29 March 2010: The Relevance of Human Rights
The Chosun Ilbo calls on South Korea to treat human rights like a serious issue, after years of the opposite:
It is time to make things extremely difficult for North Korea unless it takes at least some steps to improve the human rights situation. “It is time for the highest level of the UN, the Security Council, to step up,” Muntarbhorn said. The Security Council members — the U.S., China, the U.K., France and Russia — must tackle North Korea’s human rights situation and threaten the North with even harsher sanctions to get it to pay attention.
Seoul must play a leading role in these efforts. The South Korean government must undertake a wide range of measures, including assessing the human rights situation in North Korea and coming up with an action plan. South Korea could start by joining hands with international human rights advocacy groups who help sick children and elderly people in North Korea. Such steps will demonstrate to the world that the human rights situation in North Korea is a pressing concern.
Diplomats and analysts of various kinds who treat human rights like a distraction from their nuclear monomania don’t understand that the Kim regime’s nuclear threat and its domestic atrocities both spring from its utter disregard for human life. Diplomacy and drum circles aren’t going to change the fundamental character flaw of a sociopath, but they may weaken the rule of the Kims and empower some transitional figure — or at least someone with a shred of conscience — to push the Kims aside. Only then will diplomatic solutions have any hope for success.
Dear Richard Halloran: I’m a big fan of your writing, but I must respectfully inform you that I have registered the copyright for the application of the term “Gotterdammerung” in the North Korean context. But because I liked your article, I won’t ask for a royalty this time.
Meet the New Boss: Open News tells us a little about Kim Jong Eun:
[H]is leadership and charisma are said to be as strong as Kim Jong-Il’s. His personality can be harsh at times, and he acts cold and violent, the source said. The older generation of North Korean elites are very worried about his personality as he even uses his closest people for his ambitions, just like his father, Kim Jong- Il, does. Therefore, elder elites are anxious about Kim Jong-Eun’s succession of power.
Worried enough to do something about it?
Open News reports that “the National Security Agency ordered public executions of those who are using Chinese cell phones and leaking information.” Because the North Korean people, unlike North Korea’s neighbors, are unarmed and defenseless, this is no idle threat. By way of a grim example, Open News provides more information on “Mr. Chung” (or “Chong”) who was publicly executed in January for using a cell phone.
Hush, Jimmy. You’ve done enough. Incredibly enough, failed Human Rights President and failed ex-president Jimmy Carter opposes sanctions against Kim Jong Il’s regime, and would like to go back farg up every aspect of our diplomacy left unfarged since in 1994.
The North Korean dialect is not as pristine as advertised. The number of Russian loan words is more surprising to me than it should be.
A word about former President J. Carter’s recent public statements (again, thank you Joshua, for publishing them) – Carter is not a hypocrite and frankly, I respect his position – what surprises me about Obama is that while he, too, is a man of the left, with respect to NK’s vulnerable he takes a “different” position…one that I would call unconscionable, for while he imposes sanctions, he refuses to engage with defectors, is silent about the human rights abuses and even refuses to publicly acknowledge the private groups who are doing all the work in helping the vulnerable – disgusting – honestly, I can’t respect his “position” – it’s too hypocritical, to say the least.
I’d say the best thing anybody can do for NK’s vulnerable is hasten the end of that regime, and the current financial strictures seem to be helping. I’m not sure where you’re getting the rest of your info about Obama, Irene.
slim, the end of the north korean regime may well send shockwaves across financial markets worldwide. And that is really unwelcome at the moment because we’re in the early stages of economic recovery. And if Wall Str goes down (again), Main Str will follow as well.
Therefore, it would be my preference if the North Koreans can stick it out for another year or so, and once the recovery is fact, then to hell with them all.
slim, you can be sure about that I’m not relying on our U.S media pundits – better to let Obama’s actions speak for themselves.
