Open Sources, December 11, 2013

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THIS COULD BE BIG, even if the conclusion seems exaggerated: Yonhap reports that North Korea is dumping gold in China, and calls it a sign of “imminent economic collapse.” Yonhap says the last time that happened was when Kim Jong Il died, but to me, it’s reminiscent of North Korea’s behavior after the Banco Delta Asia action froze their money. I wonder if this is because the purge of Jang disrupted their financial network. If so, it could be a temporary coping mechanism.

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NORTH KOREA HAS RELEASED AN ENGLISH-LANGUAGE “VIDEO” of the report of Jang Song Thaek’s arrest. It’s a slightly different report (or translation) from the KCNA report I pasted in at the bottom of this post, and the only images are stills. “Dreaming different dreams” actually makes some sense if you add “in the same bed.” HT: Chico Harlan’s excellent Twitter feed.

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KOREAN PAPERS ENGAGE IN GHOULISH ODDS-MAKING on the next North Korean to be purged. Runners-up include the Ambassador to China, or any military officer over 65. The Chosun Ilbo looks at the ongoing propaganda campaign, and speculates that the purge could trigger mass defections.

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BARBARA DEMICK OF THE L.A. TIMES (also the author of this must-read book) has written another report on the Jang Song Thaek purge. The tone of this report is noticeably different then her first take, when she wrote, “The purge suggests that Kim believes he has sufficiently consolidated his rule to take the gamble….” Now, she writes that it “could bring about more political turmoil as the purge extends to Jang’s coterie of powerful relatives and supporters.” I’m a big fan of Demick’s reporting, and I don’t mean to suggest that there’s anything wrong with shifting one’s conclusions in response to new facts or arguments. Both reports are well worth reading.

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THIS LOOKS MORE LIKE A DENIAL by the ROK government that it’s harboring a senior North Korean defector. I hope they’re lying, because I’d really like our Treasury Department to know exactly where Kim Jong Un’s scratch is.

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YOU COULD SAY THAT JOE BIDEN has a unique aura about him. It’s what makes him the bride at every funeral, the corpse at every wedding.

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SELIG HARRISON, CALL YOUR OFFICE. “North Korea may have one more uranium enrichment facility besides the existing facility located in the Yongbyon nuclear complex, a prominent U.S. nuclear scientist said Sunday. David Albright, a physicist and head of the non-profit Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), said North Koreans would not ‘put everything at Yongbyon,’ given the number of years they spent developing nuclear weapons.”

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YET AGAIN, AID IS FOUND FOR SALE in a North Korean market. This time, it’s medicine being sold in a market in Pyongyang. In my comment to NK News, I cited multiple cases in which sacks of U.S., U.N., South Korean, and NGO-supplied foreign food aid have been seen or photographed for sale in North Korean markets (here, here, here, here,here, via former Ambassador John Everard). 

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ORASCOM, THE PROVIDER of North Korea’s Koryolink cell phone service, has a whole year’s revenue — $420 million — trapped in North Korea, says Steph Haggard. I wonder if the blocking of the Foreign Trade Bank in March stranded those assets there. I’d always imagined that sanctions would strand North Korean assets abroad, but the opposite could also be true.

~ 10 ~

THE ADMINISTRATION is fighting for the life of its new deal with Iran, and it may not win. On foreign policy, Congress has entered the power vacuum created by the executive’s disinterest and passivity. Congress will only be encouraged by the fact that the Iran deal is polling poorly (more here). That surprises me, given the overwhelmingly positive press coverage, and the isolationist mood of the country. Americans really must loathe and distrust the government of Iran.