Anju Links for 16 April 2007

*  My latest K-blog discovery is “Six Happy Feet,” a superb photoblog with a great  name.  You’ll want to put this one on your blogrolls.  It’s hard to read  it without concluding that this is just a genuinely nice family.

*   A Nation’s Conscience.   Some South Koreans are demanding freedom for those North Korean refugees in Laos — the ones the South Korean government refused to help. 

*   Heal Thyself, Part 1.   I can understand why the Chosun Ilbo might have its own tribal reasons for making Japan’s leaders sound like the greatest threat to world peace since Brecht and Weil fled the Berlin theater district  one step ahead of the Gestapo.  Still, you have to wonder how many South Koreans realize that Japan’s rearmament is the direct result of  their own government  helping North Korea become the bull in this Noritake shop.  Outside of the alternative universe that is Korea’s perception of Japan, history will attribute the coming East Asian arms race to Roh Moo Hyun, who couldn’t even manage a sustained reduction in  his largesse  to Kim Jong Il after the latter tested missiles and a nuke.  Not yet, anyway ….

*   Heal Thyself, Part 2.   We’ve already heard some make the spurious accusation that the FTA would “brainwash” South Koreans with American movies.  Now, a legislator — from the supposedly pro-U.S. GNP, no less —  sees an evil Yankee plot  to control the  Internet:

An opposition lawmaker on Monday warned that the free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States will greatly limit the Internet use of South Koreans due to excessive protection of the intellectual property rights of online contents.

“The U.S. is the information provider for 40 percent of the contents worldwide, while South Korea is rather an information demander,” said Rep. Kim Young-sun of the main opposition Grand National Party (GNP) during a plenary session of the parliamentary committee for science and technology policy.  [Yonhap]

If you want to  understand the greatest threat to Korea’s Internet freedom, just ask Gerry Bevers, or the boys in the Ministry of Information and Communications.

*    Plan B?   If, as seems likely, North Korea fails to comply with its part of Agreed Framework 2.0, what consequences will it face?  Few. South Korea is now saying it will halt a shipment of rice it had promised the North.  Ordinarily, I would oppose linking humanitarian aid to the actions of the North Korean regime, but we  have a  pretty good idea  that South Korea’s rice aid  isn’t going to those in greatest need.  More interestingly, South Korea has cancelled a contract for 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil, which was to be delivered as a “coordinated” step with the North’s shutdown of Yongbyon.

*   Extension Granted.   Chris Hill says,

China has asked us to be patient for three or four days, that seems like a wise thing to do. [Chosun Ilbo]

It pains me to agree, but I do.  We shouldn’t have let the BDA issue into the intial phase of this new Agreed Framework, but we did, and between us and the Chinese, we bungled it mightily.  Giving the North a few more days removes  BDA as an excuse for noncompliance.  I find much less to agree with in this statement:

It’s not for the U.S. to take unilateral actions…. We need to work closely, multilaterally with our partners. 

Yada yada.  I’ll let Korea University Professor Yoo Ho-Yeol respond to that one for me.  Money quote:

if the countries involved run about like headless chickens in the initial stage, the process of actually dismantling the North’s nuclear weapons will take even longer. Seoul and Washington both face presidential elections. They should learn their lesson from the failure to meet the initial deadline and tackle the North Korean nuclear crisis from a position that transcends domestic politics.

*   In other news, the  Russian partner is blaming America  for all of this.

*   Is Compliance Too Much to Ask?   Recently, Kathreb argued  that no one  should be  in any big rush to meet the denuclearization deadlines of Agreed Framework 2.O, and that perhaps the 60-day deadline the North Koreans agreed to was really too short.  (Tong Kim, probably knowing more about the technical aspects than me, says otherwise.)   Kathreb’s site is beautifully designed and well written.  That said, I disagree with  almost everything Kathreb writes, I commented in opposition to that argument, and Kathreb has since responded:

However, when I argue that 60 days is too short a time, I do not refer to the matter of flicking a switch. I am referring to the process of ‘negotiation – agreement – implementation’. I also factor in time to counter and respond to the delaying tactics of the DPRK. I feel that it would be remiss not to do so because I think we can find no (or few) examples of when the DPRK has proceeded from negotiation to agreement to implementation in a prompt manner and in the spirit of good will. I said one year only as a ball park figure and would happily take counter responses that another time period, longer than 60 days, would be enough time.

With regard to lowering our expectations at the cost of the very significance of the deal, I agree with you in part. Having to adjust and lower expectations does undermine the significance of the initial deal made. But I would argue that perhaps our expectations should not have been so high in the first instance. Having low expectations that are meet might be preferable than having to lower expectations. Having to lower expectations, especially publicly, has the added negative aspect of making the US look weak and/or a patsy to the DPRK’s demands.

So are we now obliged to  concede that all of the explicit terms of our agreements with North Korea are amorphous, meaningless, and negotiable?  Does the United States also get the benefit of this rule?  Agreements on issues  the reach  the heart of nations’ national security interests are  meant to prevent war by giving each party a reasonable degree of security about the other’s capabilities and intentions.  If this agreement doesn’t accomplish that purpose but helps to perpetuate the threat that Kim Jong Il poses, what exactly have we gained?  How does it serve the purpose of securing the peace?

I suspect  that more than a few  of you will also disagree with Kathreb, who is  invariably polite and respectful when disagreeing with me (I like to have some dissent around here —  especially that kind —  so please be nice).

*   Hate Kills.   I do not feel sorry for this man or for the people who exploited his self-murder.  Nothing truly  worth keeping is thrown away like this.  I sympathize with his family, which is a separate issue.

*   Arrested Decay.   A correspondent returns to Pyongayang after a 15-year absence and finds the place caught in a time warp.  Presumably, that’s a far better state of affairs than one would find in Hamhung, Hungnam, or Chongjin, or this dreadful wreck.