Update added !
Another Taiwanese businessman has been questioned on suspicion of transporting oil to a North Korean buyer in the open seas, Taiwan prosecutors said on Friday.
Chuang Chin-hung, 56, was questioned over the alleged sale of 7,000 tonnes of diesel oil to North Korea in December, prosecutors said. He was released on NT$2 million (US$68,400) bail and will face further questioning.
Ship-to-ship transfers of oil violate UN sanctions imposed on Pyongyang over its nuclear weapons programme.
“We have found that Chuang is the owner of a Marshall Island-registered trading company … and used the Jin Hye oil tanker, which he owns, to sell oil in international waters,” a spokesman for the Kaohsiung prosecutors office said on Friday.
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Russia warns totally cutting oil supplies to North Korea would be seen by Pyongyang as act of war. [South China Morning Post] North Korean diplomats en route to Moscow for talks over mutual cooperation, the Russian Embassy in North Korea said. [Reuters] |
The spokesman said the tanker was found to have loaded oil from Taiwan in November and transported the oil to a North Korean vessel in the East China Sea in December. But in the port and customs documents, Chuang allegedly wrote that the tanker was transporting the oil to Hong Kong.
Chuang, however, said he was unaware that the buyer was North Korea, but was unable to explain the false information in the documents, the spokesman said.
Chuang is the second Taiwanese national suspected of selling oil to North Korea. Last month, prosecutors placed Kaohsiung-based businessman Chen Shih-hsien and his overseas companies on a sanction list for allegedly selling oil to North Korean vessels in international waters.
The Kaohsiung prosecutors office alleged that Chen, who owns two fishing companies in Kaohsiung, was the dealer behind the transfer of oil to North Korea through the Hong Kong-registered Lighthouse Winmore in the Yellow Sea.
The tanker was seized by South Korean officials after it allegedly transferred about 600 tonnes of oil to a North Korean vessel in October.
[Source: South China Morning Post in Hong Kong and Reuters on February 2nd, 2018]
Jordan declares to cut off diplomatic relations with North Korea.
根据该声明，约旦王室已批准政府这一决定。约旦将不再承认朝鲜驻约旦大使， 约旦也将停止其驻朝鲜大使的工作。
Based on that statement, the Royal Court of Jordan already approved the government's decision. Jordan will no longer recognize North Korea's abassador in its country. It will stop as well the activity of its own ambassador to North Korea.
美国政府去年向一些国家施加压力，敦促它们与朝鲜切断外交和经济联系以孤立朝鲜。
Last year, the U.S. government put pressure on some countries urging them to cut off their diplomatic and economic relations with North Korea in order to isolate that country.
Jordan is therefore joining the regional pro-American alliance in the Middle East as presented by countries like Kuwait that is now hailing the Jordanian decision.
[Source: XinHua 新华 on February 2nd, 2018]
Newsweek article dating from January 31, 2018.
美国计划对朝“流鼻血打击” 韩国忧心
The US are planning a "Bloody Nose Strike" on North Korea
South Korea is worried.
[Source: RFA Radio Free Asia 自由亚洲电台普通话, Chinese language site from Washington DC on February 2nd, 2018]
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