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Category: Diplomacy

December 2, 2006

John Bolton on North Korea Sanctions

While looking for something else, I picked up this exchange, which I thought might interest you: Reporter: The North Korean — DPRK Sanctions Committee is going to meet today, and they seem to be rather slowly getting up to speed on their reporting and all the other work they have to do, and it’s kind of dragging on for a while. There’s some indication that perhaps some countries might be delaying action in the Sanctions Committee. Do you have a...
Categories "United" Nations/WMD
December 2, 2006

N. Korea Has 1M Tonne Food Shortfall

The U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization estimates that this year’s harvest in North Korea will be 1 million tonnes short of domestic needs. Despite an overall satisfactory food supply situation in the subregion, food shortages and emergencies persist, at national or subnational levels due to natural disasters and civil unrest. In DPR Korea, harvesting of the 2006 main season crops of rice, maize, and potatoes is underway. Lower output than last year is expected, as a result of severe floods...
Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid
December 2, 2006

What Can We Expect from Silvestre Reyes?

Reyes, a Democrat from Texas (he’s the one on the left, next to Curt Weldon), has been picked to lead the House Intelligence Committee. First, let’s heave a sigh that Nancy Pelosi’s first choice, Alcee Hastings, hit the “WTF!?” wall hard. The choice of Hastings was Pelosi’s second major personnel stumble since her selection as majority leader, before even taking up the post. Before he was elected to Congress, Hastings had been a federal judge. In 1988, he was overwhelmingly...
Categories Diplomacy/Washington Views
November 29, 2006

Kim Jong Il Unplugged, Part 15

The United States has leaked a new set of sanctions on “luxury items” that can no longer be exported to North Korea, in accordance with U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718: [T]he list of proposed luxury sanctions, obtained by The Associated Press, aims to make Kim’s swanky life harder: No more cognac, Rolex watches, cigarettes, artwork, expensive cars, Harley Davidson motorcycles or even personal watercraft, such as Jet Skis. Electronic goods like I-pods and plasma TV’s are also banned.  Defectors helped...
Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Kim Jong Il/Kremlinology/Washington Views
November 29, 2006

O Roh Is Me

It’s time for another installment of President Roh Moo Hyun’s whiney, self-pitying Hamlet act. “I hope I won’t be the first president to fail to complete his full term in office. Speculation about his intentions ran wild. The opposition Democratic Labor Party said the president was “threatening the public. Insiders do not rule out an extreme step, saying Roh is in a brittle psychological state. If you’re surprised by any of this, you must be a new reader.  Recall that...
Categories Appeasement/Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea
November 23, 2006

Betraying Sergeant Chang

What else can be said about something like this?  It’s easy enough to blame the girl on the phone, but in light of past events like this,  the more salient questions are (1) whether she was  just following orders. More on how ROK POW’s lived in North Korean captivity here and here.  And  Staff Sergeant  Chang’s pain didn’t end when he escaped, either: Chang Moo-hwan, 79, a third POW who returned to South Korea after the defection of Cho, said...
Categories Abductions/Appeasement/Korean War
November 21, 2006

Minutes of the U.N. Debate on Human Rights in North Korea, With Comments

Background:  The North Korean government government has plunged the world into crisis with a weapons buildup paid for at the cost of two million North Koreans who were starved to death.  The world’s most repressive and belligerent regime has finally and narrowly drawn the diffident and non-binding  disapproval of the U.N. General Assembly.  And even this was highly controversial to some.  The quality of the debate is so depressing as to  overpower the quality of the  result, such as it...
Categories "United" Nations/Human Rights
November 21, 2006

The Case for Starving the People

I noticed this interesting graf in a story about the effect of the luxury  items sanctions in UNSCR 1718.  For reasons that escape me entirely, some people believe that it’s counterproductive to bar Kim Jong Il from buying sashimi, S-Class sedans, and Omega watches while his people are starving – to – death,  some seem so quick to forget. Over past years, U.S. leaders have described the North Korean regime as an axis of evil, an outpost of tyranny, an...
Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid/Kim Jong Il/Korean Education/Washington Views
November 20, 2006

Kumgang Revenues Continue to Decline

Whether it’s because of  the diminishing  appeal of tyranny tourism or North Korea’s sheer belligerence, South Koreans have never been less enthusiastic about the Kumgang tourist resort: Tour organizer Hyundai Asan on Sunday said fewer than 300 tourists now visit Mt. Kumgang over the weekend. During the same period last year, weekend visitors to Mt. Kumgang numbered 400-500. The number of ordinary tourists has dwindled to fewer than 2,000 bookings for December tours, but activist groups have booked the tours...
Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Korean Politics/NK Economics
November 20, 2006

Wobble Watch: Has China Unfrozen Blocked North Korean Accounts?

The State Department is saying it doesn’t know if the reports are true; it’s telling reporters to ask the Chinese: A diplomatic source in Beijing said China has released some of the North Korean money at Macau’s Banco Delta Asia (BDA), frozen after the U.S. Treasury in September last year designated it a primary money laundering concern abetting Pyongyang’s illicit activities.  The unfrozen accounts, less than half of the US$24 million initially held up, are believed to be those not...
Categories China/Counterfeiting/Diplomacy/Money Laundering
November 20, 2006

‘Unlike in the past, it is absurd to call a person unqualified because he was a pro-North leftist.”‘

This is the statement attributed to ruling  Uri Party lawmaker Im Jong-Seok during the confirmation hearing for Lee Jae-Joung, South Korea’s next Minister of Appeasement Unification.  Fine, then.  Is it equally absurd for a civilized democracy to question the fitness of a pro-fascist rightist  for a senior cabinet position?  Does Korea’s left hereby waive all grievances against Park Chung-Hee for his collaboration with Imperial Japan, along with any hereditary claims against his daughter, just in time for next year’s election? ...
Categories Appeasement/Human Rights/Korean Politics/Korean Society
November 17, 2006

Proliferation Security Watch

The AP has a very detailed story on the search of a North Korean ship in the Indian Ocean, along with a nice summary of other searches in the recent past.  In this case, it sounds like all they found was cement. In other searches, Hong Kong authorities detained two North Korean cargo ships in October for safety violations apparently unrelated to the U.N. sanctions. Myanmar permitted a North Korean cargo ship in distress to anchor at a port in...
Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/China & Korea/Japan & Korea/U.S. & Korea/Uncategorized/WMD
November 17, 2006

General Assembly Passes N. Korea Resolution, Continues to Be Mostly Worthless

[Update:   Here is the text of the resolution.] South Korea for the first time on Friday joined other U.N. members in rebuking North Korea for gross human rights abuses, including torture, political executions and miserable prison camp conditions. A draft resolution on the abuses was passed by a vote of 91 to 21 with 60 abstentions in a General Assembly committee that includes all U.N. members, thereby assuring its official adoption by the full assembly. North Korea rejected the...
Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Human Rights