Authorities at the Panama Canal seized a North Korean flagged freighter found to be smuggling sophisticated missile radar hidden within a shipment of brown sugar. 

The freighter tripped suspicions as it passed from Pacific to the Caribbean en route to Cuba.  Authorities attempted to board it on the return trip and it tried to reenter the canal. 

What they found was an octagonal tube hidden beneath a false floor in the hold with the sugar.  Jane’s Defense identifies it as an SNR-75 'Fan Song' fire control radar unit for guided missiles, gear that dates back to the Vietnam War era.  Getting to it was a battle in itself.

The ship's 35-member North Korean crew violently resisted arrest by Panamanian authorities.  The captain attempted to slit his own throat and might have suffered a heart attack.  The crew then sabotaged the ship by cutting cables on the cranes that would be used to unload cargo.  With the cranes out of commission, the 255,000 sacks of brown sugar will have to be unloaded by hand.

The arms appear to represent a significant violation of United Nations sanctions imposed on North Korea.

(UPDATE:  Havana admits the weapons systems are Cuba's.  The Cuban foreign ministry says the vessel was carrying 240 tons of obsolete defensive weapons, including two anti-aircraft missile complexes, nine missiles in parts and spares, two MiG 21-Bis fighter planes, and 15 MiG engines.  The statement said they were all made in the mid-20th Century and were to be repaired by North Korea and returned to Cuba.)