Category: Miscellaneous

Just what does a psychotic despot have to do to get on the list of state sponsors of terrorism?  Since President Obama’s inauguration, Kim Jong Il has — been caught twice shipping weapons — reportedly including man-portable surface-to-air missiles — to Iran, apparently for the use of its terrorist clients; sent a hit squad to assassinate a prominent defector in South Korea; threatened civilian air traffic to and from South Korea; threatened to turn the capitals of various neighboring states...

Good Friends serves up the irony — that, or disinformation — in its penultimate update: This past June 1st, the Pyongsung City police succeeded in arresting 7 people involved in a professional counterfeiting operation. 4 out of 7 were women. Working out of a hidden location within the city, they were counterfeiting travel documents, Pyongyang residency proofs, Renminbi, dollars, and the new North Korean currency. Among those arrested included an employee of the Pyongsung currency printing press. After searching through...

A Fond “Good Riddance” to Chris Hill: “The U.S. Ambassador to Iraq and former envoy to South Korea Christopher Hill will retire from public service and become dean of the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver from September.” If Hill had departed so soon after being nominated by a President the news media liked less, I have a feeling we’d hear a lot more media speculation — or even actual reporting — about why he’s...

Japanese activists have joined South Korean activists and North Korean defectors in that wonderfully quixotic leaflet campaign against Kim Jong Il: “We’d like to punish the Kim Jong Il government by spreading the truth written on these leaflets,” said Seo Jung-gab, president of the National Action Campaign, one of the participating groups. Also among groups participating was the National Association for the Rescue of Japanese Kidnapped by North Korea, a group supporting the families of Japanese abducted by Pyongyang’s agents...

AFP is reporting that two Chinese traders, suspected of espionage, were beaten to death in North Korea. According to South Korea’s Yonhap new agency, which quoted unnamed sources in Beijing, the two traders from the northeastern province of Jilin were allegedly killed during a trip to the North’s border city of Manpo. “We have noted the report. We are seeking to confirm it,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters without further comment. The report said North Korea was...

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...

You know, it’s as if Michael Gerson reads this blog or something: There are limits to the policy of isolation. Given that North Koreans did not revolt when millions were dying of starvation in the mid-1990s, it is difficult to imagine that economic pressure alone will bring down a committed, completely ruthless regime that cares nothing for the opinion of the world or the lives of its own people. The most fragile thing about the North Korean regime is the...

Here’s more on that report of a ration cut in North Korea, which is sourced to Good Friends: The chairman of the Good Friends organization, based in South Korea, Pomnyun Sunim, says this is taking place because the North Korean government can no longer keep its citizens from starving. The Buddhist monk says the ruling communist party issued a directive May 26th that work units and individuals should fend for themselves. He says this can be understood as either a...

So, did you hear about Lee Myung Bak’s plot to kill Kim Jong Il? ___________________________ Sure, the idea that we can punish North Korea for sinking the Cheonan by staging some event at the World Cup is absurd in itself, but hey, it’s still not as dumb as blaring K-pop over loudspeakers at the DMZ. It might have some merit in the context of a broader campaign of subversion, which doesn’t appear to be taking shape. ___________________________ There aren’t many...

Japan’s unendurable Prime Minister, Yukio Hatoyama, has resigned over his unfulfillable promise to close the Futenma U.S. Marine Corps Base on Okinawa. Good riddance. Although the Futenma issue was the direct cause of Hatoyama’s fall, North Korea’s sinking of the Cheonan forced Hatoyama to climb down on Futenma, which means that Hatoyama’s political career was the one casualty of the Cheonan Incident I won’t mourn. _______________ Jay Solomon of the Wall Street Journal writes that big changes may be coming...

Belle, grosse linques for Curtis and me from Le Monde today. Bienvenue! ______________________ Or, maybe they’re just assholes: The Washington Post asks the timeless question of why the North Koreans behave like North Koreans. ______________________ A former North Korean army officer, now living in London, plots to overthrow the regime. ______________________ Bruce Bechtol thinks the North Koreans’ objective is to move the sea boundary south. Although the theories aren’t mutually exclusive, I continue to favor the B.R. Myers theory that...

Did China Refuse Aid for Kim Jong Il? I’ll believe that when North Korea runs out of money for yachts, cars, and glass for the Ryugyong Hotel. At most, they may have delayed it to express their annoyance over the sinking of the Cheonan. This could also be disinformation for the foreign press. ___________________________ China will supply North Korea with cheering fans for the World Cup so that Kim Jong Il can keep his people at home. Remember, it’s all...

So, I suppose some of you probably have questions for Laura and Lisa Ling: ask them here. My own comment is in moderation as I write this. _______________________ We are all necons: Colin Powell says that Kim Jong Il will face the judgment of history. It would have been better yet had Powell done less, as Secretary of State, to defer that judgment. _______________________ In China, that paradise of socialist equality, the price of female human beings is soaring: Young...

To most, a joke; to a few, a nightmare: Did you hear the one about North Korea claiming to have achieved nuclear fusion? Something tells me that my banner image will still be good for the time being. _______________________ Like most things about North Korea, its World Cup team looks rather strange to foreign eyes. _______________________ Another North Korean man has defected to the South by sea. _______________________ The Chosun Ilbo talks about North Korea’s special forces, and the damage...