Home  >  Regime Change

Category: Regime Change

February 2, 2010

Daily NK: Angry North Koreans Attacking, Killing Secret Police

The Daily NK is reporting on “an explosion in the number of casualties resulting from popular resentment” of the series of draconian economic diktats I call The Great Confiscation. These include the cancellation and reissue of the currency, which wiped out the savings of millions of people overnight; the ban on foreign currency; and the closure of markets — first in Pyongyang, and if rumors are accurate, in Chongjin and Hamhung this spring. Via Curtis, we have North Korean confirmation...
Categories Resistance
February 2, 2010

Rand: South Korea Still a Military Parasite

Years ago, I quoted extensively from a Rand report on then-President Roh Moo Hyun’s plans to cut the ROK military budget and settle into a cozy military and economic parasitism on the country Roh’s supporters loved to hate. But now that Roh is a fading bad memory, the alliance stands on firm ground again, right? Wrong: The ROK has become one of the wealthiest countries in the world, with a strong economy. Yet despite this economic strength, the ROK still...
Categories An Alliance?/Reconstruction/ROK Military
January 21, 2010

Kim Jong Il Death Watch

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il may not survive the year 2012 and massive unrest is likely to follow his death, the state-run Korea Institute for National Unification speculates. A military coup, riots, massacres and a massive exodus could follow Kim’s death, KINU said in its report. [Chosun Ilbo] My own prediction: I predict with high confidence that Kim Jong Il will die, and that there will be much rejoicing. Also, I predict with moderate to high confidence that one week...
Categories Kim Jong Il/Regime Change
January 15, 2010

We Are All Neocons

Seeing this item at the Real Clear World blog, I could no longer evade the cold truth that Change has come! The American Interest has a good round table on North Korean policy. The upshot seems to be that most analysts think that regime change is not only the optimal outcome but essentially an inevitable one – Kim Jong Il won’t live forever and what comes next could be quite chaotic if it’s not handled correctly by all the parties...
Categories Regime Change/Washington Views
January 9, 2010

Good Friends: North Korea Will Close Large Markets in Chongjin, Hamhung

Just minutes after reading of the sprawling Sunam Market in Chongjin, which she called North Korea’s largest market, my ADD got the best of me, I set aside the book, and clicked on Good Friends’s site, where I saw this: Soonam Market in Chungjin to be Closed in March North Korean authorities are to close down Soonam market in Chungjin, North Hamgyong Province in March following the shutdown of Pyongsung market in South Pyongan Province last June. The cabinet decided...
Categories NK Economics/Resistance
January 1, 2010

Happy New Year (With Updates)

Yes, the recent past is littered with unrealized predictions of upheaval in North Korea, but if it’s possible to know anything about the North Korean Street, then things are clearly changing faster now than they have in the past. Reading updates from the Daily NK and Open News sounds more like the first chapters of “A Tale of Two Cities” every week. In 2009, the North Korean people pushed their country into the margins of Phase V. This year, 2010,...
Categories Resistance
December 27, 2009

Great Confiscation Updates

The Washington Post’s Blaine Harden writes today that popular discontent over the Great Confiscation isn’t going away: It was an unexplained decision — the kind of command that for more than six decades has been obeyed without question in North Korea. But this time, in a highly unusual challenge to Kim’s near-absolute authority, the markets and the people who depend on them pushed back.  Grass-roots anger and a reported riot in an eastern coastal city pressured the government to amend...
Categories NK Economics/Resistance
December 16, 2009

Great Confiscation Updates: North Korea Bans All Foreigners

[Update: The Daily NK thinks the ban is “not news.”] So how worried is North Korea about the potential for more unrest and rioting? As of yesterday, it will ban all foreigners from entering the country until at least February to make sure there won’t be any foreign witnesses to any demonstrations or massacres. North Korea reportedly plans to ban foreigners from the country from Sunday until early February, apparently to allow unrest caused by this month’s shock currency reform...
Categories NK Economics/Resistance
December 15, 2009

