April 5, 2008

Watching Porn in Pyongyang (Part 2)

Because man cannot live on diverted food aid and crystal meth alone: The demand for X-rated movies among North Korea’s high cadres is so great that a single VCD sells for 50 US dollars. The latest publication of Good Friends, a North Korea-related aid organization, tells the story of Mr. Park, a resident of Hyesan, Yangkang Province. Mr. Park was arrested for making copies of South Korean adult movies–called “colored movies” in North Korea–and selling them in Pyongyang. Despite the...

Categories Deprogramming/Inside NK/Korean Society
April 5, 2008

MUST READ: BBC on Clandestine Journalism in N. Korea

[Update: The Daily NK has more.  There is no English Rimjingang yet, unfortunately, but you can read a somewhat clunky google translation of their home page here.] The North Korean regime has a name for journalism that it does not control: espionage. I need not elaborate on the penalty for those caught. Seven months ago, North Korea reminded us (ht) of how seriously it takes the surreptitious possession and use of a camera, and we’ve seen relatively little of that...

Categories Inside NK/Resistance
April 4, 2008

N. Korea Food Situation Continues to Worsen: Protests Continue in Chongjin; Food Prices Skyrocket; Kim Jong Il Asks China for ‘Massive’ Food Aid

[Update: A reader — one you and I both respect — writes to warn that we shouldn’t rely too heavily on the reports of Good Friends. Well, yes, the obvious caveats apply here: this being North Korea, we tend to treat third-hand rumors and hearsay, possibly further garbled by translation, as news. What I try to do here that news sites don’t do is to put each report in the context of other facts reported by other sources, either previously...

Categories Famine & Food Aid/Regime Change/Resistance
April 3, 2008

North Korea’s Food Situation ‘Far More Hopeless Than Expected’

Good Friends has published its latest dispatch from the Untergang in Pyongyang: all food rations in the capital appear to have stopped, and there are rising fears of famine in the countryside: North Korea’s food shortages are so bad that even its elite citizens in Pyongyang will not get state food rations until September, a local relief group said Thursday. Seoul-based Good Friends said the North has decided to suspend state food rations in the capital city for six months...

Categories Famine & Food Aid
April 3, 2008

Not Another Nazi Ad Campaign in Korea …

Yes, I’m afraid it is. Hurry and see the video on this Naver page before it’s taken down. [Update: Brian, praise be unto him, made YouTube videos, which you can see on a previous post at his blog. Oddly enough, I looked for something about this on YouTube and didn’t find them, but it’s good to record these things for posterity.] “Even Hitler didn’t unite the East and West.” Isn’t fascism erotic? I wonder how long she would have lasted...

Categories Korean Society/Racism/WTF?
April 3, 2008

What Should the Senate Ask Kathleen Stephens?

A reader tells me that the nomination hearing for Kathleen Stephens, State’s pick to be our next Ambassador to Seoul, will take place on April 16th, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. So if you sat on that panel, what would you ask? Naturally, I presume that every single answer to that kind of question will be thoughtful and intelligent, and the most intelligent and thoughtful questions have some unquantifiable chance to be seen by the people who will write...

Categories Appeasement/Diplomacy/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Politics/Washington Views
April 3, 2008

North Korea Violates UNSCR 1718 Again

The resolution, passed after North Korea’s diplomatically successful and technologically marginal nuclear test, prohibits the North from trading in major weapons systems. Reuters reports that for the last year, since North Korea restored diplomatic relations with Burma, North Korea has been selling its fellow tyrannical ChiCom satellite rocket launchers of “the same type as those deployed near the demilitarised zone.” It’s now fodder for popular satire that Kim Jong Il doesn’t really care what the U.N. prohibits, but still, for...

Categories "United" Nations/NK Military/Southeast Asia
April 2, 2008

Hill expects N. Korean declaration ‘in the next few days.’

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said Wednesday that Washington was waiting for a North Korean move “in the next few days” to end an impasse over Pyongyang’s promise to provide a complete declaration of its nuclear programs. Washington says the North so far failed to do so, missing a deadline that expired at the end of last year. Hill said the U.S. had hoped to resolve the issue by the end of March, which did not happen. “We...

