US Offers $5 Million For Info On China’s ‘Flagrant’ N.Korea Sanctions Violations

The Trump administration has with only weeks to go till Biden’s inauguration in January launched a new sanctions enforcement related initiative regarding North Korea that allows individuals or officials to report violations for a monetary reward.

The State Department published its new website DPRKrewards.com on Tuesday which offers up to $5 million for specific information leading to the “disruption” of “persons engaged in certain activities that support North Korea.”

With such a large sum it appears they are certainly hoping to attract potential internal regime whistleblowers or even intentioned defectors. But the whole project is squarely aimed at Beijing as part of Trump’s pressure campaign.

Upon unveiling the violations reporting website, the State Department blasted China for multiple major sanctions violations regarding the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, or DPRK. It was pointed out that China continues to host at least 20,000 North Korean workers in contravention of UN resolutions. 

“Lifting sanctions and pumping more revenue into the DPRK while its missile and nuclear production facilities continue to hum is something we will never do,” a State Dept. official for North Korea said.

Rewards Up To $5 Million!

North Korea engages in illegal cyber hacks against the U.S. as well as evasion of sanctions to fund its illegal nuclear weapons program.

Submit info on these illicit activities and you may be eligible for a reward. Visit https://t.co/iBs0DwXTpi pic.twitter.com/bsOOtosSCl

— Rewards for Justice (@RFJ_USA) December 1, 2020

The statement described specifically:

“The examples of this chronic failure are numerous, growing and worrying.”

He said that US vessels provided information to Beijing 46 times since 2019 about North Korean fuel-smuggling in Chinese waters, and in the past year observed 555 cases of North Korean shipments of coal of other sanctioned exports to China.

“On none of these occasions did the Chinese authorities act to stop these illicit imports. Not once,” the US official added.

The new website identifies potential violations as including “…money laundering, exportation of luxury goods to North Korea, specified cyber-activity and actions that support WMD proliferation.

This lashing out at China for its enabling and ‘looking the other way’ on North Korea comes as the Trump White House has promised to keep up the pressure on Beijing down to the last days before the presidential transition.