UN imposes new sanctions against North Korea

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has voted unanimously in favor of imposing new sanctions on North Korea following its latest intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test, a move that could exert crippling pressure on the peninsular country’s struggling economy.

According to Press TV, members of the UN Security Council voted 15-0 on Friday in favor of a resolution that seeks to ban almost 90 percent of the North-bound exports of refined petroleum products by limiting them to 500,000 barrels a year.

The newly adopted measure would also restrict the export of crude oil to the North at four million barrels a year. Furthermore, it demands the repatriation of North Koreans working abroad within 12 months.

In a bid to further strangle North Korea's external sources of funding, the US-drafted resolution prevents the country from exporting a number of items, including machinery, food products, lumber, electrical equipment, vessels, and other products and resources.

It also forbids the export of industrial equipment, machinery, transportation vehicles, and industrial metals to the North. Furthermore, the new measure has subjected the Ministry of the People's Armed Forces and 15 North Korean nationals to a global asset freeze and travel ban.

The resolution also allows other countries to confiscate, examine and freeze any vessel in their ports or territorial waters that they believe was shipping banned cargo or involved in prohibited activities.

On November 29, North Korea announced that it had successfully tested an ICBM in a “breakthrough” that places the US mainland within range of its nuclear weapons, whose warheads could endure re-entry to the Earth’s atmosphere. The controversial test drew quick and widespread condemnations, with Nikki Haley, the US Envoy to the UN, threatening to destroy Pyongyang in case of a possible war.

The resolution "sends the unambiguous message to Pyongyang that further defiance will invite further punishments and isolation,” said Haley, following the vote on Friday.

Wu Haitao, the Chinese envoy to the UN, slammed Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile test launches and at the same time criticized the US and its regional allies for worsening the already tense situation in the Korean Peninsula through conducting joint military drills.

China, which provides most of North Korea’s oil, has supported successive rounds of UNSC sanctions but had resisted past American calls to discontinue supplies to its neighbor.

Russia, for its part, called for an immediate cessation of ballistic activity on the peninsula, demanding all stakeholders show openness to "genuine" dialogue aimed at resolving the crisis.

ME