The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has received an exemption from international sanctions from the UN, an official told NK News on Monday, allowing the organization to ship vital equipment needed in the fight against coronavirus to North Korea.

The exemption request was submitted last Tuesday and approved on Friday, Richard Blewitt, who serves as permanent observer to the UN for the IFRC, said, describing it as “a quick turn around.”

All of the shipments will be made by air, a letter confirming the exemption showed, and will also see the IFRC provide, among other items, one RT-PCR diagnostic machine, 10,000 test kits (RT-PCR reagents), 10,000 pairs of examination gloves of different sizes, 4000 surgical masks, and 200 medical gowns.

The organization will provide N95, FFP2 Medical, and surgical masks, with “high fluid resistance, good breathability… with structured design that does not collapse against the mouth (e.g. duckbill, cup-shaped),” the letter added.

North Korea has continued to claim that no cases of the novel coronavirus have been detected in its territory, and has largely shut its borders in the face of the potential threat from the epidemic. 

Under effective house arrest, diplomats based in the DPRK capital are for the most part unable to venture outside their compounds or leave the country, while North Korean media and officials have repeatedly emphasized the threat that the virus poses to the country’s national security.

Cases of the virus soared in neighboring South Korea over the weekend, raising further questions about the reliability of North Korea’s claims that the virus is yet to appear in its territory.

And in the face of U.S. concerns about North Korea’s “vulnerability” to a coronavirus outbreak, the international community in the last week moved to help the country procure equipment needed to prevent and respond to a potential epidemic.

The recent exemption came in response to a request “from DPRK Red Cross and Ministry of Health,” IFRC permanent observer Richard Blewitt explained Monday.

The organization “hope to procure as and deliver as soon as possible,” he told NK News, adding that a detailed schedule for the delivery is not yet known.

Edited by Oliver Hotham