Agencies, Washington
US President Donald Trump has announced what he called the “heaviest sanctions” on the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), a move that came amid signs of a growing rapprochement on the Korean Peninsula.
“We imposed today (Friday) the heaviest sanctions ever imposed on a country before,” Trump said in an address to a conservative activist group in the state of Maryland, the Chinese news agency Xinhua has reported.
The new sanctions, the “largest-ever” package on the DPRK (North Korea), will target 56 vessels, shipping companies, and trade businesses, said senior Trump administration officials at a background briefing earlier in the day.
The penalty, which is part of the US campaign of “maximum pressure” on Pyongyang, will designate 27 companies, 28 ships and one person, according to a statement released by the US Department of Treasury.
The Trump administration has engaged in “maximum pressure” against the DPRK since assuming office in early 2017 to curb Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile development programme.
US Treasury Secretary Seven Mnuchin pledged on Friday that Washington would impose more punishment on Pyongyang. “We will continue as we see things that should be sanctioned, I can assure you, we will continue to roll out new sanctions,” Mnuchin said at a White House briefing.
Mnuchin also noted that the United States has already slapped more than 450 sanctions against the DPRK, with about half of them launched in 2017.
The economic impact on the DPRK is unclear. It was not clear how the United States could enforce the new measures.In his speech, Trump said that “hopefully something positive can happen” from the new sanctions measures.
Washington’s latest move, however, came as Pyongyang and Seoul have embarked on an apparent rapprochement with the PyeongChang Winter Olympics used as an opportunity over the past month.