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| China-Japan-Koreas | |
| Obama extends U.S. sanctions on N. Korea | |
| 2009-06-25 | |
WASHINGTON, June 24 (Yonhap) -- U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday extended his country's sanctions on North Korea amid tightening international pressure on the North following its recent nuclear test and other provocations.
"Because the existence and risk of the proliferation of weapons-usable fissile material on the Korean Peninsula continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States, the national emergency declared on June 26, 2008, and the measures adopted on that date to deal with that emergency, must continue in effect beyond June 26, 2009," Obama said in a notice to Congress. "I am continuing for 1 year the national emergency declared by former President George W. Bush a year earlier," he said. Laws restricting property dealings with North Korea were to expire on Friday, one year after they were invoked, unless otherwise stated by the president. Bush terminated the Trading with the Enemy Act for North Korea on June 26, 2008, as Pyongyang presented a detailed list of its nuclear activities, blew up a cooling tower connected to its Yongbyon facility and pledged to return to stalled six-party talks on ending its nuclear programs. He also had notified Congress of his intention to remove North Korea from a list of state sponsors of terror, a move long sought after by the North in order to open access to financial assistance from the international community to help its isolated, impoverished economy. While talk has abounded recently over the possibility of relisting the North due to the deepening nuclear dispute, U.S. officials and experts have said the regime's nuclear and ballistic missile tests do not constitute terrorist acts and thus do not meet the requirement for relisting the North. | |
| Posted by:Steve White |