22 June 2010
The Chinese are blocking U.N. action against their North Korean clients for sinking the Cheonan, and the Russians are playing dumb and stalling, but I’m sure that President Lee takes comfort that he has the full moral backing of the European Parliament and Central America. The Europarl resolution also “expressed disappointment with China and Russia for failing to take a clear position on the issue.”
South Korea will expand its role in the Proliferation Security Initiative:
“We have decided to join the Operational Experts Group (OEG),” an unnamed South Korean foreign ministry official told Yonhap, referring to PSI’s 20-member steering committee. Seoul believes signing up for the OEG in Japan in November will make sharing information on North Korea, a proliferator of illegal weapons, easier, the report said.
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Congress commemorates the 60th anniversary of the Korean War. Here’s a statement on that from Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (hat tip to her staff).
You already know just how little the World Cup interests me, but I thought this article by Karl Quinn about the possibility of an inter-Korean World Cup match was rather funny, until it ended on a completely tasteless note: “Oh, it would be one to watch, this match-up. But it would probably be best not to watch it from on board a South Korean ship. Just to be safe.” Sorry, Karl, that wasn’t funny at all. Not even a little.
In related news, the World Cup earned North Korea $10 million, which may be some consolation for the thumping its team took from the Portuguese.
Well, well. If it isn’t our old friends from Nodutdol, joining up with the 3/26 twoofers from the PSPD to demand that the U.N. have a more “fair and objective” discussion about the sinking of the Cheonan.
Here’s a cool web page on leaflet drops on North Korea in the ’60’s. I doubt we’d have the sac to try anything like this today.
North Korea is set for massive inflation, on top of starvation. Good Friends reports on the May 26 order that states the proletarian food supply is to be entirely regulated by market forces. Since there isn’t enough food, that means huge inflation. It also reports that foreign trade corporations have been given large quantities of new won, and told to go forth and multiply. This is just a recipe for the total collapse of the domestic currency. The Good Friends report is not easy to read but the “5.26 order” is a game changer.
Please stay with your theme that the DPRK should be back on the list of state sponsors of terrorism. The Supreme Court’s opinion of yesterday suggests that would allow us to ban all trade with, and all traders who trade with, the DPRK for anything. The reasoning of the entire Supreme Court was that, since all money is interchangeable in its use, there is no such thing as clean money as respects terrorists. A dollar contributed by outsiders for schools just frees up another internal dollar for bombs. It could really be used to hurt — when the DPRK gets back on the list.
“Oh, it would be one to watch, this match-up. But it would probably be best not to watch it from on board a South Korean ship. Just to be safe.†Sorry, Karl, that wasn’t funny at all. Not even a little.
Actually I think it is funny as all hell, due to the fact a sovereign nation gets attacked and the international community musters along the sidelines, turning the never ending blind eye to the nonstop atrocities committed by NK. When will enough be enough? So instead of crying about it, at least we can laugh about.