Court Rules that Seized North Korean Ship Can Be Sold Off by United States
The North Koreans will be very unhappy with this news:
A New York court has formally handed the US ownership of a North Korean cargo ship seized for violating international sanctions, the Justice Department said.
The 17,061 ton bulk carrier Wise Honest — the first North Korean vessel seized by Washington for sanctions violations — was caught carrying a $3 million shipment of coal in Indonesian waters last year and later handed over to US authorities.
The court in the Southern District of New York ordered the vessel to be forfeited to Washington and for the Treasury Department to “dispose of” it, an order released by the Justice Department showed.
The sale process has already taken place, according to the US Coast Guard, which earlier this month said the ship had been auctioned in a court-ordered process.
AFP
You can read more at the link, but seizing the Kim’s regime ships caught smuggling and then selling them off is an idea I have long advocated for.
Sounds like a great game. Not The Great Game, that was between Russia and England in Afghanistan. But still a great game.
I love the irony of the ship’s name and what it was caught doing. A better name for the ship might have been the Dumb Criminal. Also, I wonder if we’ll ever know who bought the POS. I have a thought in mind. What if the Chinese bought it for scrap but instead returned it to the North Koreans. Now THAT would be ironic.