Ernst, is that your real name? Too cowardly to admit who you really are?
slim, you might as well attribute Ernst’s comment above to Obama, himself, and I repeat, let Obama’s actions (and inaction) speak for itself with respect to NK’s vulnerable.
Well, Irene, I am only offering a perspective which I think should not be necessarily dismissed. That’s all. If Wall Str goes down the pan because of instability in & uncertainty about North Korea, then you yourself and everybody else on this blog will ultimately pay for it one way or the other. Be careful what you wish for is all I can say.
That’s not really an answer, Irene. Leaving aside the question of why anyone would respect Jimmy Carter in this (or nearly any international*) context, the main action that can be identified with Obama is the tightening of the financial sanctions on the elite — something Bush started doing but then backed off. So while Bush gave face time to defectors and to folks like Kang Chol-hwan, his human rights envoy for North Korea existed only on paper and his chief diplomat on North Korea gave away the store to Pyongyang for nothing. Are you sure you are reading the same OneFreeKorea that I am?
*Carter’s charity work on waterborne diseases in Africa is admirable enough; his amateur diplomacy has been a disaster for 3+ decades.
North Korea has zero global economic significance and exists mainly as a proliferation concern and of course a humanitarian disaster — and perhaps as a transnational criminal concern. Of course, a war sparked by Pyongyang as a dying gasp that embroils China and the United States would be a serious matter for markets. Short of that, I’d say the financial turmoil would be localized to Seoul and Shanghai and relatively brief. There would be positive stock plays as well as negative ones as investors contemplated the rebuilding of northern Korea.
It is bizarre to suggest that the United States wants to or should prop up North Korea until the world rides out the recession — and more bizarre to call that the Obama administration’s policy.
slim, it’s not that simple. The perceived threat to China, South Korea and possibly Japan is what will make the markets shake, and if the situation in NK would remain uncertain, then markets will price this is in for as long as they fancy. It has nothing to do with the economic insignificance of NK – it is the fact that major economic powers face mayhem at their doorsteps.
I never said it was simple. I just said it was bizarre (and not practically or politically feasible) to recommend waiting out the recession before dealing with a North Korean meltdown, which will happen on its own logic and probably sooner rather than later. Right now the situation is increasingly uncertain. The end would at least bring some certainty, especially if wisely managed. Seoul is at least on the right page on this, compared to the DJ and Roh “reality-denial-based” governments. China needs to be worked on more here, but even they are starting to change their tune a bit on the DPRK.
South Korean markets have for years consistently shrugged off all the trouble generated by North Korea, which I grant you has been small potatoes compared to what might happen. It may well be that most North Korean variables — again short of a real war — have been priced in.
Before going further, I’d want to take a look at German bourse performance in 1989-90 and broader regional indexes during the break-up of Yugoslavia and resulting wars.
Gotterdammerung. Hot dam*! Don’t forget to register the alternate (and correct) spelling–Goetterdaemmerung.
The only correct spelling is “Götterdämmerung,” but I wrote that on the Metro without internet access and hence, no capacity to cut and paste the umlaut-enhanced version from Wikipedia.
Did you know that 90% of what you read here is actually written on the Metro? Amazing but true.
Maetro, maestro?
Slim, Obama is affiliated with a political party that has not only been hypocritical but has suppressed information when it comes allowing refugees in our country, especially “zero economically significant” countries’ refugees – ask former President Clinton about his actions (or lack thereof) during the 1990’s.
Pointing out what is unconscionable where it exists is not the answer, as you seem to suggest, but certainly is worth consideration in an uncensored forum such as this one – and yes, I do read the same onefreekorea – BTW, I took note of the amended Plan B – did you?
Economically significant countries on the whole do not produce streams of refugees, not counting political emigres from, say, China, and persecuted minorities from petrol states.
