WASHINGTON, July 21 (Yonhap) -- The United States said Wednesday it will blacklist more North Korean entities and individuals within two weeks to cut off money flowing to its leaders through the trafficking of weapons of mass destruction and counterfeit and luxury goods in violation of U.N. resolutions."We'll have more to say on the specific steps that will be taken in the next couple of weeks," State Department spokesman, Philip Crowley, said. "There will be additional State and Treasury designations of entities and individuals supporting proliferation, subjecting them to an asset freeze; new efforts with key governments to stop DPRK trading companies engaged in illicit activities from operating in those countries and prevent their banks from facilitating these companies' illicit transactions."
Crowley said that the U.S. will not only use existing measures like the Patriot Act, which "gives us the ability to go after known North Korean counterfeiting in money," but also establish "new executive authorities."
"It is to interrupt programs and funding that enable them to conduct these illicit activities: conventional arms exports; counterfeiting; drug trafficking," he said.
Crowley was following up on remarks by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who said earlier in the day that Washington will impose new financial sanctions on North Korea in response to the North's torpedoeing of a South Korean warship. The steps also are intended to press the impoverished nation to abandon its ambitions for nuclear and missile programs.
Clinton took note of Washington's freezing of more than US$25 million in North Korean accounts in Banco Delta Asia in 2005. The U.S. designated the Macau bank as an entity suspected of helping North Korea launder money it earned by circulating counterfeit $100 bills called supernotes.
"We did get some action from the North Koreans as a result of these steps that were taken at that time," she said. Clinton is currently in Seoul to attend the two-plus-two talks with Defense Secretary Robert Gates and their South Korean counterparts, as part of her weeklong tour of South Korea, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Vietnam.
A diplomatic source here, however, said, "I don't think Washington will single out any one foreign bank, like they did to the Banco Delta Asia. I understand they are coming up with general guidelines for financial sanctions on North Korea."
The U.S. lifted the freeze in early 2007 to entice the North to come back to the six-party talks. Washington officials have said the freeze effectively cut off Pyongyang's access to the international financial system and dealt the nation a devastating blow.
Scores of North Korean entities and individuals are already blacklisted.
North Korea, however, has been evading U.N. sanctions, Crowley said. "North Korean entities are adapting to the existing actions that we have been taking," the spokesman said, noting "the abuse of diplomatic privileges" involving North Korean diplomats "convicted of smuggling cigarettes, I believe, through diplomatic channels" in Sweden recently.
"North Korea in turn has adapted their networks, created front companies, entities in various countries," he said. "They look to see which countries have been effectively complying in enforcing U.N. Security Council resolutions."
Crowley urged China to do more in effective implementation of the U.N. sanctions. "In some cases we're seeing that on the surface it appears to be legitimate trade, but beneath the surface there's an illicit activity that supports the programs that are in fact sanctioned under U.N. Security Council resolutions," he said.