Deceptive Headline of the Month goes to Channel News Asia for this beaut: ” New US human rights envoy suggests food aid weapon against North Korea.” Weapon against whom? The United States has sent food to the North for years, but we’ve never had much confidence that it’s been feeding the intended recipients. Which is why it’s nice that the article finally got around to saying this: Non-governmental groups have accused North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il’s regime of widespread...

Talks Update: Chris Hill is not sounding like the caving-in type today: The United States adopted a tough stand Friday ahead of talks aimed at ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons programmes, saying it would not compromise on the hardline communist state’s request to maintain peaceful atomic activities. “Our opposition has been very clear on this. What North Korea has to do is get out of the nuclear business,” said Christopher Hill, the chief US negotiator to the six-party talks due...

More on Food Aid: Another interesting article on NK’s rejection of food aid, which goes into somewhat greater detail than those I’ve linked below. I have a quibble with the reporter, a very nice man who claims to be an OFK regular, who says of Jay Lefkowitz, “His remarks sparked attention because what he said isn’t in line with the state department’s existing policy not to link humanitarian aid with human rights.” Food–specifically, the government’s denial of it to millions...

After thirty years of forced labor in a chicken farm with no chickens, Ko Myung-Sup is home at last. “Happiness was short-lived. Thinking about my beloved wife and kids I left behind in the North, I am only sad with more despair,” said the 62-year-old Ko, speaking in a heavy North Korean accent at a seminar Friday hosted by the main opposition Grand National Party. A key party goal is to push this year for bills aimed at accounting for...

North Korea is reportedly taking out its irritation on South Korean visitors in the Kumgang Mountains. “Tourists who were a little noisy as they were touring the mountains were forced by the guides to write a confession,” says one who recently returned. “Isn’t that too much?” As a public service to anyone stupid enough to ever pay good money for this, I present a photo gallery of Thailand . . . the Land of Smiles!

Antti has a very interesting post up about a North Korean refugee who had the brass balls to go to the NK consulate in Beijing and apply for permission to visit his family. Guess who tried to intervene with the paper to stop the story from being told. You’ll never guess. While you’re at his blog, don’t miss these great old photos of Seoul in the 70’s. If you were stationed at Yongsan, there’s plenty to recognize in there. Plenty...

South Korea Wants a Free Trade Agreement. I’m astonished. That we didn’t already have one, that is.

Tommy Chong, political prisoner.

Here’s some interesting follow-up. Back here, I noted that Dr. Norbert Vollertsen was coming back to Seoul for what looked like a short visit. Of course, Norbert had told some of us that he was actually expelled from Korea for his political activities. I e-mailed him and asked him what the deal was. I will print his full letter when I have his permission, but for now, it does seem that Norbert is back in Korea and will not be...

Random Predictions: Commie rat bastards will fail to knock down MacArthur on 9/11, but because it’s 9/11, just showing up will be enough to piss of the entire United States and insure that no U.S. president will ever get congressional backing to send the military to defend Korea. Soon afterward, Hwang Woo-Suk will be nudged aside by American rookie Apolo Ohno in a highly controversial Nobel Prize upset. South Korea will print a commemorative stamp of Tung-Do, known as “Alcatraz”...

Remember a couple of weeks back, when I blogged about the big Chinese mafia bust–the one where the FBI agents posed as a couple and arrested scores of gangsters on their “wedding” day? The one that ended up with the feds taking possession of a large quantity of North Korean supernotes? At the time, I had a number of questions to which I wished I knew the answers, and here are two of them: 7. Were any of those caught...

Reader Brendan Brown, who teaches North Korean refugees to speak English with Australian accents, has a letter in this morning’s Joongang Ilbo, opposing the National Security Law: “My rationale can best be summed up by Volitaire who famously said, ‘I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.’” I agree with Brendan. Oppressing people for nonviolent expression or mere belief–even repugnant belief–only clothes them in the aura of dissidents, an...

The question I’ve been asking this week is why the world should bother giving North Korea food aid when the North insists that the donors have no right to monitor it, meaning that it all ends up in the bellies of the elite. In North Korea, even the enlisted soldiers are starving, and Marcus Noland has reminded us that North Korea has taken advantage of food aid to cut back on food imports and buy more arms. Seventeen percent of...

Well, I admit it. I just feel bad for these people. There are some forms of attachment that are beyond compensation.

Roh Denies Coalition Permission to Floss His Hips.

From the Chosun Ilbo: “Two men came South; one has clearly expressed the intention to defect while the other is asking to be returned to North Korea,” South Korean authorities said Wednesday. The government is reportedly involved in inter-ministerial talks over what to do with the two and their boat. Another government official said North Korea wants both men and their boat returned. This is the third time this year that North Koreans have come South braving the West Sea...

South Korean Poll Shows Turd Sandwich Over Giant Douche! When asked, “Between President Roh and chairwoman Park, whose opinions are you more sympathetic to?” 48.9 percent said they supported Park whereas 18.2 percent said that they agreed with the president. Supporting the opinions of Park Geun-Hye is like squaring zero. But take comfort from the fact that at least they didn’t pick “Giant Douche.”

I strongly favor food aid to the North Korean people, but when I see stories like this, I’m increasingly convinced that the people won’t see any of it and it will only serve to sustain the regime itself. North Korea continues to insist that it’s kicking out international food aid workers, leaving the 6+ million North Koreans who depend on that aid to go hungry. Pyongyang is also riled by attempts by the WFP, which was providing about 100,000 tons...