North Korean cargo ships is heading home to the port of Nampo, the majority of it fully laden, after China ordered its trading companies to return coal from the isolated country, shipping data shows.Following repeated missile tests that drew international criticism, China banned all imports of North Korean coal on Feb. 26, cutting off the country's most important export product.
To curb coal traffic between the two countries, China's customs department issued an official order on April 7 telling trading companies to return their North Korean coal cargoes, said three trading sources with direct knowledge of the order.
U.S. President Donald Trump
...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States...
and Chinese President Xi Jinping were discussing North Korea at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort on April 7.
Shipping data on Thomson Rooters Eikon, a financial information and analytics platform, shows a dozen cargo ships on their way to North Korea's main west coast port of Nampo, almost all carrying cargoes from China.
Chinese authorities did not respond to requests for official comment.
The Trump administration has been pressuring China to do more to rein in North Korea, which sends the vast majority of its exports to its giant neighbour across the Yellow Sea.
To make up for the shortfall from North Korea, China has ramped up imports from the United States in an unexpected boon for U.S. President Donald Trump, who has declared he wants to revive his country's struggling coal sector.
Eikon data shows no U.S. coking coal was exported to China between late 2014 and 2016, but shipments soared to over 400,000 tonnes by late February.
This trend was exacerbated after cyclone Debbie knocked out supplies from the world's top coking coal region in the Australia's state of Queensland, forcing Chinese steel makers to buy even more U.S. cargoes.
The other big coking coal supplier that has ramped up exports to China since the ban on North Korean cargoes is Russia.