July 28, 2016
By AP
By AP
Pyoungyang, North Korea — North Korea's top diplomat (click here) for U.S. affairs told The Associated Press Thursday that Washington "crossed the red line" and effectively declared war by putting leader Kim Jong Un on its list of sanctioned individuals.
Han Song Ryol, director-general of the U.S. affairs department at the North's Foreign Ministry, said a vicious showdown could erupt if the U.S. and South Korea hold annual war games as planned next month.
He added that recent U.S. actions have put the situation on the Korean Peninsula on a war footing.
The United States and South Korea regularly conduct joint military exercises south of the Demilitarized Zone, and Pyongyang typically responds to them with tough talk and threats of retaliation....
Kim Jong Un put his money in the wrong bank. Pyoungyang needs to take it's grievances before the UN Security Council.
April 16, 2016
By Merra Gidden
The British banker Nigel Cowie, (click here) who lived in North Korea for over two decades, allegedly set up an offshore company used by Pyongyang to expand its nuclear weapons program and sell arms. News of his involvement came to light following Sunday’s leak of the Panama Papers, which have shed light on global offshore finance arrangements.
Cowie moved to North Korea in 1995, rising to become head of Daedong Credit Bank (DCB), the country’s first foreign bank, The Guardian reports. In 2006, he led a group of investors that bought a 70 percent stake in the bank. That same year, Cowie registered an offshoot of DCB in the British Virgin Islands, which law firm Mossack Fonseca—whose clients make up the Panama Papers—incorporated.
In 2013, the U.S. imposed sanctions on the company, claiming that it provided financial services to institutions central to North Korea’s arms race, Reuters reports. The offshoot also, the U.S. alleges, carried out international financial transactions with countries trying to avoid North Korea. Mossack Fonseca didn’t notice Cowie’s links to North Korea—despite him giving an address there—until 2010 when it resigned as agent....
Kim Jong Un put his money in the wrong bank. Pyoungyang needs to take it's grievances before the UN Security Council.
April 16, 2016
By Merra Gidden
The British banker Nigel Cowie, (click here) who lived in North Korea for over two decades, allegedly set up an offshore company used by Pyongyang to expand its nuclear weapons program and sell arms. News of his involvement came to light following Sunday’s leak of the Panama Papers, which have shed light on global offshore finance arrangements.
Cowie moved to North Korea in 1995, rising to become head of Daedong Credit Bank (DCB), the country’s first foreign bank, The Guardian reports. In 2006, he led a group of investors that bought a 70 percent stake in the bank. That same year, Cowie registered an offshoot of DCB in the British Virgin Islands, which law firm Mossack Fonseca—whose clients make up the Panama Papers—incorporated.
In 2013, the U.S. imposed sanctions on the company, claiming that it provided financial services to institutions central to North Korea’s arms race, Reuters reports. The offshoot also, the U.S. alleges, carried out international financial transactions with countries trying to avoid North Korea. Mossack Fonseca didn’t notice Cowie’s links to North Korea—despite him giving an address there—until 2010 when it resigned as agent....
