Category: DPRK Government

Two Koreas to talk on Thanksgiving

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Whenever North Korea heads to the negotiating table one remembers the traditional description of a second marriage: the triumph of hope over experience. We’ve been here before. Or, more accurately, the two Koreas have. Many times. Still, that’s not a criticism. As Winston Churchill famously said, “to jaw-jaw always is better than to war-war.”

Diplomatic dialogue requires two parties. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) always prefers a monologue. Kim Jong-un is most concerned about preserving his rule through what has evolved into a family dynasty. In any talks, humanitarian concerns will never be more than a gloss for the DPRK. The objective is never going to be far from extortion.

So what does each side want? Pyongyang almost certainly hopes to persuade Seoul to restart economic aid and investment suspended in 2010 after the sinking of a South Korean warship and the bombardment of a South Korean island.

For its part, Seoul must decide what it most desires out of Pyongyang. One goal should be continuing dialogue, even if the results are largely inconsequential and the process frustrating. A more substantive objective for South Korea should be to lessen the North’s conventional threat. North Korea’s military is unsophisticated, but its advanced positioning puts Seoul at risk.

The United States should offer its full endorsement for the talks and indicate its readiness to step both forward diplomatically and back militarily if the two Koreas strike a deal.

All of this goes well beyond the working-level discussions planned for [Thanksgiving Day]. But if successful such an effort would be something for which all of us could give thanks.

[Excerpts from Doug Bandow, Senior Fellow at Cato Institute]

Re-education for Kim Jong-un’s right-hand man?

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The right hand man of North Korean leader, Choe Ryong Hae, has not been seen for weeks now after failing to attend a top military chief’s funeral

Reports indicate that Kim Jong-un has purged Choe Ryong Hae, who dared to defy him, and sent this former inner circle cohort for “re-education”. Those sent for “re-education” are usually subjected to brutal psychological torture.

Speaking to CNN, Victor Cha, from the Centre for Strategic and International studies, said: “It’s not a country club, it is almost certainly a very grueling process where there is both mental and physical abuse.”

The reason why Choe Ryong Hae may not have suffered the same fate as many other high-ranking members of the regime who have stood up to the tyrant is that he is known as a “princeling” – the son of a North Korean revolutionary hero who fought the Japanese.

Choe Ryong Hae’s exile has been confirmed by South Korean intelligence officials. “Choe Ryong-hae is receiving education at Kim Il-Sung Higher Party School,” an official told Yonhap news agency.

[Daily Mirror]

Kim Jong Un demotes top North Korean official

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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is believed to have demoted one of his top officials and sent him to a rural collective farm for reeducation, South Korea’s spy agency told lawmakers Tuesday.

If confirmed, the banishment of Choe Ryong Hae would be the latest in a series of executions, purges and dismissals that Kim has orchestrated in what analysts say is a further strengthening of his grip on power since taking over in late 2011.

The National Intelligence Service (NIS) said that Choe’s demotion was related to the alleged collapse of a water tunnel at a power station. Choe was reportedly responsible for the construction of the power station in North Korea’s northeastern Ryanggang province. The NIS said Choe and Kim were also at odds over youth-related policies, according to Shin’s office.

Choe was a rising star after Kim inherited power upon the death of his dictator father Kim Jong Il. He held a series of top posts, including the top political officer in the Korean People’s Army which once made him North Korea’s second most powerful official following the 2013 execution of Kim’s uncle, Jang Song Thaek.

His influence is believed to have diminished in April 2014 when his top army post was found to have been given to Hwang Pyong So, who is now widely considered to be the North’s No. 2 official.

Choe was still considered one of Kim’s top aides and held a number of important posts, including member of the powerful Political Bureau of the ruling Worker’s Party and secretary of the party’s Central Committee. The NIS told lawmakers that Kim is eventually expected to rehabilitee Choe, but didn’t say when.

[Associated Press]

North Korea proposes talks with South Korea

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North Korea has proposed talks with South Korea to be held on Nov. 26 at the truce village on their militarized border, North Korea’s official KCNA news agency said Friday.

The talks, if held, would be the first government-level meeting focused on easing tension since the two sides agreed to improve ties following an armed standoff in August.

An official at South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which handles ties with the North, confirmed receiving Pyongyang’s proposal and said it would soon make a decision on whether to accept it, possibly later Friday.

“Now we’re back on again, the game’s afoot,” John Delury, a North Korea expert at Yonsei University in Seoul, said, adding the proposal for working-level talks would ease the way for the two sides to get on with discussions. “Sometimes these talks break down before they even start over what level to send, so this sounds like a very pragmatic and straightforward approach,” he added

[Reuters]

Why North Korean defections are down – Threatened North Korean border guards

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For the first time in 12 years, an average of less than 100 North Koreans now defect to South Korea each month.

A North Korean defector who was a chief border guard in Hoeryong, North Hamgyong Province until late 2013, said, “Since Kim Jong-un took power, border guards have been punished for taking bribes from defectors, even if this came to light after they’d already left the job. They became terrified. So bribes no longer worked.”

On the other hand, border guards who capture defectors are rewarded with promotion, Workers Party membership and recommendations to prestigious universities.

Apart from all this, the regime also installed CCTV on popular defection routes and fortified the border with barbed wire.    Read more

US official recommends pressure on North Korea human rights violations

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Speaking at the Seoul Human Rights conference, ambassador Robert King, U.S. special envoy for North Korean human rights, said, “What we’ve got to do in terms of dealing with the problems of human rights in North Korea is to look at this as a long, tough fight. I think we need continued pressure.”