Categories Diplomacy/Six-Party Talks
April 2, 2008

Treasury: North Korea Still Counterfeiting, Still a Financial Pariah

The State Department and Bill Richardson  may harbor illusions to the contrary, but Stuart Levey, Treasury’s Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence may be only man in Washington with real influence  over Pyongyang.  Yesterday, Levey  appeared before the Senate Finance Committee to testify.  A reader (thank you) forwarded me a copy of his testimony, and I excerpt the North Korea portion for you here.  The key points  here are that (a) North Korea continues to be an international financial...

Categories Counterfeiting/Money Laundering/NK Crime
April 1, 2008

A North Korean Runs in a Real Election

The Daily NK introduces us to North Korean defector Lee Ae Ran, who represents another step forward in the development of a class of post-Kim Jong Il leaders for North Korea. “I know it is laughable that a North Korean defector is running for a seat in the South Korean National Assembly,” the candidate admitted during a phone interview with Daily NK on March 28. She added, “In North Korea, if you come from a bad family background, there is...

Categories Defectors/Democracy/Korean Politics
April 1, 2008

Oh, You Meant Those Nuclear Scientists in Syria ….

You have to wonder what Chris Hill thought this inspired move would accomplish, other than to put  intelligence sources and methods at risk:  The U.S. in recent bilateral talks reportedly gave Pyongyang a list of North Korean officials involved in the supply of nuclear technology to Syria, a suspicion the North denies. A high-level diplomatic source on Monday said that the U.S. obtained the list of officials including nuclear engineers, who were involved in the supply of nuclear technology to...

Categories Appeasement/Proliferation/Six-Party Talks/U.S. Politics
March 31, 2008

Kathleen Stephens: The Wrong Person for the Job

A  few months ago, the Korean press reported that State had submitted the name of Kathleen Stephens to be the next U.S. Ambassador to South Korea, to replace the competent and affable  Alexander Vershbow.  At the time, I did not have strong opinions about Ms. Stephens’s fitness for that position.  Further research has convinced me that Ms. Stephens, though well qualified for the job and apparently a perfectly fine person, is the wrong person to be our next Ambassador to...

Categories Appeasement/Diplomacy/Six-Party Talks/U.S. & Korea/Washington Views
March 31, 2008

LiNK: Project Real Sunshine

[Update:  LiNK reports that they’ve extended the deadline to sign up for Project Real Sunshine through April 7th.]   [Correction:   A reader points out that I’ve confused two LiNK projects, “Project  Real Sunshine” and  the “Chollima Leadership Program.”  My apologies.  The Chollima  Leadership Program  is  actually the  one I  described in the post below; Project True Sunshine is an advocacy project,  which I should have remembered.  Fortunately, Andy Jackson didn’t get confused and put up a perfectly fine post.]...

Categories Activism/Reconstruction/Refugees/Regime Change
March 30, 2008

Human Rights Activists Help 12 North Koreans Enter S. Korean Embassy in Laos

A group of six  human rights activists from Europe,  Asia, and Oceania was  in Vientiane, Laos, recently to coordinate efforts on behalf of North Korean refugees when they  decided to move beyond mere words.  Here is an excerpt from  the letter one of them e-mailed me recently: It has come to our attention that twelve North Korean defectors have recently arrived in Laos after traveling through China.  They were on their way to freedom in South Korea, but have since...

Categories Activism/Refugees
March 28, 2008

South Korea Grows Up

First the Human Rights Commission, now this:      The South Korean government has decided to vote for a resolution on human rights in North Korea to be adopted by the UN Human Rights Council this week, it emerged on Tuesday. South Korea has so far boycotted or abstained from all UN votes on North Korea including the General Assembly, except for 2006, when the North conducted a nuclear test. [….] A government official, speaking on the customary condition of...

Categories "United" Nations/An Alliance?/Appeasement/NK Military/U.S. & Korea
March 27, 2008

You can check out any time you like, but they can never leave.

Hello?  Room service?  There’s a hissing sound coming from my chandelier! North Korea is converting part of its embassy in Berlin into a hostel to earn foreign currency for Kim Jong Il’s cash-strapped regime, Japan’s Sankei newspaper reported, citing diplomats it didn’t identify. The Cityhostel Berlin will initially have 37 rooms at a charge of 20 Euros ($31) per head a night, Sankei reported. A reception with a grand piano is being built and a Korean restaurant is due to...

Categories Europe/NK Economics