When the United Nations Security Council imposed a ban on exporting luxury goods to North Korea, the main targets were the isolated state's chain-smoking elites, including its leader Kim Jong-il.
While the European Union proscribed “high-quality cigars and cigarillos” under sanctions first slapped on the Stalinist regime in 2006, the US and Japan went further and targeted cigarettes.
The North Korean dictator's access to premium overseas smokes – and his regime's access to hard cash – should have been further limited by British American Tobacco's decision last year to stop supplying its State Express 555 cigarettes to the country.
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