And Jimmy Carter is a luminary of the same party, who seems to want to rinse and repeat the failed policies of the past, and yet he gets a pass from you, Irene. Is Jimmy “not a hypocrite” merely because he is always wrong in word and deed in his pariah-kissing ways? I’d rather him be a helpful hypocrite and do something useful — or else retire.
Bush talked the talk, but unfortunately in terms of policy outcomes didn’t really walk the walk, as they say.
We can’t yet make that call on Obama, but Joshua, against his general ideological disposition, has more than once noted cautiously that the Obamites are an improvement so far on the Bushies when it comes to North Korea. That’s not saying much, of course, but I’m gonna need actual concrete facts from you here, Irene.
And I need a translation here: “Pointing out what is unconscionable where it exists is not the answer, as you seem to suggest”
Likewise, Slim, it’s the translations and facts that are hard to come by when information is suppressed (and censored)…again, I would ask Clinton himself who he let in and didn’t let in during the 1990’s as “fact”.
Suffice it say, there is an unconscionable hypocrisy that exists in Obama’s party of which he is the leader. And, on the contrary, the answer does exist in an aggressive humanitarian concern for the hapless victims of the KJI regime – I quote “Diplomats and analysts of various kinds who treat human rights like a distraction from their nuclear monomania don’t understand that the Kim regime’s nuclear threat and its domestic atrocities both spring from its utter disregard for human life.”
With respect to Carter, can’t one respect the basis on which he/she stands and not agree with it? I just can’t make sense out of Obama’s left-leaning actions with respect to some issues and reconcile them with the NK refugees crisis (BTW, I’m not the only one who feels this way – just talked to a common person on the street today who feels the same way – she said, “that just doesn’t make sense” but feels that she can’t say anything “bad” about Obama or his policies or his party- if you feel as perplexed as I do, then ask any media pundit the same question.
Hi Slim, BTW, I would ask further, just who is “giving a pass” to whom?
I have to agree, which I don’t think Slim represents or anyone should interpret as an endorsement of Obama’s policies in all respects. Obama has done bupkes about making a specific issue of human rights, and Bob King has been a token presence at best.
But if you drive to the root of the human rights problem, the problem is the regime itself and the brutality that’s hard-wired into its pathology, not the number of resolutions we pass or even the number of refugees we let in. We all know that the regime is never going to moderate its oppressive and controlling nature, because that would be the end of it. The converse is therefore true — that the end of the regime is the only end to the human rights problem.
If you agree with me that far, then you must also agree that Bush’s policies and gestures did nothing to advance that objective. To my happy astonishment, you can’t fairly say the same of Obama. Look beyond the ideological superficialities and politics to the things that really matter. By really squeezing and cracking the regime economically — in ways that are probably irreversible at this point — Obama has done something concrete that is likely to lead to a gentler North Korean by the end of his term, even if that’s not his intention.
But of course, he still has plenty of time to screw it up. Hey, what’s one more bailout to our national debt? And never overestimate the U.S. Department of State.
Obama will bankrupt USA. Good news Obama will only be a four year president, like his fellow muppet Jimmy Carter. Both deluded idealogues ; ideologies are soooooo 20th century. Obama lame duck by the end of the year. You read it here first.
Ernst, were you alive from 2000-2008?
The bankrupting America part many may argue was handeled before the guy even stepped into office by his predecessor. Where were your tea parties during the spending years???
And we are officially off topic.
Oh please, let us go back to the days of the fiscal Bush years….
I thought Irene made this officially off topic a while back Joshua.
“By really squeezing and cracking the regime economically — in ways that are probably irreversible at this point — Obama has done something concrete that is likely to lead to a gentler North Korean by the end of his term, even if that’s not his intention.”
Good grief, a “gentler North Korean by the end of his term”?
How much more gentle can the vulnerable be? Where is the mention of the “human cost” of the most gentle (and vulnerable) in your reasoning?
Sorry, I still find a big gap in Obama’s “engagement” policy, coming from a man of the left, who, in my opinion, leaves much to be desired in terms of engaging the “gentle” of KJI’s regime.
