Home  >  Diplomacy

Category: Diplomacy

November 23, 2006

Betraying Sergeant Chang

What else can be said about something like this?  It’s easy enough to blame the girl on the phone, but in light of past events like this,  the more salient questions are (1) whether she was  just following orders. More on how ROK POW’s lived in North Korean captivity here and here.  And  Staff Sergeant  Chang’s pain didn’t end when he escaped, either: Chang Moo-hwan, 79, a third POW who returned to South Korea after the defection of Cho, said...

Categories Abductions/Appeasement/Korean War
November 21, 2006

Minutes of the U.N. Debate on Human Rights in North Korea, With Comments

Background:  The North Korean government government has plunged the world into crisis with a weapons buildup paid for at the cost of two million North Koreans who were starved to death.  The world’s most repressive and belligerent regime has finally and narrowly drawn the diffident and non-binding  disapproval of the U.N. General Assembly.  And even this was highly controversial to some.  The quality of the debate is so depressing as to  overpower the quality of the  result, such as it...

Categories "United" Nations/Human Rights
November 21, 2006

The Case for Starving the People

I noticed this interesting graf in a story about the effect of the luxury  items sanctions in UNSCR 1718.  For reasons that escape me entirely, some people believe that it’s counterproductive to bar Kim Jong Il from buying sashimi, S-Class sedans, and Omega watches while his people are starving – to – death,  some seem so quick to forget. Over past years, U.S. leaders have described the North Korean regime as an axis of evil, an outpost of tyranny, an...

Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid/Kim Jong Il/Korean Education/Washington Views
November 20, 2006

Kumgang Revenues Continue to Decline

Whether it’s because of  the diminishing  appeal of tyranny tourism or North Korea’s sheer belligerence, South Koreans have never been less enthusiastic about the Kumgang tourist resort: Tour organizer Hyundai Asan on Sunday said fewer than 300 tourists now visit Mt. Kumgang over the weekend. During the same period last year, weekend visitors to Mt. Kumgang numbered 400-500. The number of ordinary tourists has dwindled to fewer than 2,000 bookings for December tours, but activist groups have booked the tours...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Korean Politics/NK Economics
November 20, 2006

Wobble Watch: Has China Unfrozen Blocked North Korean Accounts?

The State Department is saying it doesn’t know if the reports are true; it’s telling reporters to ask the Chinese: A diplomatic source in Beijing said China has released some of the North Korean money at Macau’s Banco Delta Asia (BDA), frozen after the U.S. Treasury in September last year designated it a primary money laundering concern abetting Pyongyang’s illicit activities.  The unfrozen accounts, less than half of the US$24 million initially held up, are believed to be those not...

Categories China/Counterfeiting/Diplomacy/Money Laundering
November 20, 2006

‘Unlike in the past, it is absurd to call a person unqualified because he was a pro-North leftist.”‘

This is the statement attributed to ruling  Uri Party lawmaker Im Jong-Seok during the confirmation hearing for Lee Jae-Joung, South Korea’s next Minister of Appeasement Unification.  Fine, then.  Is it equally absurd for a civilized democracy to question the fitness of a pro-fascist rightist  for a senior cabinet position?  Does Korea’s left hereby waive all grievances against Park Chung-Hee for his collaboration with Imperial Japan, along with any hereditary claims against his daughter, just in time for next year’s election? ...

Categories Appeasement/Human Rights/Korean Politics/Korean Society
November 17, 2006

Proliferation Security Watch

The AP has a very detailed story on the search of a North Korean ship in the Indian Ocean, along with a nice summary of other searches in the recent past.  In this case, it sounds like all they found was cement. In other searches, Hong Kong authorities detained two North Korean cargo ships in October for safety violations apparently unrelated to the U.N. sanctions. Myanmar permitted a North Korean cargo ship in distress to anchor at a port in...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/China & Korea/Japan & Korea/U.S. & Korea/Uncategorized/WMD
November 17, 2006

General Assembly Passes N. Korea Resolution, Continues to Be Mostly Worthless

[Update:   Here is the text of the resolution.] South Korea for the first time on Friday joined other U.N. members in rebuking North Korea for gross human rights abuses, including torture, political executions and miserable prison camp conditions. A draft resolution on the abuses was passed by a vote of 91 to 21 with 60 abstentions in a General Assembly committee that includes all U.N. members, thereby assuring its official adoption by the full assembly. North Korea rejected the...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Human Rights
November 16, 2006

No Abstention This Year!

