Russia has resumed sending oil to sanctions-hit North Korea for the first time since 2020, deepening cooperation between the two nations that the US says also includes sending weapons from Pyongyang to help the Kremlin’s war in Ukraine.
A report released this week by a U.N. sanctions committee said Russia began sending refined petroleum products to North Korea in December 2022, continuing until 2023. The shipments had stopped around October 2020, they showed the data, but Russia has sent a few. 67,000 barrels of oil since it restarted the flow.
The resumption of oil shipments comes as cooperation between the longtime partners has revived in recent months, raising concerns that both nations could avoid sanctions in a partnership that helps Korea’s beleaguered economy of the North and sends weapons to Russian President Vladimir Putin for his attack. about Ukraine
Russia and North Korea appeared to have resumed trade via their only rail link late last year, according to satellite images released by the website 38 North. The link had been closed in February 2020 when Kim Jong Un sealed his borders against the emerging threat of Covid-19.
“We are concerned that the DPRK plans to deliver more military equipment to Russia,” a US State Department spokesman told Reuters on Tuesday, referring to North Korea by its official name. The State Department did not respond to a request for comment after regular business hours.
In recent months, the United States has accused North Korea, which has backed Russia’s invasion, of sending weapons and ammunition to help Putin’s war, including shells and rockets. Pyongyang has dismissed the claims as baseless rumours.
One thing the Kim regime has in abundance is weaponry, particularly Soviet-era artillery that is experiencing a renaissance on the Ukrainian front. North Korea has ammunition depots to supply what the International Institute for Strategic Studies estimates is an arsenal of more than 21,600 artillery pieces, a force that for decades has kept Seoul under the threat of devastation.
While the Biden administration has said the weapons will do little to alter the battlefield, the sales would open a revenue stream to a North Korean state cut off from much of the world’s trade.
Kim this week sent a message to Putin offering his support to the Russian people, saying he affirmed his willingness to “strive for closer strategic cooperation between the DPRK and Russia, firmly grasping the hand of the Russian president,” Korea’s Central News has officially reported. the agency reported.
Any arms sale would mark a role reversal between the neighbors, as North Korea for decades depended on weapons from its former benefactor, the Soviet Union. Pyongyang has been banned for more than 15 years from selling weapons under UN resolutions that Russia helped impose, although the country still sells weapons to the likes of Iran, Syria and Uganda, according to the US Defense Intelligence Agency.
North Korea can import 500,000 barrels of oil a year under the UN sanctions regime. But it has found ways around the measures, such as using ship-to-ship transfers of goods on the high seas.
