With Possible New Sanctions, White House Gets Serious on China’s North Korea Ties « | Foreign Policy | the Global Magazine of News and Ideas
The United States is reportedly preparing a new round of secondary sanctions on Chinese companies and individuals that do business with North Korea, according to Reuters.
The new measures would target select companies and minor financial firms but no big banks, and could be announced within a matter of weeks, according to the report. The United States slapped an initial round of sanctions on Chinese firms who help prop up Pyongyang in late June — a departure from a traditionally cautious approach to ratcheting up pressure on North Korea’s main source of support.
That the White House would consider a second round of sanctions so soon after the first indicates that the Trump administration is willing to back up its tough rhetoric on North Korea. The sanctions are meant to apply meaningful pressure on a government which is all but single-handedly propping up a regime that threatens South Korea, Japan, and the United States with nuclear destruction.
North Korea’s multiple missile tests in recent months, culminating with its first-ever successful launch last week of an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching Alaska, has alarmed the international community and presented Trump’s first major foreign policy test.
Trump has sought to persuade China, North Korea’s largest economic and trade partner by far, to use its leverage over its rogue neighbor to scale back its missile program — as have American governments for years. Despite that track record, the Trump White House displayed an initial optimism, presenting North Korea as an easily solvable problem with the help of Chinese President Xi Jinping, with whom Trump had a friendly summit back in April.
