BEIJING – China will suspend all imports of coal from North Korea until the end of the year, the commerce ministry announced Saturday, in a surprise move that would cut off a major financial lifeline for Pyongyang and significantly tighten the effectiveness of United Nations sanctions.
Coal is North Korea’s largest export item. The Ministry of Commerce said the ban would come into force Sunday and be effective until Dec. 31.
China did not give a reason for the move, but the nation is thought to be deeply frustrated with North Korea over its recent missile test and the assassination of Kim Jong Un’s half-brother in Malaysia.
Beijing has also come under significant international pressure to do more to rein in North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
North Korea is China’s fourth-biggest supplier of coal. Although China announced last April that it would ban North Korea coal imports to comply with U.N. sanctions, it made exceptions for deliveries intended for the “people’s well-being” that were not connected to the country’s missile programs.
In practice, that exception was the cover for coal to continue to flow across the border in huge quantities, with imports of non-lignite coal up 14.5 percent last year to 24.8 million U.S. tons, Reuters has reported.
But in a sign that Beijing’s patience was running out, it rejected a coal shipment from North Korea worth about $1 million Monday, the day after the North’s test of an intermediate-range ballistic missile, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported.
President Donald Trump has called on China to put more pressure on North Korea to stop its nuclear weapons program, and the subject may have come up during a telephone conversation he had with Chinese President Xi Jinping earlier this month.
The U.N. Security Council condemned North Korea’s latest missile test and urged members to “redouble efforts” to enforce sanctions. That appeal came after an emergency meeting in New York called by the United States, Japan and South Korea.
China was also frustrated by the slaying of Kim Jong Nam in Malaysia this past week: If North Korea were responsible, it would be seen as an affront to Beijing, which had played host to and protected the half-brother of the North Korean leader for many years. The motive for his killing remains a much-debated mystery.
Our editors found this article on this site using Google and regenerated it for our readers.
