Category: Humanitarian Aid and Relief

Cut off food aid to North Korea entirely or double down?

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Excerpts of Guardian opinion by Steven Weber, professor of political science at UC Berkeley:

Societies choose between spending to defend what they have, increasing current consumption, and building for the future. For decades now, the world has been subsidizing North Korea’s choice to invest massively in defense at the expense of both investment and current consumption.

Humanitarian fatigue may not be humanity’s most admirable trait, but it’s a real one and it’s not likely to be reversed unless the North Korean regime delivers something positive on security. And that’s less likely to happen if we keep the regime on slowly diminishing life support.

There are better choices: One would be to cut off aid entirely and force Pyongyang’s hand. The other would be to massively increase food aid so that the population actually receives sufficient calories to thrive.

Both strategies have obvious risks. Cut off aid and North Korea could strike out as a last ditch effort to force our hand in return. But Pyongyang might also be forced to spend more resources growing and buying food.

Double down on aid and North Korea might take advantage and happily divert yet more of its resources into the military. But it might also take the signal of peaceful intentions as an opportunity to go further in its ever-so-slight opening to the world.

[The Guardian]

Stop funding food aid to North Korea?

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Excerpts of Guardian opinion by Jang Jin-sung, once one of Kim Jong-il’s favorite state poets until he defected in 2004:

North Korean exiles will tell you that the international community must stop funding food aid. We say this for pragmatic and humanitarian reasons.

Today, the fatal threat for the regime lies not in the outside world, but within the country itself. More specifically, this is the jangmadang – an underground economy arisen from the ashes of economic collapse in the 1990s, and which consist of market activities taking place beyond the remit of the regime’s control mechanisms.

This fundamental transformation from below, the notion that lives may be lived outside the domain of loyalty to the system, is the greatest imminent threat to the regime’s power – which is held in place by inculcating the cult of the Kim dynasty, surveillance controls and the coercive mobilization of its subjects.

In today’s North Korea there are two rival forces in battle: the forces of the regime and the forces of the market. The former’s interests are better served by the maintenance of existing party, military and surveillance mechanisms of control. The latter are equivalent to North Korea’s progressives, who believe in a future that is possible beyond the absolute, stifling and structurally inhumane confines of the regime.

An international community wishing to assist the North Korean people should recognize that funding food aid is a channel of limited efficiency. The majority of North Koreans depend not on the regime’s munificence but on market forces – they have already found this a more successful alternative, despite a disproportionate lack of international support or awareness. Even at times when the regime is calling for food aid, it does not mean that the jangmadang will not have food on offer, whether stolen from state cooperatives or smuggled in from China.

[The Guardian]

Feeding North Koreans an ethical conundrum

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Excerpts of Guardian opinion by Marcus Noland, director of studies at the Peterson Institute for International Economics:

The most recent UNICEF survey suggests that 10% of the country’s two-year-olds are afflicted with severe stunting. Stunting of that degree at that age is irrecoverable and confers a lifetime of physical and mental challenges.

When the country finally admitted in 1995 that it was facing famine, the international community responded with considerable generosity, at one point feeding roughly a third of the population. But the North Korean government has never accepted the international norms in the provision of aid, impeding normal assessment, monitoring, and evaluation functions of the relief organizations.

Critically, with assistance ramping up, the government cut commercial grain imports – in essence using humanitarian aid as a form of balance of payments support, freeing up resources to finance the importation of advanced military weaponry.

The resources needed to close the hunger gap could be closed for something in the order of $8-19m — less than 0.2% of national income or one per cent of the military budget.

We evidently care more about hungry North Koreans than their government does. We should provide assistance. But we should be clear-eyed about the terms of that engagement and seek to provide aid in ways consistent with our values and our obligations under international law.

Should the world continue to fund food aid to North Korea?

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For nearly three decades, a chronic food emergency has gripped North Korea. In the 1990s a famine killed up to five per cent of the pre-crisis population.

Pyongyang presses on with its nuclear programme and prestige projects while millions remain malnourished. The long-running food crisis is the outcome of decades of economic mismanagement and a political system that absolves its leadership of any real accountability.

Humanitarian activities by the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) and private relief groups constitute the longest ongoing engagement between the hermit state and the international community. But the North Korean regime’s actions create an ethical conundrum which may be reaching its breaking point.

