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Category: Southeast Asia

April 3, 2008

North Korea Violates UNSCR 1718 Again

The resolution, passed after North Korea’s diplomatically successful and technologically marginal nuclear test, prohibits the North from trading in major weapons systems. Reuters reports that for the last year, since North Korea restored diplomatic relations with Burma, North Korea has been selling its fellow tyrannical ChiCom satellite rocket launchers of “the same type as those deployed near the demilitarised zone.” It’s now fodder for popular satire that Kim Jong Il doesn’t really care what the U.N. prohibits, but still, for...

Categories "United" Nations/NK Military/Southeast Asia
February 25, 2008

N. Korean Refugees Arrested in Thailand

Two Thais have been arrested for allegedly helping 14 North Koreans to illegally enter Thailand’s northern border town Chiang Saen, local police said Monday. Nikom Chaikul, 36, was arrested last Thursday when he was driving a minibus carrying eight North Koreans — four men and four women aged 19 to 66 — heading to Chiang Saen, according to marine police in Chiang Saen. [Kyodo] The fourteen North Koreans were charged with illegal entry. President Lee’s rhetoric about refugees and human...

Categories Refugees/Southeast Asia
December 12, 2007

House passes Burma sanctions bill

I had given up on the idea that this would ever happen.  Kudos for Tom Lantos: The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill on Tuesday blocking imports of Myanmar rubies and removing tax credits for U.S. firms investing in the military-ruled Southeast Asian country. The Block Burmese JADE (Junta’s Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act, drafted after Myanmar’s suppression of pro-democracy protests in September, was approved as the junta rejected a U.N. report putting the death toll from that crackdown at 31....

Categories Southeast Asia
December 7, 2007

Daewoo proudly announces Burma deal, complete absence of business ethics

I suppose, by now, we shouldn’t be surprised that South Korean companies find no regime too murderous or repugnant to do business with, and given the celebratory “tae-han-min-guk” tone this article, South Korean consumers probably won’t object to Daewoo pimping natural gas for the Burmese junta.  I doubt we’ll even hear from our old friend Assemblyman Im Jung In, who briefly halted his support for Kim Jong Il’s agents in the South to denounce Burma’s slightly less horrid atrocities. I...

Categories Human Rights/Southeast Asia
October 20, 2007

Fighting Hard Power With Soft: Sanctions, Iran, and Burma

Burma’s generals, confident that they have reestablished the rule of terror, have just relaxed their  curfews and bans on public assemblies.  It’s exceedingly depressing to write about yet another ongoing atrocity that no one has the courage or vision to really fight, and Burma is another of those atrocities.  If the Administration thinks that modest sanctions like these will end the slaughter, it’s fooling no one: The president directed the government to freeze any U.S.-controlled assets held by 11 senior...

Categories Iran/Southeast Asia/Uncategorized
September 24, 2007

The Rangoon Autumn

Updates below: 9/21:   Original post, background of the protests.  9/22:  Monks  march to  Aung San Suu Syi’s home in record downpour; 10,000 protest in Mandalay. 9/23:  Protests hit 8 cities; Rangoon turnout at 20,000; World leaders speak out against use of force to quell protests, but the U.N. is silent. 9/24:  Rangoon protests draw 100,000; Their hold on power seriously threatened, junta generals threaten to use force; Bush  to announce new sanctions  before U.N. General Assembly; Burmese entertainers join the opposition....

Categories Democracy/Southeast Asia
September 9, 2007

Burma’s Fighting Monks Battle the Generals’ Thugs

Far away and out of notice of the international press, one of the bravest and unlikeliest acts of defiance of recent times has been playing itself out in Central Burma.  And as is so often the case, the spark for political dissent is economic hardship — in this case, a rise in fuel prices: BANGKOK–A standoff between Burmese authorities and hundreds of Buddhist monks in the central city of Pakokku has ended with the release of 13 officials taken hostage...

Categories Southeast Asia
April 26, 2007

Anju Links for 26 April: Who’s Afraid of Victor Cha, and the Sexual Psychology of Military Parades

*   It has now been 13 days since April 13th, the day North Korea was supposed to have shut down the Yongbyon reactor, begun discussions on the full extent of its nuclear weapons and programs, invited in U.N. inspectors, and rejoined six-party talks (to include actually talking).  North Korea has (surprise!) broken every one of those agreements.  Victor Cha has since reportedly warned them that our patience is limited.  So in Pyongyang they ask …. *   Or Else,...

