3 April 2009

THE WIFE AND CHILDREN OF NORTH KOREA’S TRADE REPRESENTATIVE in Shanghai have defected to the South:

The woman, identified only as Ri, arrived in Seoul in early March through the South Korean Embassy in Singapore and is now going though questioning like other North Korean defectors, North Korean sources said.

Ri reportedly sought protection at the embassy in Singapore in January while her husband was in Pyongyang for a meeting. She decided to defect to South Korea after a troubling incident two years ago when a junior official accused her husband of spying, sources said. Her defection route has not been independently confirmed. [Chosun Ilbo]

FOOD AID WORKERS EXPELLED: The last workers for private U.S. NGO’s that had been feeding starving North Koreans have now left North Korea.

YOU DON’T SAY: The Hankyoreh is starting to worry that North Korea is discouraging Kaesong investors by taking them hostage:

It will hurt the stability of the Kaesong enterprise if North Korea handles this case arbitrarily. North Korea already hurt operations at Kaesong last month, when it prevented South Koreans from traveling between Kaesong and South Korea in response to joint US-South Korea military exercises. As a result, Pyongyang set a precedent threatening this model of inter-Korean economic cooperation for political and military reasons. To now have South Korean residents”˜ personal safety be an issue is something that will only make employees and investors nervous. [The Hankyoreh]

Ironically, I don’t see how Kaesong can survive the damage North Korea has done to it over the last year unless Kim Jong Il is overthrown.

CAPITALISM DOES WHAT ROH’S “WAR ON PROSTITUTION” COULDN’T: It’s shutting down the long-enduring red light district across the road from the former Yongsan Station, in my old neighborhood in Seoul. During my last visit to Korea in 2006, my wife met a friend at the shiny new E-Mart that had replaced the station. Across the road, other ancient forms of commerce continued as ever, still operating openly right next to a police station. Today, the Yongsan-Map’o area is a hot property in a different sense, and the warren of shabby old buildings that housed brothels for decades is being torn down to make room for luxury apartments.

KCTU UPDATE: For new readers, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions is South Korea’s largest labor organization, and one with a history of violence, anti-Americanism, and infiltration by North Korea and its sympathizers. Lately, however, the union has fallen on hard times with the loss of government subsidies (!), the arrest of leaders who promoted violent demonstrations, and a rape/cover-up scandal. Unmentioned by the Hankyoreh’s brutally frank new editorial on the KCTU’s troubles is the union group’s part in a North Korean spy scandal, but the Hanky reports that the KCTU is more riven by factional infighting and sapped by corruption than ever. Honest unions that stand for the rights of workers — including workers who really are denied the right to organize — are a good thing for the labor market. The KCTU has shown much more interest in the radical politics of its politburo.