FOREIGN POLICY/NORTH KOREA/TRAVEL BAN: “Congress plans to take up new legislation as soon as next month to implement a ban on travel to North Korea by US citizens following Otto Warmbier’s death after he was imprisoned by North Korea for 17 months.
The House foreign affairs committee will mark up a bipartisan bill that would outlaw most US travel to North Korea for five years. The legislation would ban tourism travel altogether and require US citizens who do visit the country to get a license from the Treasury Department.
The committee will take up the legislation, sponsored by South Carolina Republican Rep. Joe Wilson and California Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff, as early as next month, a Republican committee aide told CNN.
‘We need to,’ said House foreign affairs chairman Ed Royce. ‘People watch these websites that guarantee they can go into North Korea and be secure, be safe, these glossy presentations — and the reality is that many of these visitors end up being used as bargaining chips by the North Korean regime.’
Wilson and Schiff’s bill was introduced before Warmbier’s death, but his ordeal — the 22-year-old college student from Ohio suffered brain damage while imprisoned leading to his death — has added urgency to efforts to pass a new law curbing travel to the country.”
-Jeremy Herb, “Congress readies North Korean travel ban,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, June 28, 2017 06:00am