North Korean shipments to Syria chemical weapons program intercepted: UN report

UNITED NATIONS – Two North Korean shipments to a Syrian
government agency responsible for the country’s chemical weapons
program were intercepted in the past six months, according to a
confidential United Nations report on North Korea sanctions violations.
The report by a panel of independent U.N.
experts, which was submitted to the U.N. Security Council earlier this
month and seen by Reuters on Monday, gave no details on when or where
the interdictions occurred or what the shipments contained.
“The panel is investigating reported prohibited chemical, ballistic missile and conventional arms cooperation between Syria and the DPRK (North Korea),” the experts wrote in the 37-page report.
“Two member states interdicted shipments destined for Syria. Another Member state informed the panel that it had reasons to believe that the goods were part of a KOMID contract with Syria,” according to the report.
KOMID is the Korea Mining
Development Trading Corporation. It was blacklisted by the Security
Council in 2009 and described as Pyongyang’s key arms dealer and
exporter of equipment related to ballistic missiles and conventional
weapons. In March 2016 the council also blacklisted two KOMID
representatives in Syria.
“The consignees were Syrian entities designated by the European Union and the United States as front companies for Syria‘s Scientific Studies and Research Centre (SSRC), a Syrian entity identified by the Panel as cooperating with KOMID in previous prohibited item transfers,” the U.N. experts wrote.
SSRC has overseen the country’s chemical weapons program since the 1970s.
The U.N. experts said activities between Syria and North Korea they were investigating included cooperation on Syrian Scud missile programs and maintenance and repair of Syrian surface-to-air missiles air defense systems.
The North Korean and Syrian missions to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The experts said they were also investigating the use of the VX nerve agent in Malaysia to kill the estranged half-brother of North Korea‘s leader Kim Jong Un in February.
North Korea has
been under U.N. sanctions since 2006 over its ballistic missile and
nuclear programs and the Security Council has ratcheted up the measures
in response to five nuclear weapons tests and four long-range missile
launches.
Syria agreed
to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Russia
and the United States. However, diplomats and weapons inspectors suspect Syria may have secretly maintained or developed a new chemical weapons capability.
During the country’s more than six-year long
civil war the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has
said the banned nerve agent sarin has been used at least twice, while
the use of cholorine as a weapon has been widespread. The Syrian government has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons.
North Korean shipments to Syria chemical weapons program intercepted: UN report
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