Category: China

Diplomatic activity concerning North Korea

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China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi met U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday in the highest-level contact between the world’s two biggest economies since the election as concerns over North Korea’s nuclear program overshadow campaign tensions over trade. Yang relayed greetings from President Xi Jinping in the meeting with Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and senior adviser Jared Kushner at the White House, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

Tensions between the U.S. and China on how to handle North Korea have escalated since Trump accused Beijing of not doing enough to curb Kim’s nuclear ambitions. North Korea has accelerated its development of nuclear bombs and ballistic missiles since 2009, when it walked away from six-party talks involving China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the U.S.

The U.S. is considering branding North Korea as state sponsor of terrorism, Yonhap News reported Tuesday, citing a high-level South Korean government official. Representatives of the U.S., Japan and South Korea met in Washington to discuss the situation Monday.

Beijing’s leaders have called for a new round of talks on North Korea as they seek to rein in Kim Jong Un and halt American plans to deploy a missile-defense system known as Thaad in South Korea, in part on concerns that it will undermine China’s own security. North Korea hit out at China last week after it banned coal imports, saying it was “dancing to the tune of the U.S.”

Meanwhile, North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Ri Kil Song arrived in Beijing on Tuesday for possible talks with Chinese officials, Japan’s Kyodo News reported, citing one of its journalists. It marks the first known visit to China by a high-ranking North Korean official since around June last year.

[Bloomberg]

Kim Jong-nam assassination a warning to potential defectors

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The brazen assassination of Kim Jong-nam in Malaysia is a warning to North Korean elites thinking of defecting from the country via Malaysia, claims academic Go Myong-hyun, a research fellow from the Seoul-based Asan Institute for policy studies.

Go added that the assassination could have been carried out in Malaysia because it carried the least political risk compared to either Macau, China or Singapore – places where Kim Jong-nam is often seen. And as quoted in the Washington Post, Kim Jong Nam told Japanese journalist Yoji Gomi the Chinese government protected him in China and gave him a bodyguard, but did not do so elsewhere in Asia.

Go said that Macau was out of the question as it is a part of China and if North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong-un was indeed behind the murder, he wouldn’t want to create unnecessary conflict with China.

Go added that North Korea would not want to jeopardize their relationship with Singapore as it is an important regional hub for their overseas economic network. “Malaysia, in a way, is the least risky place to carry out the operation,” he said.

Kim Jong-nam, the half-brother of leader Kim Jong-un, died shortly after an unidentified liquid was sprayed in his face on February 13 while at the airport in the Malaysian capital.

[The Star – Malaysia]

The non-relationship between brothers Kim Jong Un and Kim Jong Nam

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When North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was born, his elder half-brother Kim Jong Nam was studying overseas. Kim Jong Un was brought up by a mother who saw her husband’s first family as rivals to her own sons. Brought up separately, Kim Jong Un was never going to be close to his eldest brother.

Indeed, according to Japanese journalist Yoji Gomi, the two brothers never even met.

This did not stop Kim Jong Nam openly criticizing his sibling years later, saying that the new North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was too weak to maintain control over the country and was a puppet for regime elders. Such criticism is unlikely to have gone down well in Pyongyang, which often reacts angrily to any perceived slight, particularly from overseas.

Kim Jong Nam told Gomi that North Korea would collapse without necessary reform, his half-brother Kim Jong-un would not last long as a leader and hereditary succession was a “joke to the outside world”.

Speaking to reporters last week, Gomi said Kim Jong Nam’s comments were known within the country. “A defector told me there was a rumor the oldest son of Kim Jong Il had said critical words about North Korea and could be a cause of [reform],” he said. “That person mentioned the rumor gave him hope.”

Gomi first encountered Kim Jong Nam during a chance meeting at Beijing airport in 2004, leading to an exchange of 150 emails and then two interviews in 2011.

South Korean lawmaker Lee Cheol-woo, citing a National Intelligence Service briefing, said that Pyongyang had been attempting to assassinate Kim Jong Nam for five years. A North Korean man jailed for spying in South Korean in 2012 reportedly said he had been ordered to kill Kim.

Another lawmaker, Kim Byung-kee, said that Kim Jong Nam had written to his brother in 2012, asking him to spare his life and those of his family. According to the South China Morning Post, friends of Kim Jong Nam in Macau said he told them he felt he was living on “borrowed time.”

[CNN / The Telegraph]

Sense of betrayal in China after assassination of Kim Jong Nam

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Behind the scenes there is a sense of shock and dismay in Beijing: if indeed Kim Jong Nam was assassinated on the orders of North Korea, it would be seen as an affront to the country that has afforded him protection for many years.

Kim Jong Nam has lived for over a decade in Beijing and Macao, apparently with wives and children in both places. Chinese experts said he had received 24-hour protection–and monitoring–from China’s security services, as well as financial assistance when he needed it.

