Panama finds more containers of Cuban war materiel on North Korean ship

Posted on Friday, 07.19.13

Panama finds more containers of Cuban war materiel on North Korean ship
BY JUAN O. TAMAYO
JTAMAYO@ELNUEVOHERALD.COM

PANAMA CITY — Panamanian searchers have found more undeclared containers
of Cuban weaponry aboard a North Korean freighter but may need up to 10
more days to unload all of the 220,000 bags of sugar that hid the
contraband, officials said Thursday.

Authorities said they are also trying to find several hundred empty
shipping containers to store the sugar being offloaded from the ship and
protect it from Panama's tropical downpours and oppressive humidity.

President Ricardo Martinelli said more containers have been found aboard
the Chong Chon Gang, a North Korean freighter impounded July 15 in the
Panamanian port of Manzanillo after it arrived from Cuba and prepared to
cross the Panama Canal and sail for home.

Port authorities said four new containers had been found, bringing the
total to six, in two stacks of three. They were not declared in the
ship's manifest and were hidden under 220,000 sacks of Cuban brown sugar.

Panamanian police academy cadets offloading the sugar so far have opened
only one of the freighter's four cargo holds, and each hold has six
separate sections, according to the port officials, who asked for
anonymity because they were not authorized to comment.

The first two containers found were taken off the ship and stored next
to each other in an open area under guard by heavily armed troops. A
hand-written notice attached to one said they were seized for "commerce
and contraband of weapons."

Foreign technicians with specialized imaging equipment are expected to
arrive soon to search every inch of the ship and not just its cargo
holds, because the tip that led Panamanian authorities to search the
freighter indicated that it was carrying illegal drugs.

Narcotics prosecutor Javier Caraballo said Thursday that he is not
discarding the possibility that the ship is carrying drugs. The same
freighter was detained in Ukraine several years ago carrying illegal
drugs and small arms ammunition.

Cuba has described the equipment as 240 metric tons of "obsolete
defensive weapons" sent to North Korea "to be repaired and returned." It
included two MiG-21 jets and 15 motors for them, two anti-aircraft
missile systems and nine missiles in parts and spares.

Experts have said that one container carries a targeting radar for
Soviet-designed SA-2 anti-aircraft missiles, and that SA-2s are indeed
old, first deployed in the early 1960s. But they add that an Iraqi SA-2
downed a U.S. F-15E jet in 1991.

Security Minister Jose Raul Mulino, meanwhile, said the work of
unloading the 220,000 sacks of sugar from the 450-foot Chong Chon Gang
is an "odyssey" because the 100-pound bags were loaded in Cuba without
using pallets.

"The technicians have told us that this cargo was loaded in a way that
makes it difficult to unload," Mulino told reporters, estimating that
the work of unloading all the sugar will take another seven to 10 days.

Some access to the cargo areas also was intentionally blocked off in a
clear safety violation, said Mulino, a lawyer who specializes in
maritime cases. He said the crew's quarters were filthy and described
the rusting freighter as a "pigsty."

In Washington, State Department spokesperson Marie Harf said the U.S.
government did not view the contraband weapons as a bilateral U.S.-Cuba
issue bur rather as a potential violation of the U.N. arms embargo
slapped on North Korea starting in 2006 for its nuclear weapons program.

Harf added that, nevertheless, U.S. officials will want to talk with
Havana "soon" about the shipment and that if it is indeed proven to be a
violation of the U.N. sanctions, it would be "incredibly worrisome."

U.N. Security Council experts, who will officially identify the war
material and determine whether it violated U.N. sanctions on North
Korea, are not expected to arrive in Panama until Aug. 5.

Adding to the speculation surrounding the shipment, former Colombian
President Alvaro Uribe tweeted Thursday that he had received information
that the Cuban war materiel was on its way to Ecuador, but gave no
further information. He later told Colombian journalists that his source
had given him correct information in the past.

Caraballo, meanwhile, told reporters that the freighter's 35 North
Korean crewmen, being held in a detention facility, have refused to
speak to investigators. They have been charged with endangering Panama's
security when they resisted the search of their ship.

He also played down reports that the ship's captain tried to kill
himself and suffered a heart attack at the start of the search over the
weekend. The captain went into a bathroom and came out with a small cut
on his neck, Caraballo said.

North Korea has demanded the return of the ship and its cargo, saying
there was nothing illegal about the shipment. and alleging that Panama
authorities used violence against the crew. All ships must declare their
cargo, and those carrying weapons through the Panama Canal are required
to separately report war materiel.

Panama announced Wednesday that it would allow two North Korean
diplomats based in Havana to come here to follow the case in person. But
it later withdrew the permits, apparently angered by Pyongyang's
complaint of violence against the crew.

Source: "Panama finds more containers of Cuban war materiel on North
Korean ship - Cuba - MiamiHerald.com" -
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/07/19/v-fullstory/3507253/panama-finds-more-containers.html