Yonhap News Agency:
WASHINGTON, Jan. 13 (Yonhap) — The United States should relist North Korea as a terrorism sponsor and take other tough measures to punish the regime for its fourth nuclear test while upgrading missile defenses, including the deployment of a THAAD battery to South Korea, a U.S. expert said Wednesday.
Victor Cha, Korea chairman at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, made the point in a statement submitted for a congressional hearing on North Korea, calling for sanctions that target “pressure points” that really hurt.
“U.S. officials should also give serious consideration to putting North Korea back on the State Sponsor of Terrorism list,” Cha said. “The cyber actions against both South Korea and the U.S. in particular should be investigated as grounds for relisting.”
Other measures the expert proposed included designating banks doing business with the North as institutions of primary money laundering concern so as to make them cut ties with the North and shutting down the Kaesong inter-Korean industrial complex, a key source of hard currency for Pyongyang.
Cha also said that the U.S. should urge countries around the world, including China and Russia, to stop accepting slave laborers from the North, which also serves as a cash-cow for the North, and step up efforts to send outside information into the closed nation.
He also called for deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system.
“Though South Korea has expressed reluctance in the past, it is necessary to have a discussion about better missile defense cooperation, including the emplacement of THAAD on the peninsula,” he said. “If implemented correctly, such a strategy could strangle the regime. But it could also show the North that their weapons are unusable and that the only exit is a process of negotiation.”
Bruce Klingner, a senior Korea expert at the Heritage Foundation, made similar suggestions.
South Korea should “request U.S. deployment of the THAAD missile defense system,” Klingner said during the hearing, adding, “South Korea’s indigenous missile defense system is insufficient to defend against North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile threat.”
He also called for the North’s designation as a terrorism sponsor, saying that Pyongyang has provided support for acts of international terrorism since its removal from the terrorist list, including the hacking attack on Sony and a series of similar cyber attacks on South Korea.
