The Trump administration on Friday unveiled its toughest package yet of sanctions against North Korea, targeting 56 trade companies, merchants, and vessels that have continued to prop up the Kim Jong Un regime and its pursuit of nuclear weapons.
Senior administration officials said the sanctions will target 27 shipping and trade companies, 28 vessels and at least one individual, from countries including China, Panama, Taiwan, Singapore, North Korea, and Tanzania. Among those targeted are companies that “have been used to engage in U.N.-prohibited ship-to-ship transfers,” one official said.
“These designations are a critical part of our maximum pressure campaign to diplomatically and economically isolate North Korea,” a second senior administration official told reporters during a call Friday morning.
The purpose of the latest sanctions is to “show Kim Jong Un there is no other path for him to take except denuclearization” in the Korean Peninsula, the official said.