January 3, 2012

Consistency or worse

The death of Kim Jong Il, while a joyous occasion on a metaphysical level, has generated little enthusiasm to curb (though I can’t fail to mention that Ban Ki Moon saw fit to lower the U.N. flag to half-staff for a mass murderer who flagrantly defied so many U.N. resolutions). Recognizing that it’s still a bit early to say, all signs point to a dreary consistency, or worse, in North Korea’s policies toward Earth and its various political subdivisions.  Whoever...
Categories Korean War II/Kremlinology
December 30, 2011

KCNA caught doctoring photos again

Yet again, KCNA, the world’s least reputable news agency, has been caught providing a foreign news agency with a doctored photo, and said foreign news agency went to print with it and had to kill it. The alteration is not dramatic; instead, it is so casual as to suggest that to KCNA, this sort of thing is no big deal.  Take a look at the small group of stragglers to the left of the orderly formations along the street.  As...
Categories AP Watch/Media Criticism
December 29, 2011

KIm Jong Il’s Funeral Ride Was in an American Made Car

Source: KCNA via NK Leadership Watch Well if this doesn’t take the cake!   I suspected it, but then thought twice about it — surely even the North Korean higher-ups wouldn’t go against their own propaganda for an event to be watched into perpetuity by every one of their subjects.  Yet commenter Thomas was the first here to come out and say it, and now ABC News Radio says it’s true: …But a curious detail was that the boxy black...
Categories Kim Jong Il/Propaganda/WTF?
December 23, 2011

Lankov and Klingner on NK Succession

At the Daily NK, two of the more sober and best-informed analysts offer some fairly scary prognostications (Klingner here, Lankov here).  I tend to agree with the idea that we’re going to see more instability there.  I’ve been saying that for a long time, but I also expect things to accelerate soon.  No one could have imagined that Libya and Syria would become unstable a year ago, and just look at those places now.  The more repressive the regime, the...
Categories Kim Jong Un
December 23, 2011

Kim Jong Il: Please don’t let him be misunderstood.

We’re still waiting to see who’s willing to print Selig Harrison’s requiem for Kim Jong Il, but in the meantime, there are plenty of tools out there who say that Kim Jong Il was really just misunderstood.  First up is pretty much what you’d expect from the British left: But seeing how South Korea has turned out — its Koreanness utterly submerged in neon, hip-hop and every imaginable American influence, a romantic can allow himself a small measure of melancholy:...
Categories Useful Idiocy
December 22, 2011

So he’s a high school dropout, he has a small nuclear arsenal, and he’s into torturing small animals and bondage porn. Anything else?

Soon enough, we’ll see different narratives about Kim Jong Eun emerge.  North Koreans are already hearing about Kim Jong-Eun’s badass marksmanship, and I suppose we’ll see him credited with superhuman intellence next.  Foreigners will want to believe he’s the next Gorbachev, and trust me, Peter Pan had nothing on our State Department.  I’d love to believe that myself.  And I suspect a certain former Washington Post reporter and frequent Pyongyang visitor is presently writing an op-ed telling us all that...
Categories Kim Jong Un
December 22, 2011

He was a god, you know

At times like this, I do wish that the Korean Friendship Association would enable comments: North Korea says a fierce snowstorm paused and the sky began glowing red above sacred Mount Paektu just minutes before leader Kim Jong Il’s death. State media say the ice on volcanic Lake Chon at the mountain in the far north cracked with a load roar.  And in the city of Hamhung, a Manchurian crane circled a statue of Kim’s father, late President Kim Il...
Categories Propaganda
December 21, 2011

Kim Jong Eun’s Reign Will Be Unmercifully Brief

By now, the conventional wisdom on North Korea’s succession has solidified around Jang Song-Thaek as the power behind the scenes in North Korea, in concert with other key figures who began to consolidate their power in 2009, after Kim Jong-Il’s strok — Jang’s wife and Kim Jong-Il’s sister, Kim Kyong-Hui, O Kuk Ryol, and Ju Sang-Sung. Much has been said about how little we know about Kim Jong-Eun, officially, the Great Successor.  His anointing began in 2009, after Kim Jong-Il’s...
Categories Kim Jong Un/Kremlinology
December 18, 2011

