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South Korea on Friday sanctioned eight North Korean individuals and seven organizations suspected of engaging in illicit activities to finance the North’s growing nuclear weapons and missile programs.
The move was largely symbolic considering the lack of financial exchanges and business activities between the rival Koreas. But the steps may still draw an irritated response from North Korea, which last month called South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and his government “idiots” and a “wild dog gnawing on a bone given by the U.S.” after Seoul said it’s considering placing more unilateral sanctions on Pyongyang.
The South Korean sanctions were announced shortly after the U.S. Treasury Department said it sanctioned three members of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party who provided support to the country’s development of nuclear and ballistic weapons.
South Korea’s Foreign Ministry said Seoul’s sanctions were in response to the North’s heightening weapons threat, highlighted by last month’s testing of an intercontinental ballistic missile that demonstrated potential range to reach the U.
