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Posted: 2018-02-23 18:03:06

US President Donald Trump says the United States will impose the "largest-ever" package of sanctions on North Korea, intensifying pressure on the reclusive country to give up its nuclear and missile programmes.

In addressing the Trump administration's biggest national security challenge, the US Treasury sanctioned one person, 27 companies and 28 ships, according to a statement posted on the US Treasury Department's website.

Pence raises prospect of talks with North Korea

US Vice President Mike Pence hints at possibility of dialogue with North Korea after Pyongyang's proposed talks with Seoul.

The Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control announced the measures, which are designed to disrupt North Korean shipping and trading companies and vessels and to further isolate Pyongyang.

The ships are located, registered or flagged in North Korea, China, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Marshall Islands, Tanzania, Panama and Comoros.

Washington "also issued an advisory alerting the public to the significant sanctions risks to those continuing to enable shipments of goods to and from North Korea."

"Today I am announcing that we are launching the largest-ever set of new sanctions on the North Korean regime," Trump said in excerpts of a speech he was due to deliver to a conservative activist group on Friday (local time).

North Korea's missile and nuclear programme is seeking to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the US mainland. Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have taunted each other through the media and in August Trump threatened to go beyond sanctions by bringing "fire and fury like the world has never seen".

Tougher sanctions may jeopardise the latest detente between the two Koreas, illustrated by the North's participation in the Winter Olympics in the South, amid preparations for talks about a possible summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in.

US Vice President Mike Pence had hinted at such a sanctions package two weeks ago during a stop in Tokyo that preceded his visit to South Korea for the Pyeongchang Olympics.

North Korea last year conducted dozens of missile launches and its sixth and largest nuclear test in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions. It defends the weapons programmes as essential to deter US aggression.

It has been more than two months since North Korea's last missile test.

Kim said he wants to boost the "warm climate of reconciliation and dialogue" with South Korea, which hosts 28,500 US troops, after a high-level delegation, including his sister, returned from the Olympics.

North-South paralympics talks

In an extension of that rapprochement, the North has agreed to hold working-level talks on Tuesday for the Pyeongchang Winter Paralympics on the North's side of the border village of Panmunjom.

In December, the United Nations approved US-drafted sanctions limiting North Korea's access to refined petroleum products and crude oil, which the North Korean Foreign Ministry said amounted to an act of war.

The new US sanctions were to be announced while Trump's daughter, Ivanka, is visiting South Korea. She had dinner with Moon after a closed-door meeting with the president.

Ivanka Trump's visit to South Korea coincides with that of a sanctioned North Korean official, Kim Yong Chol, blamed for the deadly 2010 sinking of a South Korean navy ship that killed 46 sailors. His delegation will attend the closing ceremony and also meet Moon.

The South Korean president said South Korea cannot acknowledge North Korea as a nuclear state and talks with the North on denuclearisation and improving inter-Korean relations must go hand in hand, Moon said, cited by his spokesman Yoon Young-chan.

He said close cooperation between the US and South Korea is important for the talks.

"President Moon also said out of all countries, South Korea has the strongest will to say it cannot acknowledge North Korea as a nuclear state," he said.

Moon made the comments to Ivanka.

The Blue House has said there are no official opportunities for US and North Korean officials to meet.

Kim Yong Chol is the vice chairman of the North's ruling Workers' Party's Central Committee and was previously chief of the Reconnaissance General Bureau, a top North Korean military intelligence agency that South Korea blamed for the sinking of its navy corvette, the Cheonan. North Korea has denied any involvement.

Seoul said it approved the pending visit by Kim Yong Chol in the pursuit of peace and asked for public understanding in the face of opposition protests.

"Under current difficult circumstances, we have decided to focus on whether peace on the Korean peninsula and improvement in inter-Korean relations can be derived from dialogue with (the visiting North Korean officials), not on their past or who they are," said Unification Ministry spokesman Baik Tae-hyun.

Kim Yong Chol currently heads the United Front Department, the North's office responsible for handling inter-Korean affairs.

South Korea's decision to allow in Kim Yong Chol, currently sanctioned by the US and South Korea, sparked protest from family members of the dead sailors and opposition parties.

Many have been angered at the North's participation at the Games, which they say has been a reward for bad behaviour with no quid pro quo from Pyongyang.

Reuters

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