UN Report: Iran, North Korea “Resuming” Long-Range Missile Cooperation
“The UN panel received information showing that Iran’s Shahid Haj Ali Movahed Research Center received ‘support and assistance’ from North Korean missile specialists for a space launch vehicle, and that North Korea was involved in certain shipments to Iran.”
While President Joe Biden’s administration wants to revive the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal, Tehran is reportedly building long-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads with the North Koreans’ help.
Once again, Iran and North Korea are secretly working together on long-range missile projects, the French news agency AFP reported on Tuesday, citing a confidential United Nations document. According to the UN report, the experts monitoring North Korea sanctions found that both countries have “resumed” shipment of critical parts needed to build intercontinental missiles capable of carrying nuclear payloads.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the regime’s military wing, received support from Pyongyang for its military satellite and space program, the UN report found.
“The UN panel received information showing that Iran’s Shahid Haj Ali Movahed Research Center received ‘support and assistance’ from North Korean missile specialists for a space launch vehicle, and that North Korea was involved in certain shipments to Iran,” Bloomberg reported.
The French broadcaster France24 reported the secret Tehran-Pyongyang axis citing the AFP news agency:
North Korea and Iran resumed cooperation on the development of long-range missiles in 2020, according to a UN report that also confirmed Pyongyang continues to violate various nuclear resolutions.
The annual report, produced by an independent panel of UN experts, was submitted to the Security Council on Monday and seen by AFP. (…)
[A]ccording to an unnamed member state, North Korea and Iran “have resumed cooperation on long-range missile development projects,” the report states.
“This resumed cooperation is said to have included the transfer of critical parts, with the most recent shipment associated with this relationship taking place in 2020.”
The report’s experts monitor the multiple sanctions imposed on Pyongyang to attempt to force it to suspend its nuclear and ballistic weapons programs. (…)
In their assessment of North Korea, the experts said Pyongyang “maintained and developed its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes, in violation of UN Security Council resolutions.”
The United States regards Iran’s North Korea-backed space program as a cover for developing intercontinental ballistic missiles.
The “space program” run by the IRGC, the outfit designated as a terrorist organization by the Trump administration, “is neither peaceful nor entirely civilian,” former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in April.
The technology, which now appears to have a North Korean signature, is “identical to, and interchangeable with, ballistic missiles, including longer-range systems such as intercontinental ballistic missiles,” he added.
The axis between the Islamic Republic and the Communist dictatorship is not limited to the secret missile program. Pyongyang supplies weapons and technology to Iran-sponsored terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah as well.
As the Jerusalem Post newspaper reported in March 2016: “Hamas’s attack tunnel in Gaza, Hezbollah’s Scud D missile stockpiles in southern Lebanon, and the Fordow Iranian nuclear facility, dug into a mountain, all have one thing in common. None of them would exist in their current form without North Korea’s assistance and worldwide weapons proliferation network.”
The terror tunnels, build by Gaza-based Islamist terrorist group Hamas for attacking and kidnapping Israeli civilians and soldiers, may also have been created by North Korean expertise.
“The North Koreans have one of the world’s most sophisticated network of tunnels running beneath the demilitarized zone with South Korea. The IDF believes Hamas has used this expertise to improve their own tunnel network in Gaza. For example, the type of cement reinforcement, enabling Hamas fighters to move weapons without detection by Israeli drones, is similar to North Korean tunnels,” Israeli TV channel Arutz Sheva reported in August 2017.
The Communist regime also helped Iran-backed Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad to build a major chemical weapons factory. “North Korea shipped 50 tons of supplies to Syria for use in building what is suspected to be an industrial-scale chemical weapons factory,” the Wall Street Journal reported in February 2018, citing a UN report.
The latest UN report also confirms the assessment made by President Donald Trump’s administration. The Trump White House pursued a policy of “maximum pressure” against Iran and expanded the sanctions regime against North Korea.
“Iran and North Korea have resumed cooperation on a long-range missile project, including the transfer of critical parts,” a Trump-era official disclosed in September 2020.
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Comments
wow. Who saw this coming?
Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, Diane Schuur, George Shearing…
even blind pigs saw that.
It’s almost like these two countries have no one to fear. Curious.
Why to go Joe! Uniting people around the world. Unity!
Biden now Eligible for a Nobel Peace Prize
Or Nobel Appeasement Prize.
It has long been believed that the NORKS made their great leap forward in missile development by raiding a Ukrainian boneyard and shipping several long range engines home. This would account for their sudden ability to field a long range missile with enough throw weight to pack a nuclear payload.
If this is true, they have a finite number of engines available.
These guys can talk all they want but just one step over the line in the sand and Biden will kick their you know what. Just one step.
yes, the line in the sand that he will keep moving until they get tired of stepping.
To add to the ‘bad’ in this article, remember that North Korea has sufficient fissile material to make nuclear bombs. While we worry about Iranian centrifuges and secret nuclear reactors, all it would take is a briefcase full of Nork Pu239 and Iran could have a usable bomb in a week, with their delivery system undoubtedly being a truck.
A week? Does it take that long for North Korea to fly a plane load of their weapons to Iran?
If Israel got nuked, the UN would twiddle their thumbs.
If Israel were nuked, Iran would glow in the dark within a few hours and would be uninhabitable for centuries. Israel is a nuclear power and has been for decades.
The big problem is what would come next? Would the Arab states take military action against Israel? Would this draw in world powers? There is a reason why the US walks a tightrope with the relations between Israel and the Arab states and it is not strictly about oil.
I don’t think the Gulf Arabs would shed any tears. The Persians (Iranians) and Iranians are long-term enemies.
No. No, they wouldn’t. They’d all be bouncing around the room screaming and shrieking with the light.
Delight…
What is interesting is the timing involved here. This got started back in the summer of 2020. Was it due to the perception that US domestic affairs had distracted President Trump? Or, were these international players tipped off about the coming results of the 2020 Presidential elections and their aftermath?