US to put its own sanctions on North Korea

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North Korean soldiers on a patrol boat along the Sinuiju river banks of North Korea opposite Dandong, northeastern China's Liaoning province, Friday. — AP

SEOUL, June 5 (AP): The United States has told South Korea it will impose its own financial sanctions on the North apart from punishments that the UN has been considering for Pyongyang's latest nuclear test, a news report said Friday.
The US sanctions call for blacklisting foreign financial institutions that help the North launder money and conduct other dubious deals, the South Korean Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported.
US Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg briefed the South Korean president on the new sanctions at a meeting Thursday, the mass-market paper said, citing an unidentified official at the presidential office. The US Embassy in Seoul could not confirm the report.
Steinberg was in Beijing Friday and met with Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi.
Last week, Pyongyang conducted a barrage of missile launches and an underground nuclear test that violated previous UN Security Council sanctions. The North also appeared to be preparing for more missile tests, including one believed to be capable of reaching the US.
A US measure imposed on Banco Delta Asia, a bank in the Chinese territory of Macau, in 2005 effectively led to the North being severed from the international financial system, as other institutions voluntarily severed their dealings with the bank and the North.
The measure hit the North hard, said Lee Sang-hyun, an analyst at the Sejong Institute think tank, south of Seoul. "Sanctioning North Korea has not worked except for one case, the BDA case, cutting off the financial flows," Lee said.
News reports at the time said North Korean officials had to carry around bags of cash for financial transactions. Pyongyang stayed away from nuclear disarmament talks for more than a year in retaliation.