Said Wang Weimin, a professor at the School of International Relations and Public Affairs at Fudan University in Shanghai, “Kim Jong Nam’s assassination makes China more aware of how unpredictable and cruel the current North Korean regime is, as well as Kim Jong Un’s willingness to abandon China and sell it for his own benefit at any second.”

Relations between Beijing and Pyongyang have deteriorated significantly in recent years, with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Kim Jong Un never having met and believed to share mutual disdain, experts say.

[Washington Post]

Senior North Korean representatives to visit the United States for talks?

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China will suspend all imports of coal from North Korea, effectively slicing the country’s exports by about half. The move, announced by China’s commerce ministry on Saturday, is believed to form part of the country’s efforts to implement United Nations sanctions against North Korea. The Ministry of Commerce said the ban would start February 19 and be effective until December 31.

The ban coincides with a report in The Washington Post that preparations are underway for senior North Korean representatives to visit the United States for talks with former American officials, a sign that Pyongyang may see a potential opening with the Trump administration.

China’s move to ban the imports effectively slices North Korea’s exports in half and came with a message for the US and its allies: it’s time to do a deal. Chinese officials say pushing North Korea into a corner won’t work as Kim Jong-un’s regime will keep developing its nuclear capability until it feels safe.

According to Shi Yongming, an associate research fellow at the Foreign Ministry-run China Institute of International Studies: “Beijing still wants to bring [Kim Jong Un] to a negotiation table – and that’s where the US role lies – because the collapse of the regime is right now outside China’s realistic capacity to handle.”

China has backed the Kim dynasty since it took charge after the Korean War, in part to prevent having a US ally on its border. With the international community enforcing sanctions on North Korea after a series of nuclear tests, China now accounts for more than 90 per cent of its total trade. Coal sales accounted for more than 50 per cent of North Korea’s exports to China last year, and about a fifth of its total trade, according to Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.

[The Sydney Morning Herald]

Kim Jong Un “MacBeth with nukes”

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Malaysian authorities arrested the second of two women in connection with the death Monday of Kim Jong Nam, the elder half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who died on his way to a hospital after an unidentified woman covered his face with a cloth containing an agent of some sort.

North Korean diplomats unsuccessfully tried to prevent an autopsy and obtain the return of Kim Jong Nam’s body.

Jong Nam in recent years lived under Chinese protection. Beijing apparently wanted a Kim in reserve to possibly serve as a China-friendly leader of a successor regime in Pyongyang. Jong Nam, often called a playboy, appeared to harbor no desire to do so and exhibited little aptitude for such a demanding role. In reality, Jong Nam posed virtually no threat to his half-brother’s rule, but that did not mean Jong Un did not try to kill him. (There was also an assassination attempt in 2012.)

Ordering a hit on a Kim, in a society where family members were once considered divine and where regime legitimacy rests on bloodline, is an especially heinous act. It is also a desperate one. The execution of a family member can intimidate others in the short term, but it erodes support and undermines regime credibility. The murder could even be interpreted as a last resort.

The killing of his Nam Jong is not the only sign of instability in Pyongyang this month. Two weeks ago, for instance, the world learned of the demotion of the minister of state security, General Kim Won Hong. On Sunday, the chief of North Korea’s strategic missile forces did not witness the launch of the Pukguksong-2 intermediate-range missile, indicating instability at the top of the Korean People’s Army.

Whether Kim Jong Un is deeply insecure or suffering from a “delusional disorder”—the diagnosis of South Korea’s National Intelligence Service—the international community faces a North Korean supremo who now exhibits a low threshold for risk, largely because he feels he has so little to lose.

Kim has long-range missiles—three that can reach the western U.S.—and a stockpile of enough plutonium and uranium to fashion about 16 to 20 warheads. His technicians have almost certainly learned how to mate a nuclear warhead to his intermediate-range missiles and within, say, four years will have mastered the ability to strap on nukes to his intercontinental-range missiles as well. So call his murderous family drama “Macbeth with Nukes.”

[The Daily Beast]

China arrests four Christian missionaries near North Korea border

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Chinese authorities recently arrested four Christian missionaries near the North Korea border, but reasons for their arrest were not provided.

A local resident in Yanji, a city in the Yanbian region of Jilin Province, said the arrests were made at a hotel in the town on Thursday, Radio Free Asia reported.

All four missionaries appear to be of Korean descent, but carried different passports.

One missionary identified as Pastor Park Won-cheol is a man in his fifties and an American citizen. Park’s whereabouts are being confirmed by the U.S. embassy in China, the source said.

Park had been traveling frequently to China “for years,” the source said. “Park flew to China from South Korea last week. On Feb. 9, at 10:30 a.m., immediately before he was to travel to Yanji airport to board a plane to return to South Korea, he was arrested at his hotel after a raid.”

