While talks on the resolution to impose extremely strong sanctions against North Korea are ongoing, the 3rd Economic Affairs, Science and Environment Standing Committee meeting was held and presided over by Chief Chun Hong-tack (Dean of the KDI School of Public Policy and Management) on Feb. 26 at the conference room of the Secretariat of NUAC to discuss “Methods of Enhancing the Actual Effect of Economic Sanctions against North Korea Regarding Nuclear Experiments.”

“There have been controversies on the actual effect of international society’s diverse economic sanctions since North Korea did not change. The limits of multilateral sanctions, such as opinion gap between UN member states and low willingness to implement, led to a weak effect on the North Korean economy,” said Moon Sung-min, head of the North Korean Economy Research Division of the Economic Research Institute of the Bank of Korea.

Specifically, China, one of North Korea’s major trading partners, took a lukewarm position, and this in turn caused the effect of economic sanctions to wane, he added. According to China Customs Statistics, trade between North Korea and China totaled $5.9 billion in 2015.

“The effect of financial sanctions is limited because North Korea changed the majority of foreign fund transactions into cash transactions after the Banco Delta Asia (BDA) bank incident or disguised them as inter-third party national trade,” Mr. Moon said.

Mr. Moon cited the necessity of strong sanctions against North Korea, cooperation between the US and China to form conditions for implementing effective economic sanctions, economic shock at the level that will make North Korea give up nuclear weapons, and incentives to induce China’s active cooperation.

In the debate that followed, majority of the members agreed on the importance of China’s participation, which is the key to the sanction against North Korea. In particular, they raised the need for the Chinese government to block illegal trading with North Korea and crack down on unqualified North Korean labor force delivery more aggressively.