US Official: North Korea Sanctions Team Helping Companies, Countries Boost Enforcement
The U.S. highlighted at the U.N. this week what it called North Korea's continued violations of sanctions violations and its attempted evasion of those measures, including through cryptocurrency, cybercrime, its deployments of information technology workers around the world, and more. The findings were outlined in a report from the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team, a group formed to report on North Korea-related sanctions breaches (see 2410170003).
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Jonathan Fritz, the State Department's principal deputy assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific affairs, said during the Jan. 12 meeting that the "only way to make a dent in this activity" is for U.N. members to work together in implementing sanctions against North Korea. "We welcome discussion of how we can best collaborate to ensure not only that North Korea cannot rely on these activities to engage in sanctioned activities, but to protect our economies, our companies and our citizens from cybercrime."
Fritz added that the report has "already supported sanctions implementation by several companies" and countries, including Argentina and Pakistan, which have both taken "action to address issues highlighted in the report." Pakistan specifically "apprehended" a person identified in the report "for her role in facilitating North Korean IT worker activities," he said. The Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team "would be happy to assist other countries in acting on the information in this report as well."