|
    
                         Website in Spanish       Website in Portuguese coming soon
Member Area

Nonproliferation for Global Security Foundation - NPSGlobal

Thursday
Mar 28th
Home News Strategic Trade North Korean arms shipment intercepted
North Korean arms shipment intercepted
Share
Telegraph, 23 Feb 2010. Strategic Trade

South African officials told a UN committee that they had seized a container ship last November that was carrying parts for T-54 or T-55 military tanks. The cargo, which was originally shipped by a North Korean company, was headed for the Republic of the Congo.

After being first loaded onto a ship in China, it was then transferred to a French-owned vessel in Malaysia before making the journey to Africa. The cargo was listed on the manifest as spare parts for a bulldozer.

However, the French crew is thought to have alerted authorities about the suspect containers.

A letter sent by South Africa to the UN Security Council's North Korea sanctions committee said that "the contents fell within the definition of conventional arms in that the contents consisted of components of a military tank T-54/T-55."

The tanks were originally designed and produced in the Soviet Union in the late 1940s and 1950s, but have since been manufactured in other countries.

Several diplomats described the seizure as a "clear-cut violation" of Security Council resolution 1874 which bans all North Korean arms exports. North Korea relies on selling arms in order to raise much-needed foreign currency for Kim Jong-il's government.

The Republic of the Congo, which borders the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has recently suffered an eruption of violence between Brazzaville, its capital, and the port town of Pointe Noire.

In December, Thai officials confiscated over 35 tons of munitions from a cargo plane at Bangkok airport. The weapons were believed to have originated in North Korea.

Back

 
Follow us on