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Category: Diplomacy

June 9, 2009

Kaesong Death Watch

For new readers, I am not a fan of the Kaesong Industrial Complex, a zone in North Korea that uses South Korean management and capital, and North Korean laborers that aren’t actually paid wages, so to speak, as much as they’re given food rations as compensation.  The idea was that Kaesong would change North Korea’s society and economy — in the original German, that’s “arbeit macht frei” — but at the first hint of that, the North Korean government predictably...

Categories Appeasement/NK Economics/North-South/Sunshine
June 7, 2009

Is Barack Obama Finding His Inner Churchill?

[Update: Clinton hints at putting North Korea back on the list of state sponsors of terrorism, and calls the charges against Laura Ling and Euna Lee “absolutely without merit or foundation.” Does that mean Clinton’s best information is that they were inside China?] I continue to be gleefully amazed by the toughness and seriousness of Obama’s words on North Korea. Now let’s see if they translate into effective action. In his young presidency, Obama has already jettisoned some of the...

Categories "United" Nations/Ling/Lee Incident/Sanctions/Washington Views
June 5, 2009

Obama Gears Up for “Plan B;” John Kerry Blocks Terror Re-Listing

I really don’t know what to make of this.  A young, inexperienced president, one whom the North Koreans arguably endorsed, comes into office showing every sign of being easier meat than Lance Bass in Riker’s Island.  The North Koreans, true to Joe Biden’s prophetic gaffe, and with their exquisite sensitivity to American weakness, don’t even let the man get inaugurated before they begin the noisy repudiation of every agreed framework, U.N. resolution, and armistice they can stuff into a shredder....

Categories "United" Nations/China/Counterfeiting/Money Laundering/NK Crime/NK Economics/Proliferation/Sanctions/U.S. Politics
June 1, 2009

SecDef Gates Not Pushing for Agreed Framework III

Michael Yon traveled with Defense Secretary Robert Gates to Singapore and passes along these observations: One matter that you will see in the press is that North Korea is the elephant in the room. Secretary Gates has made it clear that we have no intention of rewarding bad behavior, as we have done in the past with North Korea. Many readers seem to hold a special disdain for President Obama, and I actively campaigned for McCain, but I get the...

Categories Appeasement/Diplomacy/U.S. Military/U.S. Politics/Washington Views
May 29, 2009

What leverage does Russia have?

Interesting news and analysis focusing on Russia within the past 24 hours. In the past, the Kremlin has relied on China to make the leading decision on how to react to North Korean aggression since the latter appears to have more influence on the DPRK when dealing with the Kim regime. However, in light of the most recent North Korean nuclear test, it seems we are seeing a more aggressive Russia than before, with some suggesting the country is looking...

Categories Diplomacy/Russia
May 28, 2009

Draft Text of New U.N. Resolution on North Korea

Fred Fry gets a big hat tip for sending this, via the Inner City Press.  And what an predictable disappointment it is — it “deplores” the North Korean tests and calls on U.N. member states to finally enforce the same resolutions they’ve been failing to enforce since 2006.  But to be fair, this is still a draft. Feel free to insert your own Hans Brix/Team America clip link in the comments. Update 1: We’d all love to know what’s going...

Categories "United" Nations
May 26, 2009

Bolton: Expel North Korea from the U.N.

[Bolton] urged Obama’s team to first put North Korea back on the list of state sponsors of terrorism following its removal in the waning months of the Bush administration.  Bolton also urged the UN Security Council to expel Pyongyang from the world body as a “persistent violator” of UN resolutions.  [AFP] The accusation is obviously true, and it could be justified for human rights reasons alone. North Korea has also consistently stolen U.N. development and food aid and refused to...

Categories "United" Nations
May 26, 2009

And Now, the Fallout

Kim Jong Il has followed yesterday’s nuke test by firing two more short-range missiles, as a rudderless world tries to decide how to respond.  When you consider each of these developments, ask yourself whether Kim Jong Il could reasonably have anticipated that it would happen.  So far, everything I see happening fits within the range of Kim Jong Il’s calculation of “acceptable consequences.” FOR ONE THING, KIM JONG IL IS PROBABLY BETTING that John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi don’t possess...

Categories "United" Nations/Diplomacy/Proliferation/WMD
May 24, 2009

Dr. Hwang, I’ll Need Ten Copies of Lavrenti Beria by Next Week

Via a reliable source — though it’s third-hand information — I’m told that William Stanton is still very much in the running to become the next de facto U.S. ambassador to Taiwan (head of the American Institute on Taiwan).  Stanton’s recent comments about Laura Ling and Euna Lee (“stupid,” “a distraction from the bigger issues” — and this to a delegation of congressional staffers, no less) tell us about all we need to know about his suave diplomatic skills.  He’s...

