This article was originally published on VoA and translated by OKN Correspondent.
The United Nations has launched an official investigation after it was discovered that two South Korean tankers had recently been transferred to the North Korean regime. Ships that once carried the South Korean flag, including the North Korean ship Wise Ernest sold by the United States, are being mobilized for violating sanctions against North Korea. Jiha Ham reports.
In a recently-released annual report, the UN Security Council’s Panel of Experts from the North Korea Sanctions Committee said that it is investigating the case of the North Korean-owned oil tanker “Ocean Sky”, which was sold by a South Korean company last year.
The ship, originally being South Korea’s “Daeho Sunrise”, was sold to a Chinese and Hong Kong-based company last year. On May 11 of the same year, it was towed by a Hong Kong-based company called “Asia Ocean Shipping” and left the Port of Busan, South Korea. The expert panel points out that the ship was likely transported to North Korea’s “Ryongsong Trading Company” between May 24 and 30.
The expert panel traced back the Automatic Vessel Identification System (AIS) that shows the location information of the ship and analyzed the satellite image data to confirm that the ship was later flagged as Sierra Leone and changed its name to “Ocean Sky.”
It also explained that additional investigations are currently underway as the vessel’s final entry into North Korea has been confirmed.
Built in 1996, the “Ocean Sky” is a small to medium-sized tanker with a length of 99.9m and a deadweight tonnage (DWT) of 5,807 tons.
The UN Security Council adopted Resolution 2321 on North Korea in 2016 to prevent UN member states from selling vessels to or purchasing North Korean vessels from North Korea.
Apart from the Security Council Resolution, South Korea completely bans trade with North Korea, including ships, through sanctions such as the May 24 measures in 2010.
Therefore, it raises the possibility that the sanction of the United Nations and other countries against North Korea were not abided until the South Korean ship “Daeho Sunrise” was transformed into “Ocean Sky” owned by North Korea.
The South Korean company “Daeho Shipping”, which sold the vessel, confirmed in a letter to the expert panel that the vessel in question was owned by the company from February 28, 2011, to May 17 of last year.
It added that in March of last year, a broker operating in China and Hong Kong contacted a broker with the Korean surname Jang, and a sales contract was signed shortly thereafter.
The company also indicated that inspections of ships, usually conducted by buyers, were canceled due to the novel coronavirus, and after that, the ship was handed over to a South Korean broker without a buyer’s agent.
The expert panel also confirmed that another oil tanker, the “Woojung”, which once belonged to South Korea, was carrying a North Korean flag and is conducting an investigation.
The “Woojung” was a South Korean ship that had its homeport in Busan, South Korea just before heading to the Port of Shidao, China in July 2019, but now it has become the North Korean “Shinpyeong 5” and is under the control of the North Korean authorities.
In particular, “Shinpyeong 5” was caught receiving oil from an Palauan oil tanker from using the illegal ship-to-ship transshipment method on August 8, 9, and 10 of last year.
A tanker that once sailed around the world flying the South Korean flag has come to be at the center of violating sanctions on North Korea in just two years.
This is not the first time that a South Korean ship has been “transformed” into a North Korean ship and has been involved in sanctions violations.
Earlier, VOA reported that the North Korean ship “Wise Ernest”, which was caught by the Indonesian authorities while transporting North Korean coal and was subsequently sold by the US government, was the “Eny” that carried the South Korean flag until 2015.
At that time, the company that purchased the “Eny” changed the name of the ship several times and changed flags between several countries, including Cambodia and Tanzania, but the ship in question eventually became the North Korean “Wise Ernest” about a year later.
In addition, the North Korean tanker “Baekma”, subject to sanctions by the US Treasury and the UN Security Council, was the “Royal Miracle” that was actually owned and operated by a South Korean company in the past. Also, the “Hanguk” operated by a South Korean company called Daeshin Shipping from 2003 to 2010 has also become the “Golden No. 1” of North Korea, which is currently subject to US Treasury sanctions.
In addition, the ship that was detained for smuggling coal into South Korea under the name of “Shin Sung-hai” or “Talent Ace” was the “Dongchin Shanghai”, which was owned by South Korea’s “Dongchin Shipping” from 2008 to 2017.
In a phone call with VOA on April 4, Lee Dong-geun, a shipping expert and CEO of Woochang Shipping, analyzed that North Korea was replacing its aging vessels with ones from South Korea.
[Recording: CEO Lee Dong-geun] “It’s close to a replacement ship. If a ship gets old, won’t there be a limit where even the best technology can’t repair it? In particular, if there are no parts for the engine or things that can operate or something that cannot be repaired with technology, or there is a leak in an important part… ”
He pointed out that South Korean ships with relatively low prices may have emerged as an alternative to North Korean authorities instead of Japanese ships, which have a high second-hand transaction price due to their short-term usage.
Noting that most South Korean ships purchased by North Korea weigh less than 10,000 tons, Lee advised that “when a sale contract of this size is made, the South Korean government and ship sellers need to carefully examine the source of funds and other things.”
He also emphasized that relevant authorities should be careful while closely monitoring companies that have a history of selling ships to North Korea.
To read the original article in Korean, please click here.