Categories Abductions/America/Japan & Korea/Refugees/Six-Party Talks/Southeast Asia/Terrorism (NK)/Terrorism/Iraq/WMD
April 25, 2007

400 N. Korean Refugees on Hunger Strike in Thai Jail

Roughly 80% of the refugees — 314 to be exact — are women. The refugees, arrested by Thai police over the last three months, face almost certain death if sent back to North Korea. They are demanding that they be allowed to travel to South Korea. An NGO representative accuses South Korea of failing to help them: However, “For whatever the reason, the South Korean government is not bringing these refugees who have been waiting for release even though the...

Categories Refugees/Southeast Asia
April 23, 2007

Anju Links for 23 April 2007

*   The Ides of April.   I’ve previously blogged about the replacement of Premier  Pak Pong Ju with Kim Yong Il.  Now, we learn that Kim Kyok-Sik is taking over as the new “military first,” to borrow a tired  expression,  which technically makes him second only to Korigula himself (ht: Richardson).  Two other old party hacks have gone off to that Eternal Party Congress chaired by Mephistopheles himself, or soon will:  Foreign Minister  Paek Nam-Sun  and Marshall Cho Myong-Rok.  All...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Diplomacy/Drugs & N Korea/Korean Society/Kremlinology/Money Laundering/Six-Party Talks/Southeast Asia/Uncategorized/WMD
April 4, 2007

Thailand and Laos Planning Mass Repatriations of N. Korean Refugees

[Update:   Please click the comment link, look for the “Digg” link at the bottom of the post,  and Digg.  The e-mail address of the Thai  Embassy is info@thaiembdc.org.]   Two e-mail messages in as many days convey some very bad news about North Korean refugees in two Southeast Asian nations, Thailand and Laos.  Both nations, apparently seeing no U.S. objection and a new U.S. disinterest in the subject of human rights for North Koreans generally, are catching refugees and...

Categories Human Rights/Refugees/Southeast Asia
January 12, 2007

What Unites These Nations?

ASEAN says it wants to become a more robust organization with more “teeth.”   Think they can do it?  Maybe this is a clue: The 10 leaders, whose members range from an absolute monarchy and military juntas to parliamentary democracies and one-party communist states, have agreed to start drafting a charter that would give ASEAN a legal basis for the first time since it was founded at the height of the Vietnam war nearly 40 years ago. I wonder what...

Categories Southeast Asia
January 7, 2007

N. Korean Freedom Coalition Protests Thai Generals’ Pact With China’s Inhumanity

You may recall my previous post about the decision of the Thai military government to launch an “offensive” against North Korean refugees crossing into Thailand after a long and dangerous journey through China. The decision, by a government run by a military junta, reverses what had been the most humane policy in an undemocratic region. As is often true, democracy was only the first casualty; humanity soon became the next casualty. The generals’ decision comes despite the fact that the...

Categories "United" Nations/China/Human Rights/Refugees/Southeast Asia
December 20, 2006

Bangkok Post: Thai Military Gov’t Orders ‘Offensive’ Against N. Korean Refugees

Thanks to a reader for forwarding this.  Chiang Rai _ Immigration authorities in the North are going on the offensive to try to stem the influx of North Korean migrants by tipping off China where the migrants are hiding before they enter Thailand illegally. Pol Col Jessada Yaisoon, the immigration checkpoint chief for Mae Sai district, said immigration officers would use more pro-active measures which necessitate approaching China, the ”upstream country” of the problem. The government has been alarmed by...

Categories China/China & Korea/Human Rights/Refugees/Southeast Asia
December 1, 2006

N. Korean Refugees Continue Flooding Into Thailand

Thailand is annoyed, and has just sentenced dozens more to short jail terms for illegal border crossing.  This from Reuters and the Bangkok Post, dated November 30, 2006. The Foreign Ministry complained yesterday that local and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) were hampering Thailand ‘s efforts to prevent illegal entry by North Korean defectors. The ministry’s complaint came after police rounded up 59 North Koreans in Pathum Thani province on Tuesday, the third mass arrest in four months. The UNHCR, which...

Categories Refugees/Southeast Asia