Kim Jong Il Dead

Good riddance to him. Any bets on who will actually run the place now? It’s hard to imagine that anyone can fill the psychological void he leaves. It doesn’t matter that most North Koreans undoubtedly despised him. He was still a tremendous, terrible presence that no one else can be. [KCNA, Reuters] [Reuters, Kim Kyung-Hoon] Update: Here are some posts that seem freshly relevant: – Boldly, I had predicted that Kim Jong Il would die. But we could see this...
Categories Kim Jong Il
December 18, 2011

December 18, 2011

There are a few things I can’t let pass without comment this weekend. The defection of a squad of armed North Korean soldiers — if true, as the compulsory caveat goes — could open a new chapter in the Kim Dynasty’s erosive dialectic. This sort of defection can’t happen on a mass scale despite the forceful suppression of the two fascist regimes that border the Yalu, but it does suggest that when North Korea eventually devolves into something like what...
Categories Anju Links
December 7, 2011

December 10, 2011 – Citizens’ Rally and Walk on Behalf of the Daughter of Tongyeong

From NKnet: On Saturday, December 10* in Seoul join South Korean citizens who have been walking 680km to rescue the Daughter of Tongyeong and her two daughters from imprisonment in North Korea for over 20 years. Performances “¢ Elec-Cookie “¢ Traditional Martial Arts Performance “¢ Modern Dance Performance “¢ NB Crew (B-Boy group) “¢ A Song for Abductees ““ sung by singer Lee Kwang Pil “¢ Answer (North Korean Song Troupe) “¢ Ha-Ha-Ho-Ho (Brass Ensemble) Ongoing during the day “¢...
Categories Activism/Human Rights/The Camps
December 4, 2011

December 9th, 2011 – Worldwide Demonstration Protesting Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity in North Korea

Seoul-based Korean-American activist Kang Hun-Sok, who was introduced to me online by a trusted friend, asks for my assistance in getting the word out about a coordinated series of demonstrations next week. I’m glad to do so, and hope that other bloggers out there will do the same. Mr. Kang’s press release follows: ===================================== This is an international call to protest on December 9th, 2011, 63rd anniversary of the United Nations Genocide Convention which North Korea is violating in every...
Categories Activism/Human Rights
November 30, 2011

N. Korea Threatens to Destroy S. Korean President’s House

So, if I’d been asleep for the last six months, would I awake to find that the whole world had changed? Or would I roll over to see that the whole world was still snoring right there beside me? Via the AP: North Korea has threatened to turn South Korea’s presidential palace into a “sea of fire” in response to any provocation, a day after Seoul’s military held a big exercise near the border. The land, sea and air drill...
Categories Anju Links/Terrorism (NK)
November 25, 2011

Darusman Disappoints (Me, Mostly)

Maruzki Darusman gave a press conference this morning to convey the results of his six-day trip to South Korea. The contents of my report on the event were published by Daily NK  at the time, and are also republished below; Maruzki Darusman, the UN’s special rapporteur on North Korean human rights issues, believes there has been no improvement since he took on the role in 2010, and has once again urged Pyongyang to take action to remedy its multitude of...
Categories "United" Nations/Abductions/China
November 4, 2011

NKHR Film Festival, NKDB/US-Korea Institute Seminar

(seminar info updated below) NKnet is hosting a North Korean Human Rights International Film Festival in Seoul on November 10-11, 2011.  Let this also serve as the official OFK announcement that NKnet has a new English-language website ready for your consumption. _____________________________ The US-Korea Institute at SAIS and the Database Center for North Korean Human Rights are joining forces again for a seminar in Washington, DC, soon: Building a Strategy on North Korean Human Rights: International Perspectives with Keynote Address...
Categories Books & Films/Human Rights