Monthly Archive: August, 2005

The BBC reported the inevitable conclusion on Saturday, Washington time: Talks on North Korea’s nuclear plans are due to go into recess on Sunday for two weeks, China’s Xinhua news agency quotes a Russian official as saying. Chief negotiator Alexander Alexeyev said the talks would break up after a plenary session on Sunday morning. The North continues to deny US reports of a uranium-based capability. Three previous rounds of talks have ended in failure, but this fourth round has gone...

The South Koreans are asking to take jurisdiction over a soldier involved in a recent fatal traffic accident that killed a 51 year-old Korean woman pushing a yogurt cart along a street. All available evidence suggests that the death, tragic as it may have been, was accidental. The soldier was driving an Army truck, and presumably was on duty at the time. Under the U.S.-Korea Status of Forces Agreement, Article XXII, para. 3(a)(iii), the U.S. military has primary jurisdiction over...

The Silencing of Hong Kong has begun in earnest.

Whenever you read that the World Food Program is calling a situation a “food crisis” or “food shortage,” bear in mind that this is how they described the North Korean famine while millions were starving, out of a fear of offending the “host” nation. The reasons for this food shortage, incipient famine, whatever, are also analogous: Mr Morris said the government’s policy of trying to control the economy and the movement of people was to blame for the fact that...

Talks Update: The BBC says “near deadlock.” I don’t know how one concludes that they’re not already deadlocked; “near breakdown” might be more accurate.

It’s bad news if you hold hope in negotiating an easy deal with North Korea, better news if you see North Korea’s self-isolation as a better outcome for the present: BEIJING, Aug. 4 – Negotiators on the North Korean nuclear program decided today to meet for at least one more day in hopes of breaking a deadlock with North Korea, even as discussions began about what might be salvaged if this round of talks ends without an agreement. The outcome...

When so many others’ idea of public diplomacy appears to involve beer vessels, it’s encouraging to see some decent public diplomacy from the commanding general.

George Galloway is not content simply being corrupt, slick, and mendacious. It is his destiny to be a corrupt, slick, mendacious traitor and an abettor of murderers. From a safe distance, of course.

His latest piece in The American Enterprise appears to a be a refined version of this speech, delivered in Seoul in May, and an extended version of a piece he published in the Weekly Standard in June. Read it if you haven’t already.

Koreans and Japanese Are Brothers! Let there be Sunshine over Tokdo! An interesting study here, although I have my doubts about who represents “Japanese,” “Chinese,” or “European” genes. Japanese from the West have a distinctly more “Korean” look than those in the Kanto Plain and further North, who tend to look more European. There are also drastic variations between the peoples of North, South, and West China. The one that would have interested me the most would have been a...

Three Hundred Bucks for a Bus Tour of Kaesong? Someone should tell the Donga-A Ilbo that “capitalism” and “profit-crushing greed” are not synonyms.

On one hand, it’s not a walkout. On the other, five out of six nations (N. Korea being the sixth) agree on a draft of basic, non-specific, wishy-washy principles. China is turning the screws . . . or wants us to think it is. Update: Amb. Chris Hill says, “We cannot have a situation where the DPRK (North Korea) pretends to abandon their nuclear programme and we pretend to believe them.” That’s encouraging.

OK, this officially concerns me, presuming the facts are as reported. Lack of clarity as to how we treat terrorist detainees doesn’t excuse this. This guy was a captured uniformed officer. As such, he was presumably entitled to POW status. The Army trains every soldier how to treat POWs. I’ve personally trained thousands of them. And of course, even a captured terrorist would be entitled to better treatment than this under Common Article II of Geneva. Given the content of...

Is this a walkout? If so, it’s the perfect diplomatic storm. All of the other parties had apparently agreed on a draft statement of very fuzzy general principles. Under those circumstances, even China would be under pressure to abstain on a sanctions resolution, or alternatively, to turn off the fuel spigot. I doubt even North Korea would be that stupid. Update to an update: The Washington Post has more: [U.S. delegate Amb. Chris] Hill, briefing reporters after an evening of...

I’m often taken aback by statements from intelligent people that North Korea should not be linked to the Middle East or terrorism, or seen as a proliferation danger. Typical is this recent comment on NKZone: NK does not have any affiliation to the Moslem Middle East . . . Oh, really? Exhibit A, North Korean technical assistance to the Iranian nuclear program since the 1990s. Exhibit B, a report that Iran recently sold Russian-made cruise missiles to North Korea. Exhibit...

One of my zanier ideas has actually come to pass: wireless family reunions, which have the advantage of an absence of North Korean state minders. A few weeks ago, Mr. Han, a North Korean defector currently residing in South Korea, talked to his family in North Korea on the mobile phone of Mr. Kim. Mr. Han thought it was better to call at night for his family to lock the house and talk in the corner of a room. However,...

From the NY Times: BEIJING, Aug. 2 – Six-nation talks aimed at ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs may be suspended or even break off altogether if the participants cannot settle on a summary of principles for future disarmament talks, the chief American negotiator said Tuesday. “Whether we have a draft that everyone agrees on, whether we have a recess of some kind, I don’t know yet,” the negotiator, Christopher Hill, told reporters here after an eighth day of the...

I’m often taken aback by statements from intelligent people that North Korea should not be linked to the Middle East or terrorism, or seen as a proliferation danger. Typical is this recent comment on NKZone: NK does not have any affiliation to the Moslem Middle East . . . Oh, really? Exhibit A, North Korean technical assistance to the Iranian nuclear program since the 1990s. Exhibit B, a report that Iran recently sold Russian-made cruise missiles to North Korea. Exhibit...