Seoul, in a surprise reversal, will reluctantly support this year’s U.N. resolution on human rights in North Korea: South Korea decided Thursday to vote in favor of a United Nations resolution condemning North Korea’s human rights abuses, citing a change in the geopolitical situation after Pyongyang’s nuclear weapon test in October.  The U.N. General Assembly is expected to vote on the nonbinding resolution drafted by the European Union, the United States, and Japan early Friday (Seoul time). Thursday’s decision, which...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Human Rights
November 15, 2006

Two Cheers for Tom Lantos

He’d get three if he’d said  it three years ago, and four if he offered a few more specifics, but Tom Lantos (D, Cal.) sounds at least as  tough here  as Jim Leach (R, Ia.) might have: The Bush administration’s policy toward North Korea has failed and a new approach must be tried, including punishing the North’s leaders and sending a U.S. envoy to Pyongyang for talks, a key Democrat said on Wednesday. Rep. Tom Lantos of California, who is...

Categories America/Diplomacy/Six-Party Talks/Washington Views/WMD
November 14, 2006

The Reinvention of Ban Ki-Moon

He seems to have concluded that he needs to put some distance between himself and his comrades in the ruling party.  The first of two stories is this remarkable statement, timed just before Seoul is expected to abstain from yet another UN resolution on human rights in the North. UN secretary-general-designate Ban Ki-moon on Sunday called for a “more proactive position” from Seoul on North Korea’s human rights issues. Ban said the international community “has great expectations in that regard,...

Categories "United" Nations/Human Rights/Korean War
November 13, 2006

Shame on South Korea

They’re going to abstain again.  This year, there will be  another U.N. resolution condemning North Korea’s mass murder of its own people — 2.4 million and counting, and South Korea will remain silent.  LiNK was there to make sure the world remembers this cowardly, selfish, and  reprehensible act.  One day, the North Korean people will demand an explanation.  These abstentions will add  the bitterness of betrayal to the great difficulties that are sure to come with reunification.  (Picture credits:  1,...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Human Rights
November 11, 2006

North Korea’s Food Crisis and the Theory of Comparative Advantage

Donor fatigue has hit the World Food Program’s much-reduced North Korea operations: James Morris, the agency’s outgoing chief, told the WFP executive board session in Rome earlier this week that the operation in North Korea “is dramatically underfunded.” “If we are to continue, and you overwhelmingly have said you want us to stay there and want us to be helpful in addressing the humanitarian agenda, we are going to need some help,” he said. “Otherwise, come February, we will be...

Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid
November 10, 2006

The Next Food Crisis, Part 1: DLA Piper Report: N. Korean Famine A ‘Crime Against Humanity’

I’ve finally finished reading the DLA Piper report, which calls on the U.N. Security Council to invoke Chapter VI, and then Chapter VII, against North Korea for the crime of failing to protect its population.  As regular readers know, I’ve long placed the North Korean famine at the top of the list of its crimes against humanity, and now, for the first time, a published scholarly report is making that same accusation and tying it to specific provisions of international...

Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid/Human Rights
November 10, 2006

The Next Food Crisis, Part 2: Will Josette Sheeran Stop the Next Great Famine?

As the reports on North Korea’s food situation continue to grow more dire, I’m no longer alone in warning that the country is again on the brink of famine (see, e.g., this, this, or this, at pages 26-28).  That’s why food policy — not nukes,  missiles, or even other human rights issues —  could soon become the most urgent issue in  how the world approaches North  Korea.  It would also be a real opportunity for the U.N. to redeem itself...

Categories "United" Nations/Famine & Food Aid/Human Rights