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Anju Links for 23 August 2008

NEXT SURRENDER, VERIFICATION?  Sung Kim has been in talks with the North Koreans in New York to break the latest impasse, which could only mean one thing.  I hope he brought enough lubricant.

HERE’S AUDIO OF ADRIAN HONG on the Hugh Hewitt Show.

THE WORLD FOOD PROGRAM HAS ASKED South Korea to provide $60 million in emergency food aid.  No word on when the U.N. will tender a similar request to the Ryugyong Hotel Building Fund.

IN 1997, NORTH KOREAN AGENTS MURDERED LEE HAN YOUNG, Kim Jong Il’s nephew, after Lee exposed the extravigance of his uncle’s lifestyle at the height of North Korea’s Great Famine.   South Korean agents should have been protecting him.  Lee’s  widow  has now won a judgment  against the  South Korean government for its failure to protect her husband.

I’M SEEING A PATTERN HERE:   “Kim Hyun-sik [Kim Jong Il’s former tutor] says he was told that after he fled North Korea, his family in North Korea were sent to a labor camp and executed afterwards. He confesses to such great pain  when he thinks of what Kim Jong-il did to his family that he frequently imagines killing him and then committing suicide.” 

LEE MYUNG BAK CALLS FOR A STRONGER DEFENSE:  I take it this will  reverse Roh Moo Hyun’s plans to reduce the ROK military well below the levels that would be needed to deal with a North Korean collapse, or to defend South Korea without massive inputs from U.S. taxpayers.

IF YOU’RE ONE WHO BELIEVES THAT SPORTS have a significant role in diplomatic and defense policy, you’re probably astonished  at  how little  the N.Y. Philharmonic’s concert in Pyongyang solved.  If you’re skeptical of the entire idea, you’ll appreciate  seeing the South  Korean government showing a little  gravitas for a change:

FIFA have moved next month’s World Cup qualifier between the two Koreas to Shanghai because the North had refused to play the anthem or fly the flag of its Cold War rival, South Korean football officials said on  Thursday.

Experts have said North Korea will not allow patriotic displays from the South because they could undermine the messages from the communist state’s propaganda  machine.  [IHT]

THE FAMILIES OF AMERICAN MIA’S from the Korean War still cling to hope of seeing their loved ones again, and with the continuing escapes of South Korean POW’s, I can understand why.

BUT WE MUSTN’T POLITICIZE THE OLYMPICS:  In China, you’re never too old to be reeducated or too peaceful to be arrested:

Some 77 applications were lodged to hold protests, none went ahead. Rights groups say the zones were just a way for the Chinese government to put on an appearance of complying with international standards. A handful who sought a permit to demonstrate was taken away by security officials, rights groups said.  [AP, Audra Ang]

One world, one nightmare.

2 Responses

  1. [Posted by Joshua at Wolmae’s request]

    Wolmae said,

    August 24, 2008 @ 5:32 pm

    Here are some telling quotes from Prof. Kim Hyun Sik’s article in the Sept./Oct. issue of Foreign Policy:

    1. On the nuclear issue, drawing from how Kim Jong Il felt about giving up nukes in 1994 (I think you can guess how), Prof. Kim observes:

    Today, just as he hoped, Kim Jong Il’s vision has been realized—albeit through a continuing policy of military extortion. Whereas international trade and finance have only played a marginal role in North Korea’s economy and security, Kim has managed to extract resources from wealthier and stronger states by manufacturing crises and generating international instability. His brand of nuclear blackmail is a virtual guarantor of bottomless international aid for the world’s most militarized society.

    2. In 1989, on the eve of hosting the World Festival of Youth and Students, the Kim Duo had disabled residents of Pyongyang evicted from the capital of paradise on earth, including healthy people short in height:

    My friend explained how he picked out the shortest among the large group. He told the crowd that the drug would best take effect when consumed regularly in an environment with clean air. The people willingly, and without the slightest suspicion, hopped aboard two ships—women in one, men in the other. Separately, they were sent away to different uninhabited islands in an attempt to end their substandard” genes from repeating in a new generation. Left for dead, none of the people made it back home. They were forced to spend the rest of their lives separated from their families and far from civilization.

    3. After commenting of NK’s terrorist attacks on SK in the 1980s, Prof. Kim writes:

    The Aung San terrorist bombing of Oct. 9, 1983, claimed the lives of 17 South Korean cabinet members, including Deputy Prime Minister Suh Suk Joon and Foreign Minister Lee Beom Suk. Fifteen more suffered major injuries. A year later, the Burmese government reported to the United Nations that the country had carried out the Aung San terrorist bombing and severed diplomatic relations with North Korea. I only learned those facts many years later, upon coming to Seoul. At the time, I was oblivious to the truth and was busy being summoned every day to rallies condemning the South Korean regime for the bombing.

    Now, when I hear of tragic events on the peninsula, such as the incident in July in which a North Korean soldier shot and killed a 53-year-old tourist from the South, I think of the lies that the North must be telling its citizens. That is, if they hear anything at all.

    Read the rest yourself.