Panama’s resident Ricardo Martinelli tweeted photos of the Cuban missiles smuggled below a cargo of sugar in a North Korean ship:
Panamá capturo barco de bandera Norcoreana proveniente de cuba con cargamento bélico no declarado pic.twitter.com/MdWGfbXvVJ
— Ricardo Martinelli (@rmartinelli) July 16, 2013
Material venia escondido en contenedores bajo un cargamento de azucar pic.twitter.com/x1OqI7SOhX
— Ricardo Martinelli (@rmartinelli) July 16, 2013
North Korean ship with ‘military cargo’ held by Panama
Panama’s president says his country has seized a North Korean-flagged ship carrying “undeclared military cargo”.
President Ricardo Martinelli said the ship, held in the Panama Canal as it sailed from Cuba, contained suspected “sophisticated missile equipment”.
He posted a photo of what looked like a large green object inside a cargo container on his Twitter account.
The president said the 35-strong crew had resisted the search and the captain had tried to kill himself.
They didn’t just try to resist the search:
Panama’s search of North Korean ship triggers ‘violent’ confrontation
Few details of the confrontation were available, but the ship’s North Korean crew of 35 resisted arrest, said Panama’s security minister, Jose Raul Mulino. He described it as “violent,” saying that the crew tried to sabotage the ship by cutting cables on the cranes that would be used to unload cargo.
As it is, authorities now have to remove 255,000 sacks of brown sugar by hand, Mulino said.
During the struggle with Panamanian authorities, the ship’s captain suffered an apparent heart attack and then tried to kill himself, according to President Ricardo Martinelli.The crew also refused to raise the ship’s anchor, Mulino said, forcing Panamanian authorities to cut the anchor loose to move the ship.
…
Jane’s proposed two theories why the equipment was on board the ship. “One possibility is that Cuba could be sending the system to North Korea for an upgrade. In this case, it would likely be returned to Cuba and the cargo of sugar could be a payment for the services,” the Jane’s statement said.
Jane’s other theory was that “the fire-control radar equipment could have been en route to North Korea to augment Pyongyang’s existing air defense network. North Korea’s air defense network is arguably one of the densest in the world, but it is also based on obsolete weapons, missiles and radars.”
Ros-Lehtinen: Ship caught with missiles headed to N. Korea from Cuba serves as wake up call to Obama Admin. It should, but I don’t expect it to.
UPDATE:
The ship’s AIS (Automatic Identification System) had been inoperative for weeks, so it’ll be difficult to trace its prior route. The AIS transmits to a satellite a continuous signal tracking a ship’s location.
