It also requires that the Trump administration report to Congress within 90 days on whether North Korea should be reinstated on the government’s state sponsors of terror list. Such a designation would trigger more sanctions, including a restriction on US foreign assistance.
GOP Rep. Walter Jones of North Carolina was the sole member to vote against the measure. The bill now goes to the Senate.
The bipartisan legislation is aimed at shutting down the flow of currency to North Korea by cutting off access to the cash the regime needs to continue on their path to nuclearization.
The measure is sponsored by Rep. Ed Royce of California, the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Rep. Eliot Engel of New York, the committee’s senior Democrat.
The bill bars ships owned by North Korea—or by countries that refuse to comply with UN resolutions against North Korea—from operating in American waters or docking at US ports. Products produced by North Korean forced labor would be prohibited from entering the United States, according to the legislation.
Anyone who uses the slave labor that North Korea exports to other countries would be subject to sanctions under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the bill states.
Rep. Royce said companies from Senegal to Qatar to Angola import North Korean workers, who send their salary back to Pyongyang, earning the regime billions of dollars in hard currency each year.
“This is money that Kim Jong-un uses to advance his nuclear and missile program and also pay his generals, buying their loyalty to his brutal regime,” Royce said. “That is what the high-level defectors that I meet with say. So let’s squeeze his purse.”
President Trump and regional allies are pressuring the Kim regime to halt the development of nuclear weapons through strong showings of military force, alignments with allies, and economic pressure.
China, one of North Korea’s only allies, is also showing a strong desire to halt the nuclearization of the Korean peninsula and has added pressure of its own on the Kim regime after Chinese President Xi met with President Trump to discuss the North Korea situation.
More and more, North Korea is isolated. The economic actions by the allied nations, the Chinese, and now this added restriction placed by the US are a siege on the economy. Like a siege in castle warfare from ages ago, the goal is to starve North Korea into compliance.
