In mid-March, while North Korea watchers were busy discussing Rex Tillerson’s sacking and the possibility that Shinzo Abe might try to sneak in a meeting with Kim Jong Un, over in Luxembourg a European Court made an important and completely overlooked ruling related to North Korea. It was the first significant North Korean sanctions challenge the European courts have yet to handle. And it was the first that North Korea lost.

The case revolves around the EU’s sanctioning in 2015 of the German office of the Korea National Insurance Corporation (KNIC), and several individuals purportedly affiliated