Search Results for: indict

February 23, 2010

23 February 2010: “The Little One”

Kim Jong-Eun still has a way to go to gain the adoration, much less acceptance, of the North Korean elites: According to a high-level source, the nickname of Kim Jong-il’s heir, Kim Jong-Eun, is “the little one.” According to multiple sources, the North Korean elites officially call Kim Jong-Eun “the great leader” and “successor of the great accomplishments of the military-first policy,” but inofficially, Kim Jong-Eun is referred to as “the little one. “The little one” is usually used in...

Categories Anju Links

February 13, 2010

Thailand Deports Crew of Axis of Evil Express

Brokedown Palace is about to lose a few tenants. Thailand has decided to deport the Boratistani crew of the Il-76 caught carrying weapons from North Korea to Iran instead of prosecuting them. The crew may face prosecution in their home countries instead. The plane and the cargo will stay in Thailand for the time being: “We are waiting for the United Nations to recommend what to do with the weapons,” Mr. Panitan said in a telephone interview. “The plane is...

Categories Axis of Evil/Missiles/Proliferation/Sanctions/Terrorism (NK)

January 15, 2010

How Corrupt Is North Korea These Days?

Very, if this report from Good Friends is true: On November 28th, Hamheung City, South Hamgyong Province publicized the latest results of the drug crackdown. The City launched the campaign since last September. Party officials, including four officials belonging to the Provincial Party, three officials from the city party, two police officers from the Sungchun region, two prosecutors from the Province, and one party official from the Sapo region, who have accepted bribes from drug smugglers were the main targets...

Categories Drugs & N Korea/Inside NK

December 25, 2009

Korean-American Activist Crosses Into North Korea (Updated)

Oh God, not again. Reuters is reporting that Robert Park, a 28 year-old American, has walked across the Tumen River from China to the North Korean town of Hoeryong, which is infamous for being both the birthplace of Kim Jong Il’s mother and the town nearest to Camp 22. Park’s apparent objectives were (1) to get himself arrested and (2) thereby raise global attention about North Korea’s brutal political prison camps. Rest assured that Park will accomplish Objective Number One....

Categories Activism/Human Rights/Robert Park/Useful Idiocy

December 7, 2009

N. Korea Comes Up for Human Rights Review at the U.N.

North Korea’s “universal periodic review” before the U.N. Human Rights Council began today in Geneva. Nothing much will come of it, I suspect, but at least the human rights story will get a bit of media attention, and North Korea will be just a little more toxic to potential investors. “There is a difference between wanting to be isolated and not caring about the rest of the world. North Korea cares about the world and therefore it wants to be...

Categories "United" Nations/Activism/Human Rights

December 3, 2009

3 December 2009 (Updated)

THE GREAT CONFISCATION CONTINUES. The Wall Street Journal reports that in Pyongyang, the exchange has been “calm and orderly,” at least to the extent foreign observers have been able to tell. Meanwhile, the Daily NK explains who will be hurt most badly by this. If markets are damaged as badly as I suspect they might be, there could be a new flood of food refugees into China this winter. Another effect will be the final collapse of confidence by the...

Categories Anju Links/NK Economics/NK Military/North-South

October 30, 2009

Another South Korean Professor Caught Spying for the North

A South Korean university lecturer accused of spying for North Korea since the early 1990s has been indicted on espionage charges, prosecutors said Thursday. The suspect, identified by the surname Lee, was charged with giving North Korea confidential information, including the locations of key South Korean military facilities and an army operations manual, prosecutors in Suwon, south of Seoul, said in a statement. [MacLeans] They could have waited a few years and gotten it all from Google Earth. Anyway, if...

Categories An Alliance?/The Fifth Column

October 28, 2009

Antihuman Crime Investigation Committee Holds Seminar

A group I had not heard of, calling itself in English the Antihuman Crime Investigation Committee (반인도범죄조사위원회), held a seminar yesterday (Oct. 27th) at the Seoul Press Center in Gwanghwamun. I received word of the event last-minute, and was only able to attend part of it, but here are some highlights. After all the necessary introductions and congratulatory remarks (축사), Kim Tae-Jin, president of the Democracy Network against the North Korean Gulag (북한민주화운동본부) and himself originally from North Korea, gave...

Categories Human Rights

September 29, 2009

Obama Administration Says First Words About Human Rights in North Korea

Eight months, a missile test, and a nuclear test after President Obama’s inauguration, he has finally gotten around to nominating Bob King to be Special Envoy for Human Rights in North Korea, a move mandated by the North Korean Human Rights Act of 2004 and the North Korean Human Rights Reauthorization Act of 2008. The United States said Friday it was “very concerned” about human rights violations in North Korea, as President Barack Obama named an envoy to focus on...

