Trump: North Korea Sponsors Terrorism


President Donald Trump has re-designated North Korea a state sponsor of terrorism and said new sanctions were coming against the country, whose propaganda poster above is captioned: “There is no sanction that can break the single-minded unity of our people.” Illustration via DPRK Korea.

President Donald Trump has re-designated North Korea a state sponsor of terrorism. The Monday announcement allows the US to treat the country with special considerations, opening the door to using sanctions and penalties to deter further nuclear proliferation.

“Today, the United States is designating North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “It should have happened a long time ago. It should have happened years ago.”

Trump said the Treasury Department would be announcing an additional sanction, “a very large one,” Tuesday.

“It’ll be the highest level of sanctions by the time it’s finished over a two-week period,” Trump said, adding North Korea “must end its unlawful, nuclear ballistic missile development.”

A day earlier, North Korea’s state-run media outlet Korean Central News Agency criticized Trump’s treatment of the country during his 12-day tour of the region earlier in the month.

“Trump had better pay heed to the despicable plight of his country, the dark empire of evils under worldwide criticism,” the piece reads, “before poking his nose into others’ things.”

The President’s move contrasts former President George W. Bush’s 2008 removal of the country from the list, a move “aimed at salvaging a sputtering nuclear disarmament deal but that sparked internal controversy, infuriated Japan and drew some Republican opposition,” according to the New York Times. North Korea was placed on the list in the first place after the 1987 bombing of a South Korean airliner, according to the article.