King said the United States and others have pressured North Korea in various ways, and so far, the strategy has been working. Yonhap reported the U.S. official said Pyongyang is feeling the heat from the international community and a vote is to take place at the United Nations General Assembly in December on a North Korea human rights resolution.

Placing pressure on North Korea to change, however, is just one of many tasks for concerned governments, King said. Humanitarian aid should be provided in a way that can be monitored by outside observers, and in a way that assistance is properly channeled to the most vulnerable segment of the North Korean population.

King’s remarks come at a time when the U.N. General Assembly’s Third Committee is expected to address the North Korea human rights resolution.

[UPI]

German expert speculates North Korea could announce major reforms next year

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North Korean leader Kim Jong-un could announce a dramatic policy change, comparable to economic reforms that China and Vietnam embraced in the 1980s, when he convenes a rare meeting of the ruling Workers’ Party in May 2016, a German expert said Wednesday.

The last Congress of the Workers’ Party was held in 1980, when Kim’s grandfather and national founder Kim Il-sung was in power. Thus the announcement of a Congress spurred speculation as to why Kim decided to convene such a rare meeting.

Ruediger Frank, a North Korea expert at the University of Vienna, said Kim could use the meeting for a “declaration of his victory in the domestic struggle for power” after massive purges in the past years or to announce a major policy change marking the departure down a path of true reform.

“Kim Jong-un might … play it safe and, after having spent the last years cleaning the ranks of the party, military and government, will use the 7th Party Congress for a triumphant declaration of his victory in the domestic struggle for power. The country would return to a new normal and continue to muddle through,” Frank said.

“We should also remember that all major reforms of state socialism — be it in China under Deng Xiaoping, the Soviet Union under Gorbachev, or Vietnam — have been announced at such regular party congresses or related events,” he said in an article contributed to 38 North.     Read more

Policy change under Kim Jong-un

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Unlike his father and late leader Kim Jong-il who pursued “songun,” or military-first, policy, the current North Korean leader Kim Jong-un pursues the “byeongjin” policy of seeking both economic and nuclear development simultaneously.

“Kim Jong-un has from day one of his leadership declared that he wants to improve the material living conditions of his people,“ said Ruediger Frank, a North Korea expert at the University of Vienna.

He has tried to do that within the constraints of the existing system,” Frank said. “I had estimated that he would need about five years to find out that this does not work, that the system itself is the problem. The time is almost up.”

As Kim has consolidated his leadership and the economic situation in the North is relatively stable, the emerging middle class and the growing inflow of information from the outside, in particular via China, have put the regime under high pressure for reform, the expert said.

[Yonhap]

North Korea raises issue of “comfort women” with Japan

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North Korea has urged Japan to also address North Korean “comfort women” as part of the current discussion with neighboring South Korea. As many as 200,000 women, mostly from Korea and China, were forced into the Japanese Army’s brothels during World War II, though it is not known how many may currently live in North Korea.

“This issue can hardly find a final solution unless the damage suffered by all Koreans is redressed throughout Korea because there are victims of the sexual slavery of the Imperial Japanese Army not only in the south of Korea but also in the north,” said a spokesperson for North Korea’s Foreign Ministry in a statement carried by the country’s state-controlled media Korean Central News Agency.

Pyongyang has claimed compensation from Tokyo for the aggression in the past, but the latest move comes at a delicate time. North Korea is facing growing criticism for its human rights record.

Yang Moo-jin, a professor of University of North Korea Studies in Seoul, said North Korea’s focus on the comfort women issue appears to be an attempt to counter the Japanese efforts on Pyongyang’s human rights conditions. “Pyongyang might have raised the issue to try to deflect the world’s attention away from its human rights situation. …” said Yang.

Nam Gwang-gyu, a professor at Korea University, said Pyongyang might be trying to use the diplomatic row between Seoul and Tokyo to press Seoul. “North Korea can blame South Korea for any unsatisfactory results from future talks between South Korea and Japan over the comfort women issue,” said Nam.

[VoA]

North Korea says action by U.S. could lead to peace

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TIME reports North Korea saying the United States needs to end its “nuclear-based threats and blackmail” and respond to the North’s recent diplomatic overture to formally end the decades-old Korean conflict.

Speaking in an interview Tuesday in London with Associated Press Television News, senior North Korean Foreign Ministry official Jong Tong Hak said a permanent peace settlement on the Korean Peninsula first requires a North Korean-U.S. agreement.

Discussing North Korea’s view of the root cause of tensions, he blamed what he described as “the U.S. government’s decades of hostile policies against the DPRK and its endless nuclear-based threats, blackmail and manipulative schemes.” He said Washington provides “strategic nuclear weapons” to South Korea, “in other words the nuclear-powered aircraft carriers it always pushes (toward the DPRK) and the strategic nuclear bombers it always has flying in the skies above the southern part of the Korean Peninsula.”

Jong said a compromise to break the impasse requires decisive action by Washington. “The issue of signing a peace treaty between the DPRK and the United States depends on the policy determinations of the U.S. administration,” he said, adding that Washington must “make a policy decision to respect our republic’s sovereignty and end the decades-long hostility between the DPRK and the U.S. to guarantee peace in the Korean Peninsula.”

The U.S. Congress, meanwhile, is mulling whether North Korea should be designated a state sponsor of terrorism.