Thailand charges 5 foreign crew after NKorean weapons seized from plane

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5 charged after NKorean weapons seized in Thailand

BANGKOK — Five foreigners who crewed an aircraft carrying about 35 tons of weapons originating in North Korea have been charged with illegal possession of arms in Thailand, police said Sunday.

The men — four from Kazakhstan and one from Belarus — were detained when an Ilyushin 76 transport plane, carrying explosives, rocket-propelled grenades and components for surface-to-air missiles, was impounded Saturday during a refueling stop at Bangkok’s Don Muang airport, Thai officials said.

Thai authorities took the action because of a United Nations resolution banning the transport of certain weapons from or to North Korea, the Foreign Ministry said.

Police Col. Supisarn Pakdinarunart said the men denied the arms possession charges and were refused bail. They will appear in court Monday.

Air Force spokesman Capt. Montol Suchookorn said the chartered cargo plane originated in North Korea’s capital Pyongyang and requested to land at Don Muang airport to refuel.

There were differing local media reports about the plane’s destination with some saying it was headed to Sri Lanka and others saying Pakistan.

“I cannot disclose the destination of their plane because this involves national security. The government will provide more details on this,” Supisarn said.

North Korea has been widely accused of violating United Nations sanctions by selling weapons to nations in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

The latest U.N. sanctions were imposed in June after the reclusive communist regime conducted a nuclear test in May and also test-fired ballistic and other missiles. The sanctions were aimed at derailing North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, but also banned the North’s sale of any conventional arms.

Thai Foreign Ministry spokesman Thani Thongphakdi said Thailand made the seizure because of the U.N. resolution.

“Once further details have been finalized, and all the proper checks have been made we will report all details to the United Nations sanctions committee,” he said.

Local press reports said Thai authorities were tipped off by their American counterparts about the cargo aboard the aircraft. U.S. Embassy spokesman Michael Turner said the embassy would not comment on the incident.

Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban said it would take several days to obtain details on the incident, which would be reported to the United Nations, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

“People should not be alarmed because the government will ensure that the investigation will be carried out transparently. The government will be able to explain the situation to foreign countries,” Suthep said.

Thai authorities said the weapons were moved by trucks amid high security Saturday night from the airport to a military base in the nearby province of Nakhon Sawan.

Experts in Seoul, South Korea, noted that the seizure came days after President Barack Obama’s special envoy made a rare three-day trip to North Korea on a mission to persuade Pyongyang to rejoin six-nation nuclear disarmament talks.

Envoy Stephen Bosworth said the two sides had reached common understandings on the need to restart the talks.

“There is a possibility that the incident could have a negative effect on moves to get the North to rejoin the six-party talks and a U.S.-North Korea dialogue mood,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at Seoul’s University of North Korean Studies.

Baek Seung-joo of the state-run Korea Institute for Defense Analyses said the seizure demonstrated a U.S. intention to continue to enforce sanctions on the North while also engaging in dialogue.

Arms sales are a key source of hard currency for the impoverished North. Baek said the North is believed to have earned hundreds of millions of dollars every year by selling missiles, missile parts and other weapons to countries like Iran, Syria and Myanmar.

In August, the United Arab Emirates seized a Bahamas-flagged cargo ship bound for Iran with a cache of banned rocket-propelled grenades and other arms from North Korea, the first seizure since sanctions against North Korea were ramped up.

Associated Press writer Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul contributed to this report.