SEOUL – North Korea severed diplomatic ties with Malaysia on Friday after the country’s supreme court agreed to extradite a North Korean man accused of money laundering to the United States, a major coup in Washington’s efforts to to stifle the illegal trade in Pyongyang.
In a ruling last week, the federal court in Malaysia approved the extradition of a North Korean citizen, Mun Chol-myong, and rejected his argument that the case against him was politically motivated and that he was caught in the crosshairs of diplomatic enmity between North Korea and Washington.
Washington sought to remove Mr. Bring Mun to the United States to face criminal charges of laundering money through front-line companies and violating international sanctions by sending banned luxury goods from Singapore to North Korea, on behalf of the regime in Pyongyang. Mr. Mun was arrested in Malaysia in 2019, where he moved from Singapore in 2008.
Mr. Mun was the first North Korean extradited to the United States to face a criminal trial. His extradition is part of Washington’s efforts to curb what it describes as widespread sanctions-evading activities by North Korean businessmen and diplomats. Over the years, the United Nations Security Council has imposed a series of increasingly stringent sanctions on North Korea to strangle the country’s access to foreign exchange, which it has used to fund its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
North Korea on Friday identified the United States as “the manipulator and the main culprit” behind the extradition of Mr. He warned that Washington would have to pay a due price. ‘It did not expand, but its announcement comes a day after North Korea said it would not respond to any attempt by the new Biden government to establish a communication channel that could be used to end it. do not join the growing nuclear weapons program of Pyongyang.
Negotiations fell apart after meetings between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and former President Donald J. Trump abruptly ended in 2019.
“This is a shameful act and relentlessly heinous crime,” the North Korean Foreign Ministry said in a statement issued Friday by its official Korean Central News Agency, accusing Malaysia of harassing Mr. Mun presents as a sacrifice of US hostile policy. “The ‘total severance of diplomatic relations with Malaysia’ takes effect immediately.
Relations between North Korea and Malaysia have already been frozen after Kim’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, was assassinated in February 2017 at an airport in Kuala Lumpur. Two women hired by agents from Pyongyang smeared his face with the internationally banned VX nerve agent. . North Korea denies involvement.
After the incident, the two countries expelled ambassadors from their capitals.
North Korea’s severance of ties with Malaysia will deepen its diplomatic isolation. After the North conducted its sixth and final nuclear test in 2017, in defiance of United Nations resolutions, several countries, including Mexico, Spain and Kuwait, suspended North Korean ambassadors.
North Korean diplomats have also left their overseas posts in recent years.
Thae Yong-ho, a minister at the North Korean embassy in London, crossed into Seoul in 2016 with his wife and two sons. According to South Korean lawmakers, Jo Song-gil, a senior North Korean diplomat who disappeared from Italy in late 2018, also ended up in Seoul. Ryu Kyeon-woo, a senior North Korean diplomat who fled his post in Kuwait in 2019, also showed up in South Korea.
Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III met with their South Korean counterparts in Seoul on Thursday. Afterwards, the two allies said they would coordinate their approaches to North Korea as the Biden administration completes its policy review in the next few weeks. Washington said it had been trying to establish a diplomatic channel since last month, but that North Korea had not responded.
North Korea’s Deputy Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui said on Thursday that North Korea had no need to respond to “the” US delay period “and that dialogue would only be possible after the United States his ‘ended hostile policies’. ”
During his trial in Malaysia, Mr. Mun, who is in his fifties, denies money laundering or has issued fraudulent documents to support illegal shipments to his homeland. His lawyer calls him “a pawn caught in the rivalry between the US and North Korea.”