Category: Uncategorized

“Restart of Nuke Talks Is Only First Step” Listening to CSPAN last night, it came out the North Koreans haven’t even set a date–definite or otherwise–for their return. Preconditions? Why, it never came up. And that doesn’t even approach the question of substantive progress. Of all people you wouldn’t have expected to report the best call, the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler did: [A] U.S. official familiar with the one-hour meeting [sounds like DiTrani, no?] and two Asian officials briefed by...

I admit it, I was wrong. I thought it would take a whole day. And the sanctions threat, you ask? That’s on again, too. Yawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwn.

Xenophobia, the last refuge of a despot: North Korea is aggressively asserting greater control over domestic and international communications, apparently out of fear the United States could launch a preemptive military strike on the country, two sources with close connections to North Korea have suggested. Starting in April, the sources said Pyongyang blocked 90 percent of its international phone lines to hinder leaks of information to the outside world. Before April, the North operated 970 international phone lines, but the...

An activist helping South Korean prisoners of war detained in North Korea return to the South said yesterday he does the work because the government does not. Choi Seong-yong, 53, head of an organization called the Abductee Family Assembly, was interviewed yesterday by the JoongAng Ilbo. Mr. Choi said he became involved in his work after his father, a fisherman, was kidnapped to North Korea in 1967. Read the rest on your own. If you missed my recent post on...

Another reason not to contribute to Amnesty International–the terrorist they asked us to help them free. If they don’t see an obligation to investigate the backgrounds of those whose causes they take up–and to be truthful with their supporters about what they learn–they’re certainly revealing much about themselves. After all, they were certainly uncritical in their acceptance of what captured terrorists and detainees said about the United States.

I admit it, I was wrong. I thought it would take a whole day. And the sanctions threat, you ask? That’s on again, too. Yawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwn.

Whether you still hope that North Korea will “come back to the table” and wrestle with us in the sticky-but-hardening amber called The Six-Party Talks–or not–your hopes have been raised and dashed–or dashed and raised. I’m in the latter category, having conclusively decided on the unseriousness of negotiations with North Korea sometime around 1992, which I realize is sometime before the negotiations even began. Today, if you haven’t heard, the latest news is that the talks are off again. They’ll...

Xenophobia, the last refuge of a despot: North Korea is aggressively asserting greater control over domestic and international communications, apparently out of fear the United States could launch a preemptive military strike on the country, two sources with close connections to North Korea have suggested. Starting in April, the sources said Pyongyang blocked 90 percent of its international phone lines to hinder leaks of information to the outside world. Before April, the North operated 970 international phone lines, but the...

An activist helping South Korean prisoners of war detained in North Korea return to the South said yesterday he does the work because the government does not. Choi Seong-yong, 53, head of an organization called the Abductee Family Assembly, was interviewed yesterday by the JoongAng Ilbo. Mr. Choi said he became involved in his work after his father, a fisherman, was kidnapped to North Korea in 1967. Read the rest on your own. If you missed my recent post on...

Another reason not to contribute to Amnesty International–the terrorist they asked us to help them free. If they don’t see an obligation to investigate the backgrounds of those whose causes they take up–and to be truthful with their supporters about what they learn–they’re certainly revealing much about themselves. After all, they were certainly uncritical in their acceptance of what captured terrorists and detainees said about the United States.

Whether you still hope that North Korea will “come back to the table” and wrestle with us in the sticky-but-hardening amber called The Six-Party Talks–or not–your hopes have been raised and dashed–or dashed and raised. I’m in the latter category, having conclusively decided on the unseriousness of negotiations with North Korea sometime around 1992, which I realize is sometime before the negotiations even began. Today, if you haven’t heard, the latest news is that the talks are off again. They’ll...

Perhaps Kim Jong-il can. A far more sensible and rational man that some experts and his own rhetoric suggest, Kim clouds my heart with melancholy by inviting us back to the diplomatic tarpit known as the six-party talks for another bout of wrestling: North Korea has contacted the Bush administration in recent days in what American officials believe could be the first indications that the country is preparing to return to substantive negotiations about its nuclear program, senior American and...

It’s about time. Not being loaded with spare time today, I’ll simply run down some of the coverage in the papers on what’s under consideration. As the above post suggests, it’s had a remarkable solvent effect on the gummy diplomatic gears, which of course is bad news, but probably not substantially worse then throwing this steaming mess into the lap of the United Nations. Here’s the AP’s Matt Kelley: The Bush administration may ask the United Nations to punish North...

“Don’t get me wrong. I want us to do the right thing. I don’t think there should be a policy that permits interrogators to treat the Qur’an like it was, oh, a Bible discovered in the Saudi airport customs line. But when it comes to the revelations of these Gitmo tales, I cannot care as much as they would like me to care. I cannot. Not to say we should treat the Qur’an with casual disrespect. But if an infidel...

Spotted in Azerbaijan.

A Chinese diplomat in Austalia has requested political asylum and offered to expose of list of 1,000 PRC spies in Australian territory. The diplomat claims that China maintains this network for the specific purpose of monitoring dissidents and Falun Gong members, and that its agents have even participated in kidnappings. You would think that Australia would want to interview this man to assure that the freedoms of its citizens and residents are protected. You would be wrong. A fugitive Chinese...

Perhaps Kim Jong-il can. A far more sensible and rational man that some experts and his own rhetoric suggest, Kim clouds my heart with melancholy by inviting us back to the diplomatic tarpit known as the six-party talks for another bout of wrestling: North Korea has contacted the Bush administration in recent days in what American officials believe could be the first indications that the country is preparing to return to substantive negotiations about its nuclear program, senior American and...

It’s about time. Not being loaded with spare time today, I’ll simply run down some of the coverage in the papers on what’s under consideration. As the above post suggests, it’s had a remarkable solvent effect on the gummy diplomatic gears, which of course is bad news, but probably not substantially worse then throwing this steaming mess into the lap of the United Nations. Here’s the AP’s Matt Kelley: The Bush administration may ask the United Nations to punish North...