The Trump administration has raised the pressure on Moscow and Beijing to isolate the North Korean regime by imposing sanctions on an array of Chinese and Russian companies and individuals it accused of helping Pyongyang develop nuclear weapons.
The measures announced yesterday come weeks after the UN Security Council imposed tough sanctions on North Korea in response to its first two tests of an intercontinental ballistic missile — measures backed by China and Russia.
They also come after an unprecedented war of words between Donald Trump and counterpart Kim Jong Un, in which the US president promised “fire and fury” if Pyongyang threatened the US. That was followed by a North Korean threat to fire missiles at Guam.