How Kim Jong Un Smuggled His Armoured Mercedes-Benz Limo Into North Korea Despite Ban

Last yr, Kim Jong-Un, the chief of North Korea was noticed driving in armoured Mercedes-Benz S-Class lengthy wheelbase limos. Daimler had issued an official assertion confirming that they’d no data how Kim Jong-Un bought his fingers on a Mercedes-Benz armoured automobile when it has sanctions that prohibit the sale of luxurious merchandise within the nation by the United Nations.

In gentle of the identical, the New York Times and Centre for Defense Studies carried out an intense investigation to learn how the automobile reached the nation. Two armoured Mercedes-Benz automobiles managed to make their manner from Rotterdam, the Netherlands to Kim Jong-un’s storage. Both the automobiles occurred to value round $500,000 every. The Times began monitoring the cargo from the Netherlands the place it was loaded onto a cargo ship with none anomaly. After 41 days on the water, the cargo lastly reaches China on the identical ship they’d set out on.

After China, the cargo is then transported to Japan, earlier than being loaded onto one other ship to go to South Korea. This is the place issues get fascinating. A Russian ghost ship, that ultimately grew to become the epicentre of NYT’s investigation, picks up the containers with the automobiles in them and turns off its mandated tracker earlier than it heads onto an unknown location. After 18 days, the ship reappears. However, this time, the automobiles are gone and as an alternative it’s carrying coal.

The background of the ship readily means that it entered the scene to convolute the cargo and assist it attain its required vacation spot. The cargo in query was known as Xiang Jin and had hyperlinks to North Korea. However, shortly earlier than it receives the automobile, its title adjustments to DN5505 with its possession being underneath Do Young Shipping, a shell firm based mostly out of Marshall Islands. This transport firm is owned by the Russian National. To make issues even difficult, it’s to be famous that the ship sails underneath the flag of West African nation Togo and its security supervisor are based mostly out of Hong Kong.

NYT additionally confirmed that the Russian ghost ship was trailing the cargo as quickly because it reached China. Then from port to port, it adopted till the alternate was accomplished in South Korea. NYT speculates that the cargo with the automobiles was taken to the Russian port of Vladivostok for a number of causes. First, the Russian ship turned off its transponders at a coal port close to Vladivostok the place the ships should have been dropped off. Second, Danil Kazachuk, the one that owns the ship confirmed that he purchased and bought the Mercedes with out giving any additional particulars.

Third, two of the North Korean transport planes which have been monitored by NYT took off for Vladivostok and arrived on the similar time when the cargo reached its shores. While this has been the case for Kim’s automobiles, the nation is now suspected to hold out the transport of different applied sciences and gas that will assist the nation construct nuclear weapons.