Gangster Regime: How North Korea Counterfeits United States Currency (PDF; 534 KB)
Source: Staff of U.S. Rep. Ed Royce (CA-40)

On February 13, 2007, the United States, North Korea, China, South Korea, Japan, and Russia reached an agreement on the future of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. In return for a suspension of its activities at Yongbyon – used by North Korea to produce weapons-grade plutonium – North Korea would receive 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil. Further inducements of political, economic, and humanitarian assistance are to be provided as North Korea carries out commitments to declare all nuclear activities and eventually dismantle its nuclear weapons program.

It appears that the United States made an essential concession to pave the way for this agreement. Since September 2005, North Korean officials have been enraged over actions taken by the U.S. Treasury Department to blacklist Macau-based Banco Delta Asia, which had been complicit in North Korean money laundering and counterfeiting of United States currency. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, the U.S. negotiator at the six-party talks, made a commitment to “resolve” the issues surrounding Banco Delta Asia within 30 days. It remains unclear how this dispute will be “resolved.”

The purpose of this report is to examine through open-source material the extent of North Korean counterfeiting to better assess potential U.S. concessions in this area and to make appropriate recommendations.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 13th, 2007 at 3:06 pm and is filed under Asia, Business and economics, Government and politics, International Relations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.