North Korea envoy to Egypt could be facing deportation

CAIRO, March 21 (UPI) -- The North Korean ambassador to Egypt could be facing deportation.

Pyongyang's top diplomat to Cairo, Pak Chun Il, is included in a roster of blacklisted North Korean individuals in Resolution 2270, Radio Free Asia reported.

The resolution is the latest round of United Nations Security Council sanctions that passed in early March, and Egypt is a U.N. member country.

A clause in the international sanctions requires compliant countries to deport blacklisted North Korean diplomats, and the issue is being raised at the local media level.

According to a source in Egypt who spoke to RFA on the condition of anonymity, Ambassador Pak was appointed to his post in December 2013, and played a key role in establishing an Egyptian branch of Pyongyang's Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation, or KOMID, which is also under U.S. sanctions.

As a KOMID agent, Pak conducted illicit activities that included weapons trafficking, according to the source.

Transactions with KOMID are banned under both U.N. and U.S. sanctions.

Pak also oversaw the activities of North Korea's Mansudae Overseas Project group of companies, which built roads and a thermoelectric power plant in Egypt.

North Korea has supported Egypt with military supplies in the past, and maintains friendly ties with various countries in the Middle East.

South Korean news service Newsis reported Kim Yong Nam, chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea, sent condolences to the leaders of the United Arab Emirates and Russia for the recent crash of a Flydubai plane in Russia.

Kim, who is in charge of foreign relations on behalf of leader Kim Jong Un, relayed his deep sympathy to the bereaved families of the crash victims, North Korea's KCNA reported.