North Korea has not abandoned nuclear programme and continues to violate sanctions, UN report says

North Korea has not stopped its nuclear and missile programmes and is violating UN sanctions including by “a massive increase in illicit ship-to-ship transfers of petroleum products,” UN experts said in a new report.

A summary of the report by experts monitoring UN sanctions against North Korea, which was sent to the Security Council on Friday night and obtained by The Associated Press, said North Korea is also violating sanctions by transferring coal at sea and flouting an arms embargo and financial sanctions.

The panel of experts said North Korea attempted to sell small arms and light weapons and other military equipment via foreign intermediaries, including Syrian arms traffickers in the case of Houthi Shiite rebels in Yemen as well as Libya and Sudan. The report also said North Korea has continued military cooperation with Syria, in breach of UN sanctions.

The panel said it is continuing to investigate sanctioned individuals, companies and other entities in Asia that clandestinely procured centrifuges for North Korea’s nuclear programme and attempted to sell a wide range of military equipment to governments and armed groups in the Middle East and Africa.

The Security Council first imposed sanctions on North Korea after its first nuclear test in 2006 and has made them tougher and tougher in response to further nuclear tests and its increasingly sophisticated ballistic missile programme.

Many diplomats and analysts credit the sanctions, which have sharply cut North Korea’s exports and imports, with helping promote the thaw in relations between North Korea and South Korea as well as the June meeting between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

But the report said North Korea “has not stopped its nuclear and missiles programmes” and continues to defy the sanctions resolutions.