US cuts off Chinese bank over pyongyang ties

NK could be listed as terrorism sponsor

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States excluded China’s Bank of Dandong from its financial system on Thursday, alleging that it has helped North Korea evade financial sanctions to launder funds.

Washington had alerted other businesses in June that it planned to take the action, but it finally went into effect just as U.S. President Donald Trump was to set off on an Asian tour.

The U.S. leader has demanded that Beijing do more to push its neighbor North Korea to stop efforts to build a nuclear-armed missile capable of reaching American cities.

Officials in Washington warn that, while they would prefer Kim to come to the table, Trump has not ruled out a pre-emptive strike to prevent him from crossing the missile threshold.

But, alongside this saber rattling, Washington is also slowly stepping up secondary sanctions on foreign institutions like the Bank of Dandong it accuses of funneling illicit funds.

This risks angering China, but hawkish commentators argue that it remains the only way short of war to force Pyongyang, and perhaps more importantly Beijing, to reconsider their strategy.

“Banks and businesses worldwide should take note that they must be vigilant against attempts by North Korea to conduct illicit financing and trade,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said.

Along with the ban on Bank of Dandong, the Treasury also issued new guidance to international banks’ risk and compliance officers to help them spot North Korean attempts to infiltrate world finance.

Banks from China and around the world find it hard to operate if they are barred from the U.S. financial system, which is a clearing house for most dollar-denominated transactions.

As well as the financial sanctions Washington may also decide to re-designate North Korea as a “state sponsor of terrorism” — a formal blacklist that would add to sanctions pressure.

Here, however, the Trump administration does not seem to be in a hurry, despite his anger over the death of U.S. student Otto Warmbier after he was imprisoned and apparently brutalized in the North.

On Aug. 2, Trump reluctantly enacted a law that was forced on him by the U.S. Congress pressing for new economic and political sanctions against Iran, Russia and North Korea.

One clause of that act required the U.S. State Department to say within 90 days whether North Korea should be named a terror sponsor -a deadline lawmakers say expired on Tuesday.

The State Department said it had calculated the deadline differently and was working toward a Thursday announcement, but as office hours came to an end there was no news.

Congressman Ted Poe, chairman of the House subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade, was unimpressed and followed up with the State Department to ask about the delay.