Chosun Ilbo: North Korea Executes 12 After Currency Riot in Hamhung

Now that many North Koreans have burned the savings that the regime suddenly declared worthless this month, the Chosun Ilbo reports that public outrage has forced Kim Jong Il to raise the exchange limit to 500,000 won. The decision coincides with the first report of a significant outbreak of anti-regime violence, followed by a brutal reaction: The announcements came after rioting by market traders in the Hamhung region was reported on Dec. 5-6 amid sympathy from ordinary people, sources said....
Categories Famine & Food Aid/Human Rights/NK Economics/Resistance
December 11, 2009

Great Confiscation Updates

A DAY AFTER I excoriated the New York Times for its awful North Korea coverage (well, it is …) their Ideas blog links and recommends my New Ledger post about the Ajumma Rebellion. I prefer to think they’re trying to appease me. =================== NORTH KOREA SANCTIONS ITSELF: So, exactly how much of a North Korean economy is still left if you suddenly and arbitrarily confiscate private savings and eradicate private markets? South Korea’s Hankyoreh newspaper quoted sources in China’s border...
Categories NK Economics/Resistance
December 9, 2009

More Violence Reported in N. Korea

The Wall Street Journal’s Evan Ramstad, picking up on reports of the Ajumma Rebellion and fresh reports from Open Radio, writes: New reports emerged Tuesday of protests and deadly violence in North Korea as the country’s authoritarian regime over the past week seized most of its citizens’ money and savings via a new-currency issue. Open Radio for North Korea, a Seoul-based shortwave radio station that broadcasts news to the North, said police killed two men in Pyongsong, a market center...
Categories Resistance
December 6, 2009

North Korea Completes Great Confiscation (Upated)

[Updated below.] By now, it is December 7th in Pyongyang, and the period for exchanging old currency for new has passed. By filling the streets with troops and police, the regime has, for the moment, managed to contain the “fury and frustration” of people who, robbed of their savings and deprived of food rations, no longer know how they’re going to make it through the winter. For now, only isolated outbreaks of dissent are reported. The people know that this...
Categories NK Economics/Resistance
December 1, 2009

North Korea Revalues Currency, Wipes Away Savings of Millions (Updated)

North Korea has shocked its entire population with a sudden announcement that it will replace its currency with new notes that drop two zeroes from the denominations. The new North Korean currency’s official exchange rates will increase by a hundredfold. The move is causing widespread outrage, panic, and a run on U.S. and Chinese currency. North Koreans throughout the country and at every socioeconomic level are reacting with shock, tears, and anger. According to some reports, people are literally weeping...
Categories NK Economics/Resistance
October 15, 2009

Anti-Kim Jong Il Posters Trigger Massive Dragnet in Small Farming Town

A story sourced to Open Radio (link in Korean) reports that in the small farming town of Kwaksan-Up, North Pyongan Province, anti-government posters were placed on the door and window of the local party office. The posters denounced the top local party official, complaining that in his ambition to curry favor with Kim Jong Il, he had created unbearable conditions for the local people. The posters were signed by a group calling itself “Seo namu dan,” or “pine tree group.”...
Categories Resistance
October 14, 2009

Interview with Kim Young-il, Executive Director of PSCORE

People for Successful COrean REunification (PSCORE; 성공적인 통일ìâ€ž ë§Å’들어ê°â‚¬Ã«Å ” 사람들, aka 성통ë§Å’사) is a small NGO that works on “democratization, human rights and social issues. [They] hope to bridge the gap between South Korea, North Korea and the international community.” They mostly aim their programs, such as essay contests, a one-on-one tutoring program, a summer English camp, and cultural outings, at students, but they’ve held at least one seminar for the public at large (last Spring).  Mark your calendars for...
Categories Defectors/Democracy/Human Rights/Reconstruction
September 30, 2009

Must Read: North Korea Contingency Planning and U.S.-ROK Cooperation

Although it seems to have genetic origins in plenty of other things I’ve read by Lankov, Noland, etc., combining and updating some already excellent works only makes the Asia Society’s / U.S.-Korea Institute’s final product even better. I’ll quote the executive summary and let you read the rest on your own: – Current internal dynamics in North Korea suggest a growing need for international cooperation on contingency planning, led by policy coordination between South Korea and the United States. –...
Categories Reconstruction/Regime Change