Japan, South Korea and the United States in mid-October 2024 announced the launch of a multinational team to monitor sanctions enforcement against North Korea after the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Russia thwarted monitoring activities at the United Nations.
The Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team was introduced after Russia in March 2024 vetoed the annual renewal of a U.N. panel of experts that for 15 years oversaw the implementation of sanctions to curb North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. The PRC abstained from the vote.
The new team will continue the U.N. panel’s work, including issuing regular reports on sanctions enforcement. It will also involve Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.
Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Masataka Okano, South Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Hong-kyun and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell made the announcement in Seoul, South Korea, alongside ambassadors of the eight other countries.
“There have been many discussions about how to build an effective monitoring system that can replace the U.N. panel, but even during that process, cases of North Korea violating sanctions continued to occur, so we thought that we should not delay any longer and should quickly fill the gap,” Kim said.
While the allies will continue to seek to reinstate the U.N. mechanism, the team is open to all countries willing to help ensure sanctions are implemented, Kim added.
Campbell said Russia’s veto was likely influenced by the U.N. panel’s reporting on Moscow’s illegal procurement of military equipment and munitions from North Korea for the war in Ukraine.
“The potential for this to be a major effort in tracking and holding to account steps that North Korea is taking across a range of provocative actions is real,” Campbell said. “So this is a big step in the right direction.”
North Korea and Russia signed a mutual defense treaty in June 2024, and Seoul and Washington say the two countries have conducted illicit military transactions.
The new sanctions initiative could monitor North Korea more effectively, free from efforts by Moscow and Beijing at the U.N. to downplay Pyongyang’s sanctions evasion, said Ethan Hee-seok Shin, a legal analyst at the Seoul-based Transitional Justice Working Group.
“Going forward, the like-minded governments should also consider utilizing the sanctions to target the individuals and entities in North Korea and elsewhere that enable Pyongyang to commit grave human rights violations,” Shin said.
