A 41-year-old Chinese national who is in the U.S. illegally was arrested on Tuesday after he allegedly shipped weapons from California to North Korea, the Justice Department said.
According to an affidavit filed last week, Shenghua Wen of Ontario, California, obtained firearms, ammunition, and military equipment to ship to America’s enemy which is currently under sanctions. Wen allegedly hid the weapons and military equipment in shipping containers that shipped out from Long Beach to Hong Kong and then to North Korea. A federal complaint filed in the Central District of California said that Wen, along with other co-conspirators, “successfully exported at least two shipments of firearms and ammunition to North Korea,” Fox News reported.
Wen allegedly admitted to investigators that he met with North Korean government officials at two North Korean consulates in China before he came to the U.S. on a student visa in 2012. Wen remained in the U.S. illegally after his student visa expired. He reportedly said he was directed to procure goods on behalf of the North Korean government because he was “good at smuggling.”
The Chinese national also allegedly told investigators that North Korean government officials wired him around $2 million to purchase the weapons and military equipment.
During two separate searches of Wen’s home earlier this year, federal agents seized a chemical threat identification device, a receiver that detects eavesdropping devices, and 50,000 rounds of 9mm ammunition, according to the DOJ. Wen allegedly told investigators that he believed the North Korean government would potentially use the weapons for a surprise attack on South Korea. The two shipments that made it to North Korea took place in October and December of 2023, according to the complaint.
Wen allegedly had others purchase firearms for him to avoid being detected by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). The federal complaint alleges that Wen told investigators “that he purchased many of the firearms that he sent to North Korea in Texas and that he drove the firearms from Texas to California on three separate trips.” Wen is charged with conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and faces up to 20 years in federal prison.
The North Korean dictatorship has been a major U.S. enemy since the Korean War split Korea into the Chinese Communist-backed North and Western-backed South. Wen’s arrest comes on the same day that South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol declared martial law to guard against what he is calling “threats of North Korean communist forces” operating within the South Korean government.
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In 2023 and into 2024, a record number of Chinese nationals illegally crossed the U.S. southern border under the Biden administration’s lax border policies. Since 2023, Border Patrol agents recorded more than 55,000 illegal entries into the U.S. by Chinese migrants, The Washington Post reported.