Japan is considering imposing further sanctions against North Korea, including shipping

Japan is considering imposing further sanctions against North Korea, including shipping, if Kim Jong Il’s government goes ahead with a planned nuclear test. Shinzo Abe, Japan’s newly appointed Prime Minister, yesterday told the Diet in Tokyo that he considered the test, which would follow on from a series of missile test launches in June this year, was “definitely not permissible”. The previous administration, of which Abe was a member, included a shipping ban on a list of potential sanctions against North Korea. After the June tests Japan banned the passenger-cargo ship Man Gyong Bong – which operates the only scheduled passenger service between the two countries - from calling in Japan for a period of six months. A legal framework already exists to extend the ship ban to all North Korean-registered vessels, a threat implied in Abe’s comments and a move which could have serious consequences for North Korea’s fragile economy.