Categories Diplomacy
May 23, 2009

Some Final Thoughts on Roh Moo-Hyun

Even though most indications were pointing to an unhappy ending to the former president’s legacy, I was still shocked to hear the news of Roh’s death. His presidency, beginning with the elections that got him inaugurated, served as a constant backdrop during my time in South Korea, which correlated with his term. I arrived in Korea just after the conclusion of the World Cup. Tensions were high in relation to the unfortunate tank incident involving the U.S. military and South...

Categories Appeasement/North-South
May 21, 2009

Smart, Tough Diplomacy: Hillary Clinton Asks Bloggers to Free U.S. Journalists from North Korea

Because if there’s one thing Kim Jong Il simply cannot withstand, it’s that lethal instrument of soft power known as “snark:” US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday urged women students to use the Internet to campaign for the release of two American women journalists held in North Korea. Clinton urged graduates of Barnard College, a women’s university in New York City, to show their opposition to Pyongyang’s detention of the two journalists who are due to go on...

Categories Abductions/Activism/Diplomacy/Unintended Humor/WTF?
May 19, 2009

North Korea Shoots a Messenger

Surely there is some sensible middle ground between these two extremes of personnel management — in America, diplomats who push for policies that fail get promoted.  We learn today that pressing for bold diplomatic initiatives turns out to be less career-enhancing in the Foreign Ministry of the Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea: North Korea executed its pointman on South Korea last year, holding him responsible for wrong predictions about Seoul’s new conservative government that has ditched a decade of engagement...

Categories Diplomacy/Inside NK/Kremlinology/NK Economics
May 17, 2009

Kaesong: Dead or Just Pining?

[Updated below] The headline is pretty much what I’d predicted three years ago: “North Korea announces nullification of all ‘Kaesong agreements,’” and that’s from the Hanky: North Korea’s military leadership has made statements hinting they would demand a withdrawal of businesses from Kaesong, but this is the first time the Bureau has brought up the possibility. In this notification, North Korea said, “We announce the nullification of all Kaesong Industrial Complex agreements made between the two Koreas which gave preference...

Categories Appeasement/NK Economics/Sunshine
May 17, 2009

Victor Cha: Let’s Reward Terrorism!

If Victor Cha has ever persuaded me of anything, it’s  of the  paradox that some of the most  highly educated and  academically intelligent people  never learn.  Cha,  one of the  architects  of  the Bush Administration’s magnificently  unsuccessful opening to Kim Jong Il’s North Korea, draws on that disqualification to advise us who should bring Laura Ling and Euna Lee home, and how. Having participated in a mission to bring home the remains of American servicemen killed in the Korean War,...

Categories Abductions/Diplomacy/Terrorism (NK)
May 15, 2009

Clinton Welcomes North Korean “Trial” of U.S. Journalists

So North Korea is about to subject two American journalists to one of the world’s most opaque, arbitrary, and harsh judicial systems. This would mark the first North Korean trial of an American in recent years, if ever. And although our Secretary of State calls the charges “baseless,” she sounds just thrilled to pieces at the prospect of two of her country’s citizens facing a revolutionary tribunal: At a press appearance with Malaysia’s foreign minister, Clinton cast the announcement as,...

Categories Abductions/Diplomacy
May 14, 2009

North Korea Sets a Trial Date for Laura Ling and Euna Lee; NK Won’t Talk to Us

Why now?  All I can do is guess, but it’s probably a combination of diplomatic convenience and the likelihood that they finally gave their interrogators what they wanted. In announcing the trial date, the North’s state-run news agency, KCNA, gave no further details, such as what charges they faced. But Pyongyang had earlier said that it found evidence of illegal entry and unspecified hostile acts. Under North Korea’s criminal code, a person convicted of hostile acts against the state can...

Categories Diplomacy/Terrorism (NK)
May 14, 2009

Obama Cabinet Watch: Still No Hint of a Coherent NK Policy

Perhaps “ready on day one” was setting the bar a bit too high.  I dare anyone to find coherence within the dizzying crossfire of U.S. policy statements on North Korea this week. Special Envoy Stephen “Bud” Bosworth just returned from a trip to China, Japan, South Korea, and Russia to “convince the North to come back to the negotiating table” and “take the pulse” of the other four nations that supply the aid that sustains Kim’s misrule. Our diplomats never...

Categories Diplomacy
May 11, 2009

John Kerry: Clueless About North Korea

History will deservedly remember John Kerry as a failed poseur, a man too self-important and detestable to unseat George W. Bush in 2004, and one of my least favorite American politicians of all time.  We are still burdened with Kerry as Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in which capacity he spirited the incompetent and congenital liar Christopher Hill to confirmation as the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq.  In that capacity, Kerry seems to have learned much from the nominee’s...

Categories Diplomacy/U.S. Politics