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Monthly Archive: April, 2007

April 5, 2007

Anju Links for 4/5

The New York Sun has more on the “supernotes” found at U.N. Headquarters  and the investigation that follows. It looks like North Korea will fail to meet the April 13 deadline to shut down its reactor at Yongbyon.  Chris Hill is still  saying he’s “confident” that North Korea can meet it, meaning that he still expects them to.  The Chinese are not so optimistic. Our capitulations strengthen our enemies.  Roh’s popularity rises following a the signing of an FTA that...

Categories Uncategorized
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
April 4, 2007

Stage 4 Watch: Are North Korean Diplomats Going Native?

An order from Pyongyang directing North Korean diplomats in overseas posts to send their children back home has been met with defiance, sources in Beijing said yesterday. Pyongyang has extended the deadline for sending the children home until the end of this month in the face of the diplomats’ reluctance to obey. On March 6, the JoongAng Ilbo reported that the communist Workers’ Party of North Korea had issued the order in February, but no explanation was provided. Under the...

Categories Kremlinology/Resistance
April 4, 2007

Richard Lawless Resigns

Lawless was responsible for pushing the South Koreans into USFK restructuring and cost-sharing agreements, and unlike years of predecessors, had been tough enough to sit down and negotiate as firmly as his counterparts.  No one pushed Richard Lawless around.  As a result, the Korean government and press were not fans.  See, e.g., this picture the Joongang Ilbo printed.  “Hulk angry!” Lawless cited personal reasons for his resignation, according to one official. He will leave his post in a few weeks,...

Categories An Alliance?/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/U.S. Politics
April 3, 2007

FTA Hits Opposition in U.S. Congress

The Economist’s blog reports, After a long drawn out, and highly fraught, negotiation that pushed right up against the deadline, America and South Korea have inked a new trade deal. It is the largest America has signed since NAFTA. However, tensions between the Bush administration and resurgent protectionists in America’s new Democratic Congress make it highly uncertain that the pact will be ratified. I don’t yet know if the opposition will be enough to defeat the deal, but some key...

Categories Human Trafficking/Korean Politics/NK Economics/U.S. Politics
April 2, 2007

Tough Neighborhood

Writing in the Washington Post, Samuel Songhoon Lee relates the experiences of some of the North Korean students who taught him English, including this rather remarkable report: [B] graduated from School 34 a few weeks ago and is studying at Sungkyunkwan University, one of the nation’s top colleges. He grew up a few minutes away from one of North Korea’s most notorious political prisons, Prison 22 in Hyeryung, Ham-Kyung Province, at the northern tip of North Korea. Because food and...

Categories Human Rights
April 1, 2007

FTA Agreement Reached FTA Talks Near Failure: The Death of an Alliance, Part 66

[Update 2: Well, as it turns out, the two sides did reach an agreement, although it’s not clear how comprehensive. Both sides — mainly us — made major last-minute concessions. Talks were ongoing until minutes before the legal deadline. Beef tariffs will be phased out over 15 years, which is a long time. (We’ll see if the Koreans actually accept the next shipment.) Korea also gets to protect its rice market. There’s really only one bright spot I can see:...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Politics/NK Economics/The Fifth Column/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Politics
April 1, 2007

A Souvenir from Kim Jong Il

My comparison yesterday between North Korean ideology, Nazism, and Stalinism led me to conclude that in terms of intrusive state control and deification of its political leaders, North Korea was the outlier. Speaking of deification, I nearly forgot this: (Click for full size) The protector of our race’s destiny, unification [gu-song, possibly N. Korean vernacular] North and South shall bask together in the glow of General Kim Jong Il’s embrace We should follow our great general Kim Jong Il eternally!...

Categories North Korea/The Fifth Column/U.S. Military