Posted on 12/29/2017 12:27:21 PM PST by jazusamo
The crew of a Hong Kong-flagged ship that allegedly violated U.N. sanctions by transferring oil to a North Korean vessel in October is being held in South Korea until a full inspection is sent to the Security Council, officials announced Friday.
The Lighthouse Winmore is believed to have transferred about 600 tons of refined petroleum products to the North Korean ship, the Sam Jong 2, in international waters in the East China Sea on Oct. 19, after leaving the South Korean port of Yeosu, a South Korean Foreign Ministry official told the Associated Press.
The announcement came on the same day Defense Secretary James Mattis told Fox News that he believes the world will exert “increased pressure” on North Korea in the coming months following the recent maritime incidents.
South Korean customs authorities said they boarded the ship and interviewed crew members after they returned to Yeosu on Nov. 24. South Korea formally seized the ship after the U.N. Security Council on Dec. 22 imposed new sanctions on North Korea that allow member states to seize, inspect and freeze vessels that are suspected of transferring banned goods to or from North Korea, the official said. He spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity, citing office rules.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Good for South Korea.
The oil did not “actually” come from China, but from Japan.
You have to wonder how much the NK’s have been buying that way.
Japan has no oil. Chances are, they bought it from Alaska.
Need to put my glasses on, I read this part of it as “to seize, inspect and freeze vessels that are suspected of transferring baked goods “.
Trade them for the USS Pueblo.
Oil is available in unlimited quantities on the black market. So are marijuana, heroin, cocaine, opioids, assault firearms, prostitutes, etc, etc. Law breakers are never constrained by any laws. Black markets have been in existence since before Jesus was born. Where there is demand, there will be suppliers.
I bet they pay a pretty stiff premium for contraband oil. The sellers are sure to have a markup in the multi thousand percent range..................
Pretty sure they didn’t just give it to them.
My guess it was a lot higher than normal.
Japan has excess refinery capacity. They import crude from Saudi Arabia and the Emirates.
I can imagine the South Koreans finding pallets of US $20 bills.
Sell the ship at auction.
Read the article. They loaded in Japan, bound for Taiwan.
I wonder if the NORKs paid for the oil with some of their infamous high quality counterfeit US currency.
That’d be a big step towards stopping the black marketing of oil, those ships don’t come cheap.
Ship was flagged in HK & had a mostly Chinese crew, but it is chartered to “Taiwan’s Billions Bunker Group.” The article does not state the owner, but selling the ship at auction (etc.) doesn’t “hit” this “Billions Bunker Group”, who are the people needing to be KO’d, in this case.
Other thoughts:
For reference, one metric ton of crude is around 7.14 barrels. (We are not told exactly what refined products were involved.) Roughly, the transfer was 4284 barrels. A drop in the bucket.
OTOH, from this and other articles, it appears these ship-to-ship transfers are very common / numerous.
I still think Trump should tweet (slightly modified from earlier post) “China, Taiwan, etc., need to stop those illegally transferring oil to NK or lose face!”
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