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From the N.Y. Times: The Roman Catholic Church and the Chinese government are actively exploring the re-establishment of diplomatic relations, with contacts between the sides warming to the point that the ailing John Paul II quietly received a quasi-official Chinese delegation in the Vatican late last year.

Random Prediction of the Day: I’m laying odds on North Korea not actually testing a bomb–because I’m a pessimist by nature–but if it does, South Korea will say, “How do you know it was really nuclear?,” which we might not, if it’s done underground. Which completely ignores the real point, of course: North Korea is intentionally creating the perception that it is building and testing nukes. The regime that cultivates doubts about whether they’re real should bear the risks of...

Yahoo Headline: “N. Korea nuke test would pose challenges.” There is one interesting item in the article: The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Richard Lugar (news, bio, voting record), R-Ind., said he concluded from a recent meeting with Bush that the president expected other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council — including Russia and China — to join him in seeking U.N. penalties against North Korea if there were a test. China has indicated it opposes...

The Joongang Ilbo reports that discussion OPLAN 5029 contingency plans is on again, but it could just as well be that it’s back to Square One: No firm policy decisions were reached at the closed-door sessions, which took place May 10 to 12 at Yongsan Garrison, according to a participant in the meeting, who characterized it as essentially a brainstorming session. The meeting was titled the United Nations Command Special Operation Force Component Conference. The U.S.-led UN Command invited military...

As I said before, “mercurial.”

Laura Bush in Jerusalem: I realize how unfashionable it has become to question the patriotism of people–even those who openly sympathize with our enemies or spy for other nations–but I question the patriotism of Americans who want Jonathan Pollard to be released from prison simply because he was spying for Israel. Ditto those who wanted Robert Kim released because he was spying for Korea. These men are traitors who were duly tried, convicted, and sentenced in competent courts of law....

From the N.Y. Times: The Roman Catholic Church and the Chinese government are actively exploring the re-establishment of diplomatic relations, with contacts between the sides warming to the point that the ailing John Paul II quietly received a quasi-official Chinese delegation in the Vatican late last year.

Random Prediction of the Day: I’m laying odds on North Korea not actually testing a bomb–because I’m a pessimist by nature–but if it does, South Korea will say, “How do you know it was really nuclear?,” which we might not, if it’s done underground. Which completely ignores the real point, of course: North Korea is intentionally creating the perception that it is building and testing nukes. The regime that cultivates doubts about whether they’re real should bear the risks of...

Yahoo Headline: “N. Korea nuke test would pose challenges.” There is one interesting item in the article: The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Richard Lugar (news, bio, voting record), R-Ind., said he concluded from a recent meeting with Bush that the president expected other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council — including Russia and China — to join him in seeking U.N. penalties against North Korea if there were a test. China has indicated it opposes...

Yahoo Headline: “N. Korea nuke test would pose challenges.” There is one interesting item in the article: The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Richard Lugar (news, bio, voting record), R-Ind., said he concluded from a recent meeting with Bush that the president expected other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council — including Russia and China — to join him in seeking U.N. penalties against North Korea if there were a test. China has indicated it opposes...

Gerhard Schroeder has led his party to an electoral shellacking in Westphalia, Germany’s rust belt and the power base of the Social Democrats. The fear of a split within the ruling coalition or more beating at the polls has forced him to take the “highly unusual” step of calling early elections this fall: Mr Schroeder’s Social Democrat-led government not only lost its traditional powerbase on Sunday, but it now has so few seats in the upper house of parliament that...

Gerhard Schroeder has led his party to an electoral shellacking in Westphalia, Germany’s rust belt and the power base of the Social Democrats. The fear of a split within the ruling coalition or more beating at the polls has forced him to take the “highly unusual” step of calling early elections this fall: Mr Schroeder’s Social Democrat-led government not only lost its traditional powerbase on Sunday, but it now has so few seats in the upper house of parliament that...

Chung Dong-Yong, disingenuous protestations notwithstanding, thinks that his ineffectual low-level talks with the North Koreans are going to make him the next president of South Korea. I sure hope he doesn’t–I mean does–use that picture of himself in his campaign posters. Here’s a prediction on those talks, at which nothing of substance appears to be either completed or forthcoming: when the North Koreans have their fertilizer, they’ll find an excuse to call them off again. In fact, this regime has...

Chung Dong-Yong, disingenuous protestations notwithstanding, thinks that his ineffectual low-level talks with the North Koreans are going to make him the next president of South Korea. I sure hope he doesn’t–I mean does–use that picture of himself in his campaign posters. Here’s a prediction on those talks, at which nothing of substance appears to be either completed or forthcoming: when the North Koreans have their fertilizer, they’ll find an excuse to call them off again. In fact, this regime has...

Freedom House, which won the $2 million contract to promote democracy under the North Korean Human Rights Act, has picked professor Jae Ku to be its North Korea Program Director. My sources don’t know anything about him, but I’ll keep asking around.

Idiocy: The industrialized world’s worst judicial system makes its home in Korea. It places great emphasis on the extraction of confessions, which are a great short-cut to the truth for lazy jurists who’d rather jail the occasional innocent than hit the ground, investigate the facts, or perform a competent cross-examination. Its main truth-engine is a prosecutorial investigative service with powers of lengthy pre-trial detention without habeas corpus (and a few cattle prods, should the need arise). It tends to compensate...

If You Enjoy Reading this Blog, I hope you’ll take a few minutes to oppose government efforts to regulate it. This is a recipe for doing to the Internet what we’ve managed to do to newspapers and radio in this country: overconsolidate control, constrict the flow of ideas past biased editors, and stultify debate.

Dissident Demonstration in Cuba: A great post, with pictures. I’d be disappointed if a USG representative was not there, but I have to say that the presence of the Czech diplomat is uniquely inspiring to me. I’ll say it again: Vaclav Havel would make an outstanding replacement for Kofi Annan.