Categories Activism/Diplomacy/Human Rights/U.S. Politics

August 14, 2009

How Kim Jong Il Got Away With Counterfeiting Our Money

Having finally found time to read all of David Rose’s excellent Vanity Fair piece on North Korea’s supernote counterfeiting operation, I agree absolutely with Richardson and Curtis; it’s an excellent piece of journalism. For a fuller understanding, it should be read in the context of two others. Stephen Mihm’s New York Times report explained how North Korea assembled Intaglio printing presses and optically variable ink from the same Swiss manufacturer that supplies them to the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and...

Categories Counterfeiting/Money Laundering/Sanctions

July 21, 2009

Absolute Must Read: Washington Post on North Korea’s Concentration Camps

At last.  The Washington Post has done a truly detailed, comprehensive, well-researched story on North Korea’s concentration camps.  It’s a story that the Post wouldn’t have done had Anthony Faiola or Glenn Kessler been doing the reporting; Blaine Harden deserves much credit for writing what deserves to become a major exhibit in the indictment of our State Department for its culpable complicity.  The satellite imagery of the camps features prominently in the story. (Disclosure:  I provided Mr. Harden and one...

Categories Human Rights/The Camps/U.S. Politics/Washington Views

June 29, 2009

Obama Forms Team Plan B

The Washington Post is reporting that President Obama is forming an inter-agency team, much like the Illicit Activities Initiative that David Asher headed in G.W. Bush’s first term, to coordinate sanctions against North Korea: The White House is forming an interagency team to coordinate sanctions efforts against North Korea with other nations, senior administration officials said yesterday.  The team will be led by Philip S. Goldberg, a former ambassador to Bolivia who is slated to leave for China in the...

Categories Diplomacy/Money Laundering/Sanctions/U.S. Politics/Washington Views

June 28, 2009

A North Korean Connection to Those Counterfeit Bonds?

It’s very short on specifics, but it’s the first published report affirmatively linking those fake bonds to North Korea: An Italian newspaper reports a recent mysterious case involving US$134.5 billion worth of counterfeit bonds has a North Korea connection. Earlier this month two Japanese nationals were caught in Italy allegedly trying to smuggle the bonds into Switzerland. Il Messaggero says the fake bonds may have been manufactured in North Korea since the two men are North Korean agents and are...

Categories Counterfeiting/Money Laundering/NK Crime/Sanctions

June 9, 2009

North Korea’s “Business as Usual” Publicity Tactic

John McCreary made an interesting – and I think spot-on – observation about North Korea’s current publicity tactic in his most recent NightWatch email bulletin: Whatever internal instability might be going on inside North Korea with regard to succession issues or increased tensions with the outside world, the DPRK is taking a “business as usual” approach when it comes to how it presents itself to public eyes. For example, when announcing the sentence of Laura Ling and Euna Lee, the...

Categories Inside NK

June 8, 2009

North Korea Sentences American Journalists to Twelve Years of Hard Labor

[Update: Twelve years is also the maximum sentence. Obviously, the North Koreans are sending a message. The message is, “This one is going to cost you.”] North Korea on Monday sentenced two American journalists to 12 years of hard labor in a case widely seen as a test of how far the isolated Communist state was willing to take its confrontational stance toward the United States. The Central Court, the highest court of North Korea, held the trial of the...

Categories Ling/Lee Incident

May 29, 2009

Lisa Ling to Go Public, Demand the Release of Her Sister

This just in from the Facebook page for Laura Ling and Euna Lee, the two U.S. journalists whom North Korea seized along its border with China back in March, shortly before its long-range missile test: Subject: Going public Hi everyone, it’s Lisa Ling. Firstly, our families are deeply grateful for your support and efforts to try to secure the release of Laura and Euna. To say that this has been stressful would be to grossly understate how hard this has...

Categories Abductions/Terrorism (NK)

April 5, 2009

What President Obama Should (But Won’t) Do About North Korea’s Missile Test

[Update: The nations are not united. The U.N. Security Council fails to agree on the text of a very angry letter. You don’t say.] [Afterthought: So can we conclude that the Obama Administration views even “soft power” as excessive force?] Our Words Mean Nothing Even for North Korea, today’s missile test was an especially flagrant, telegraphed, and premeditated provocation. Whether the missile carried a satellite or not, to launch it was a clear violation of two U.N. resolutions. That the...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Missiles

March 30, 2009

One Man’s “Bargaining Chip” Is Another Man’s Hostage

Update: Uh oh: Two American journalists detained at North Korea’s border with China two weeks ago will be indicted and tried, “their suspected hostile acts” already confirmed, Pyongyang’s state-run news agency said Tuesday. The Korean Central News Agency report did not say when a trial might take place, but said preparations to indict the Americans were under way as the investigation continues. “The illegal entry of U.S. reporters into the DPRK and their suspected hostile acts have been confirmed by...

Categories Media Criticism/Refugees/Terrorism (NK)