Mozambique is implementing all UN sanctions on North Korea – Govt

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique is implementing all UN sanctions on North Korea – Govt

12:58 CAT | 05 Feb 2018

O País (File photo) / Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Maria Manuela dos Santos Lucas

Mozambique’s deputy minister of foreign affairs, Maria Manuela Lucas, said today that the country is fully implementing all sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council on North Korea.

“Mozambique is implementing all the resolutions and agenda of the United Nations,” she said in statements to Radio Mozambique.

The deputy-minister said that the Mozambican government recently invited the panel monitoring enforcement of U.N. sanctions against North Korea to visit the country, “so as to see ‘in loco’ the work that is being done.”

“The panel was recently meeting, will publish a report and promised to visit Mozambique this quarter,” she added.

Lucas said that “the country has historical relations with North Korea, which go back to the beginnings of the national liberation struggle”.

“We continue to have political relations with North Korea but, due to the work of the United Nations, of which we are a part, we are collaborating with all the work of the panel on sanctions.”

Also Read: UN “conducting investigations” in Mozambique, 7 more countries, over embargo on N. Korea

Without offering details, Lucas said that “work is being done on the ground to identify some Mozambican companies which were working with North Korea prior to the publication of sanctions. We are working on the ground to sensitise” some firms and the government is “working with them”.

“We have no economic relationship with North Korea now,” she said.

North Korea earned US $200 million between January and September 2017 from exports of products banned by UN sanctions, according to a document seen by AFP on Saturday.

Also Read: Mozambique and North Korea: A story misreported by CNN?

WATCH: Government denies cooperation with North Korea – AIM report

At the same time, the US television network CNN reported that there is a secret network of front companies, military cooperation and elite force-building agreements between North Korea and Mozambique, which violate the sanctions.

In September 2017, a UN expert commission complained that Mozambique did not provide “a substantive response” to the indications that the North Korean company Haegeumgang Trading Corporation had sold surface-to-air missiles and a radar to Monte Binga, a company controlled by the Mozambican government.

“The government will work with this commission to better understand any issues” that may arise, with a view to “due clarification, in a timely manner,” Council of Ministers spokesperson Ana Comoana told Lusa at the time.

“But our country has done everything to ensure compliance with the treaties to which it is a party,” she concluded.

Also Read: Mozambique will work with UN experts on alleged violation of arms embargo on North Korea

Source: Lusa