Search Results for: commission of inquiry

~  1  ~ CONSEQUENCES: The State Department sends a strong hint that it’s mulling more sanctions on North Korea in response to the North’s recent missile tests, including two medium-range missiles fired toward Japan, but offered no details on the type of sanction or whether they would be unilateral or at the U.N. This separate report, however, says that our U.N. ambassador is talking with other members of the Security Council. If State does press for U.N. sanctions, that would...

“At the end of the Second World War so many people said ‘if only we had known… if only we had known the wrongs that were done in the countries of the hostile forces’,” he said. “Well, now the international community does know… There will be no excusing of failure of action because we didn’t know,” he said, at a news conference at UN headquarters in Geneva. “Too many times in this building there are reports and no action. Well...

~  1  ~ THE NORTH KOREAN GOVERNMENT has finally gotten around to dismissing the U.N. Commission of Inquiry Report with some classic KCNA prose that (sadly) fails to deploy either “madcap” or “brigandish” for this special occasion: The Commission was set up highhandedly at the meeting of the Council last year by the U.S. and its satellite forces out of inveterate repugnance towards the DPRK. The DPRK, therefore, has never recognized its existence as it is no more than a...

~  1  ~ SOUTH KOREA’S NATIONAL ASSEMBLY STILL HASN’T MOVED on a North Korean human rights law, although I expect that next’s week’s release of the U.N. Commission of Inquiry report will likely put pressure to the Democratic Party to stop trying to turn it into the Kim Jong Un Recreational Facility Stimulus Act. The Citizens’ Alliance for North Korean Human Rights is adding some pressure of its own, by demonstrating at the National Assembly building in Yeoido. ~  2 ...

~ 1 ~ U.N. UPDATE: “The United Nations unanimously adopted a resolution that denounces North Korea’s worsening human rights violations, including its brutal treatment of political prisoners in the communist country, Seoul’s foreign ministry said Wednesday.” China, Russia, Cuba, Iran, and Venezuela did not participate, which I suppose is less bad than voting against or abstaining. The vote by the Third Committee is not a vote by the General Assembly or the Security Council, nor does it adopt the findings...

~          1          ~ I HAVE A TERRIBLE FEELING ABOUT THIS: Every now and then, North Korea says something that my gut tells me is more true than false: North Korea’s security agency said Thursday it arrested a South Korean spy in Pyongyang who intended to rally anti-government forces, a claim that intelligence officials in Seoul quickly called ridiculous and groundless.  [….] The North Korean security ministry said that the South Korean initially said...

WHAT’S THAT, YOU SAY? And they’re floating it into North Korea? That’s really too good to be true, and I’m checking with a contact to see if it is. One thing’s for sure–if it is true, I’ll report it before the AP does. Update, 10/14: According to a knowledgeable reader, the “conservative groups” in question are still attempting to acquire the alleged video, but do have an (again, alleged) photo of Ri naked with another man, which they’re floating into...

~          1          ~ THREE CHEERS FOR THE WASHINGTON POST: Ever since Blaine Harden, Chico Harlan, and Max Fisher have covered the story, the Post‘s North Korea coverage has been leagues beyond that of any competitor, especially The New York Times. What’s really commendable is that the Post‘s editorial board draws the necessary conclusions from what its journalists are reporting: A COMMON illusion held by dictators is that they need only to shut the borders, turn...