Donor fatigue has set in. The WFP’s assistance requests are grossly undersubscribed and the organization may be forced to shut down its remaining programme. And if it tries to soldier on with reduced resources, its ability to monitor its own activities will be badly affected, risking aid diversion and catastrophic scandal.

[The Guardian]

American Matthew Miller to be tried in North Korean court Sept 14

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Detained American Matthew Miller will be tried next Sunday, North Korean state media said, less than a week after the detainee made a rare foreign media appearance to plead for help.

Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency said in a brief dispatch Sunday that the Supreme Court decided to “judge” Miller on Sept. 14. It did not elaborate on specific charges against him, although past reports have accused him of hostile acts.

Miller, 24, was detained after entering the country April 10, when he tore up his tourist visa at the airport and shouted that he wanted to seek asylum, Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency has reported.

In a brief interview with The Associated Press in Pyongyang last week, Miller and two other Americans held by North Korea, Jeffrey Fowle and Kenneth Bae, called for Washington to send a high-ranking U.S. representative to make a direct appeal for their freedom.

Miller said he has met with the Swedish ambassador and been allowed to make phone calls to his relatives.

[AP]

No new insights from former U.S. special representative for North Korea policy

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Americans Kenneth Bae, Matthew Miller and Jeffrey Fowle are all imprisoned in North Korea on different charges. It’s unclear what it will take to secure their release. Visits from high-level officials have worked in such situations in the past. David Greene of NPR spoke with Stephen Bosworth, who served as U.S. special representative for North Korea policy during President Obama’s first term. Some excerpts from their conversation:

NPR: So what is your take on the tactics being employed by North Korea? They presented the Americans to the media in carefully staged interviews. What are they up to?

Bosworth: Well, first I think we don’t know very much about what they’re really up to – we have suspicions. But dealing with this government in North Korea is not easy. It’s very complicated, and we frankly don’t know much about their decision-making process under the current leader Kim Jong Un. We understood his father a little bit, but with him we’ve had much less experience.

NPR: So they appear to be using these Americans as bargaining chips.

Bosworth: That’s right. I think this is a way for them to try to get our attention. They’ve clearly been trying to get the attention of the Obama administration to reengage in some form of dialogue over the last several months. And so far the administration has not been willing to do that. They’ve been insisting that North Korea has to, in advance, demonstrate that it’s serious about its commitment to denuclearization.

NPR: And is there any reason to believe it’s possible to negotiate with the current leadership there? You have some experience dealing with them on these issues.

Bosworth: Yeah, I think it’s always possible to negotiate. It depends on what your objective is and what their objective is. As I said, in this case I think they want to get our attention. I feel very sorry for these people who have been detained in North Korea. It’s not a pleasant place to be if you’re a prisoner, but it’s not clear to me that the North Koreans are at this point prepared to negotiate seriously on this. And I don’t know who they would find acceptable to go there. In the past, that sort of high-level visit has worked, but it’s probably some political risk.

NPR: Given all that, what’s your sense of the U.S. strategy to secure the release of its citizens at this point?

Bosworth: Well, I think we’ve tried to send Bob King, the special representative for human rights in North Korea. He was ready to get on a plane in Tokyo and go there and presumably bring them back when, for reasons that are not clear to me at least, the North Koreans cancelled his trip. This was four, five months ago.

What North Korea wants in return for 3 American hostages

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North Korean officials whisked a CNN team away in a van, and hours later, they were presented with three Americans held captive in the reclusive country.

Like virtually everything in Pyongyang, the interviews were carefully managed by the regime. Each man had exactly five minutes to speak. Some of their statements seemed eerily similar.

Kenneth Bae - Matthew Miller - Jeffrey FowleSo what was the government’s motive in letting Kenneth Bae, Matthew Todd Miller and Jeffrey Edward Fowle address the world?

“First of all, their motivation always behind these interviews has been to gather U.S. attention and then try to pave a way for high-level dialogue with Washington,” said Ellen Kim of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“Their negotiating ploy with the U.S. is to try to get us to agree to nuclear arms control, to sort of accept them as a nuclear weapons state — which we can’t do,” said Michael Green of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Another possibility: That North Korea wants sanctions against the regime lifted.