Of the other missionaries, at least one is a South Korean passport holder with the surname Kim, and in his thirties.

[UPI]

North Korea launches ballistic missile test-fire

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North Korea says it has successfully completed the launch of a new ballistic missile, according to state media. KCNA reported Kim was present at the site and personally gave the order for the launch, which was the first missile test by Pyongyang since US President Donald Trump took office.

A US official said the missile traveled 500 kilometers (310 miles) before landing in the Sea of Japan, also known as the East Sea, and that it was launched from North Pyongan province.  Intermediate-range ballistic missiles typically travel from 3,000 to 5,500 kilometers (1,864 to 3,417 miles).

The United Nations Security Council said it plans hold consultations on an “urgent basis” Monday afternoon regarding North Korea, according to the US Mission to the United Nations. The meeting was requested by the United States, South Korea and Japan — whose Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, was visiting President Trump in the United States when the launch occurred.

Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, spoke to his South Korean counterpart Kim Kwan Jin, according to the South Korean President’s office. They condemned the launch and agreed “to seek all possible options” to deter Pyongyang in the future. China, North Korea’s neighbor and most important strategic partner, has not yet commented on the launch.

[CNN]

North Korean defector Hyeonseo Lee prominent global voice

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Hyeonseo Lee is a miniature hurricane and a woman of strong will — “obstinate” is how she puts it herself — she is not at all the doll-faced persona suggested in photographs. Now 36, she escaped on foot across the frozen Yalu river into China from her home in North Korea at the age of 17. For the next decade, she survived abusive Chinese pimps, gangsters, importunate marriage suitors, informers and police interrogators, and then escaped again to seek asylum and a new home in South Korea.

She is now one of the most prominent global voices of the subjugated North Korean people, a bestselling author and public speaker and a campaigner against the thriving Chinese trade in Korean sex slaves. Recalling the TED talk she gave in 2013 that propelled her to stardom, and which has so far been watched 7 million times, she says, “The TED talk I gave [me] a kind of responsibility. Every word I’m speaking, it’s not from myself. I’m speaking for and representing the people of communist North Korea.”

Lee is The Girl with Seven Names (her autobiographical book describes how she escaped detection in China, learning the language and living under a series of assumed identities), and unless the two Koreas are reunified, I will probably never know her real name, which must remain secret to protect relatives and friends left behind under the dictatorship of Kim Jong Un. She chose the name Hyeonseo — whose two parts mean “sunshine” and “good luck” — to celebrate her emergence from the “long tunnels” of darkness into her new life of freedom in South Korea, and insists that even her mother must use it all the time.

The dangers are real. South Korea’s National Intelligence Service has warned Lee that Pyongyang’s agents may try to kidnap her — it has happened to other critics of Pyongyang and Beijing — and make an example of her in North Korea. “That’s why the NIS tells me, every event, when you receive an invitation, better check if that’s a real event. And the one thing they told me is, don’t go to Southeast Asia, including China.”

[Financial Times]

North Korean defector Hyeonseo Lee on the secretive state

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While interviewing North Korean defector Hyeonseo Lee, her memories come tumbling out, some good but mostly bad: her disbelieving mother — lost and now found again — running towards her in a prison yard in Laos; the corpses of famine victims floating down the Yalu River; the handcarts to take away the dead so that Chinese visitors would not see evidence of North Korea’s shameful failure; a weakling flung on to the heaps of dead because he was probably going to die anyway and a passing Chinese driver laughing at the sight. “Sometimes the dead bodies wouldn’t be moved, so the smell of the decomposing flesh was everywhere, especially under the bridge and near the train station, because under the bridge is where not many people can see.”

North Koreans flee because they realize there is something wrong with their homeland. It is the lies they have been taught about the rest of the world that are deeply ingrained. “We learned that Americans are our primary enemies and all human scums live in America,” says Lee, who stunned her mother and brother by entering a relationship with an American man called Brian, before marrying him four years ago.

“South Korea was described as the poorest country in the world, where beggars were filling the streets. And then the most shocking thing for us was the Korean war — it was created by the American and South Korean enemies together. We never learned it was actually started by the North Korean regime. My mum, who was brainwashed for more than 60 years, she still asks me: ‘Show me the proof’.”

Lee wants reunification, she wants to be able to go back to her hometown on the Yalu, and she worries that young South Koreans do not care as much as their parents whether or not it ever happens. (“Many people in the past, they never predicted German reunification,” she says hopefully, “but it did happen very abruptly.”).

The importance of Lee’s story rests on her intimate understanding of China. … The communist government in Beijing treats North Korean refugees with varying degrees of cruelty and indifference, depending on the winds of geopolitics. “We refugees [are a political punching bag] between China and South Korea and North Korea. China has all the keys right now. .. So if … China stops supporting North Korea, within one week or 10 days they can make North Korea chaos. I wish they could do more, but they are not doing it at all.”

[Financial Times]