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Italian animation company agrees to $538,000 penalty for ‘apparent violations’ of US sanctions on North Korea

An Italian animation company has agreed to pay the US Treasury Department $538,000 for “apparent violations” of US sanctions against North Korea by doing business with a North Korean state-owned animation studio, the department said Wednesday.

Founded in 1985, Mondo has produced or distributed a number of popular cartoons in Italy, including an adventure show called “Sandokan – The Two Tigers.” While many companies unknowingly hire North Korean workers, Mondo executives were under no illusions over who they were dealing with, according to the Treasury Department. “It’s rather surprising that any European company would knowingly work with a North Korean company like this after 2013, much less believe transactions to designated third parties — especially in the US — would go unnoticed,” Jenny Town, director of the Korea program at the Stimson Center think tank, told CNN, referring to United Nations sanctions imposed on North Korea in 2013.

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