Confused Ernst with Irene, satire meter fail. My apologies to Ernst.
So back to the article. If anything Seoul could focus human rights on existing North Korean refugees now living in the south. By this I mean educating natural born South Korean citizens about northern immigrants and how to treat them more “brotherly”. Still it is nice to see the south taking a more ardent step in the matter.
To be clear, a gentler North Korea means a dead Kim Jong Il, and Kim Jong Eun sidelined.
Confused Ernst with Irene? Apologies to Ernst? Boy, you sure do live up to your reputation as gaffe machine here at OFK (and elsewhere).
I have a reputationhere ? I feel so elated. And please describe this elsewhere you speak of where I also have this mysterious reputation. Or how about stop trolling.
Quarrelings aside, Irene I agree with you that Barack Obama is riddled with as many mistakes as any politician, however when it comes to North Korea so far in his early presidency he is far from terrible. I honestly thought the guy would fold to kim Jong Il fast. However so far, minus the keeping them off the states that sponsor terrosim list, I really do not see how you can blast him in such a way.
Why the need to hide your identity, listener? Just realize that an internet “troll” never reveals his identity – sound familiar? Maybe you should look in the mirror and stop acting like the ultimate hypocrite with respect to “trolling”.
I disagree vehemently with the who is “blasting away whom?” As a private citizen, I have every right to criticize our leaders and their “attack dogs”. And BTW, the internet “troll” by definition never reveals his identity – sound familiar listener? Maybe you should look in the mirror and stop acting like the ultimate hypocrite when it comes to “trolling”.
Just who is blasting away whom, listener? As a private citizen, I have every right to criticize our leaders and their “attack dogs”. BTW, the internet troll, by definition, never reveals his identity – sound familiar listener? Why don’t ;you look in the mirror and stop acting like the ultimate hypocrite when it comes to “trolling”?
I’m starting to get the idea that this thread has outlived its usefulness. The comparative virtues and vices of the Obama and Bush policies toward NK is on topic. Who called who what isn’t.
Irene — I’m trying hard to maintain a logical train of thought on this thread, but I need your help in reading and writing carefully. Forgive me if you are not writing in your native language and I am being too harsh on you, but I just can’t tell where you are going with this and what you want done for “the vulnerable”.
You seem to be giving Jimmy Carter a free pass here when it seems clear to nearly all of the rest of us that his remarks in Seoul this week show that he has learned nothing from nearly two decades of dealing with North Korea. I am giving Obama a passing grade on North Korea SO FAR, because the administration has not wavered on sanctions and in fact has appeared to learn from the mistakes of the Bush team. The surprise and relief I share with Joshua on this narrow point is that Obama has rather quickly walked away from his campaign, post-election and pre-inauguration pledges to embrace all of America’s enemies unconditionally. (In the cases of North Korea, Iran and Venezuela, he really had no choice.) In this context, it is good that Obama effectively has no “engagement policy” with North Korea and (so far) it looks that future engagement will take place only on U.S. terms. That’s a good start.
The U.S. refugee intake during the Clinton era, two famines and two “nuclear crises” ago, is not really relevant in any discussion of “the vulnerable” now and is especially beside the point in evaluating Obama. South Korea’s refugee intake (i.e. acceptance of its own citizens, legally speaking) only really started to pick up in the beginning of this decade, the waning months of the Clinton era.
I personally believe that only the end of the DPRK and that benighted territory’s absorption into the ROK will reduce the misery and privations of North Korea’s vulnerable. I would say that the ranks of the vulnerable now include practically all non-elite.
For God’s sake, can’t we give NK’s vulnerable some food and fuel?! And Joshua, why did you post all three posts when only one was needed? Didn’t you get my email?
Sorry Slim, can’t understand some of your drivel other than your very harsh position – on some points I agree, on others I disagree…that’s all.