U.S. Treasury Official Says North Korea Using Counterfeit Money to Finance WMD Proliferation

A senior U.S. Treasury Department official has said counterfeit U.S. dollars produced in North Korea are believed to be funding Pyongyang’s WMD programs, Agence France-Presse reported today (see GSN, Oct. 19).

U.S. Treasury Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Stuart Levey said the United States is concerned about the large amounts of counterfeit currency coming out of North Korea.

“You have to come to the conclusion that the counterfeit is supporting the proliferation,” he said (Agence France-Presse, Oct. 28).

Levey also said that China’s help is needed to halt North Korean counterfeiting, the Associated Press reported.

“It is clear there is a shared understanding of how seriously we take such threats,” he said today after discussing the matter with Chinese officials in Beijing. “It was a very encouraging response (Christopher Bodeen, Associated Press/NewsfromRussia.com, Oct. 28).

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