Taking away Nork leader's toys

AP/NY Times:

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... the list of proposed luxury sanctions, obtained by The Associated Press, aims to make Kim's swanky life harder: No more cognac, Rolex watches, cigarettes, artwork, expensive cars, Harley Davidson motorcycles or even personal watercraft, such as Jet Skis.

The new ban would extend even to music and sports equipment. The 5-foot-3 Kim is an enthusiastic basketball fan; then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright presented him with a ball signed by Michael Jordan during a rare diplomatic trip in 2000.

Experts said the effort -- being coordinated under the United Nations -- would be the first ever to curtail a specific category of goods not associated with military buildups or weapons designs, especially one so tailored to annoy a foreign leader. U.S. officials acknowledge that enforcing the ban on black-market trading would be difficult.

The population in North Korea, one of the world's most isolated economies, is impoverished and routinely suffers widescale food shortages. The new trade ban would forbid U.S. shipments there of Rolexes, French cognac, plasma TVs, yachts and more -- all items favored by Kim but unattainable by most of the country.

''It's a new concept; it's kind of creative,'' said William Reinsch, a former senior Commerce Department official who oversaw trade restrictions with North Korea during Bill Clinton's presidency. Reinsch predicted governments will comply with the new sanctions, but agreed that efforts to block all underground shipments will be frustrated.

''The problem is there has always been and will always be this group of people who work at getting these goods illegally,'' Reinsch said. Small electronics, such as iPods or laptops, are ''untraceable and available all over the place,'' he said. U.S. exports to North Korea are paltry, amounting to only $5.8 million last year.

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Defectors to South Korea have described Kim giving expensive gifts of cars, liquor and Japanese-made appliances to his most faithful bureaucrats.

''If you take away one of the tools of his control, perhaps you weaken the cohesion of his leadership,'' said Robert J. Einhorn, a former senior State Department official who visited North Korea with Albright and dined extravagantly there. ''It can't hurt, but whether it works, we don't know.''

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If nothing else you inconvenience him and make him have to exert greater effort to get the toys that are important to his control of the country. When added with the sanctions on his counterfeit operations that has made it more difficult for him to move money his life will be a little harder. While still not as hard as that of his subjects it will be another straw weighing on his back.