Victor Cha, the North Korea adviser to former President George W. Bush, said the presentation of all three Americans at once could be telling. “My guess is the fact that all three of them were put on tape for an American audience on Labor Day as a signal from the North Koreans that they’re looking for some sort of package deal to try to get them all out,” Cha said. “Whether they’re trying to connect this to the long-style nuclear negotiations is anybody’s guess.”

It’s apparent the three men are now being used by North Korea as “bargaining chips,” said Bill Richardson, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who has traveled to the isolated country. “They’re sending a signal, saying, ‘We’re ready to bargain for the three hostages.'”

[CNN]

Americans held in North Korea interviewed by CNN

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North Korea allowed three American prisoners to speak briefly with Western reporters Monday. Kenneth Bae, Matthew Miller and Jeffrey Edward Fowle described their time in captivity and appealed in interviews with CNN and the Associated Press. The three said they did not know they were going to be interviewed until immediately beforehand. All said they believe the only solution to their situation is for a U.S. representative to come to North Korea to make a direct appeal.

Who are the three men being held by North Korean authorities?

  • Jeffrey Edward Fowle, 56, arrived in North Korea on April 29. He is accused of leaving a Bible in a nightclub in the northern port city of Chongjin. Fowle is from Miamisburg, Ohio, and works in a municipal street department. His wife, Tatyana, is from Russia, and they have three children ages 9, 10 and 12.
  • Matthew Miller, 24, of Bakersfield, Calif., was detained as he tried to enter the country April 10, according to Korean Central News Agency, North Korea’s state news agency. The agency said that Miller had a tourist visa for North Korea and tore it up and said he was seeking asylum.
  • Kenneth Bae, 46, a Korean-American Christian missionary, has been held since being detained in the North Korean city of Rason, on the border with China, in late 2012. He was sentenced to 15 years hard labor on charges of state subversion by trying to establish a proselytizing network inside the country. Bae was born in South Korea and came to the United States as a teenager. He lived for a time in Snohomish County, Wash., where a sister lives. Bae has acknowledged being a missionary and said he conducted services in North Korea, according to an audio sermon and note posted on the website of a Korean Presbyterian church in St. Louis, Reuters reported.

CNN interview with Kenneth Bae

The process of getting defectors’ remittances to North Korea

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The number of North Korean refugees now in South Korea who remit money to their families still in the North is rising.

“Some 15,000 North Korean refugees have settled in the country, and over 6,000 of them are remitting money to North Korea,” a government official said. “We understand the size of the remittances is also growing.” An official with a refugee organization said there must be more than 10,000 who remit money to their families in the North.

Remittance routes are clandestine. Money is remitted to a Chinese broker, who contacts another in North Korea, who pays the recipient with his own money and settles the account with the Chinese broker later, leaving no documentary trail.

Currencies are usually American dollars and Chinese yuan. Commissions range between 15 and 20 percent, according to sources. “Remittances through brokers designated by North Koreans generally reach the recipient without a hitch, but Chinese brokers contacted in China are liable to steal the money,” a refugee said. The brokers handle tens of millions of dollars and are linked to organized gangs.

In the past, remittances required enormous bribes. First a man had to be sent to North Korea to bribe guards, with commissions exceeding 40 percent. But with the emergence of remittance brokers and the establishment of an organized system, the amount of money that reaches North Korean families has increased substantially.

The North Korean won is practically worthless in international exchange. $1000 would be the equivalent of 100 years’ worth of earnings and buys two apartments in places like Chongjin, North Hamgyeong Province, or Hamhung, South Hamgyeong Province.

[Chosun Ilbo]

United Nations’ Food Aid Program for North Korea lacks funding to continue

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The United Nations’ food assistance agency says it may have to stop operating in North Korea because of a lack of funding, as donors continue to shy away from the rogue state.

Giving aid to North Korea is politically sensitive, particularly in light of the widely held view that Pyongyang is able to feed its people but is instead developing its military capabilities.

The World Food Programme has distributed aid in North Korea since a famine in the mid-1990s, but the amount has steadily dropped over the past decade as Pyongyang defied the international community’s calls to stop nuclear tests. In 2001, it distributed 900,000 metric tons of food in North Korea; in 2013, the figure was 46,000 metric tons, the agency says.

The WFP, which is funded by voluntary contributions from private donors and U.N. member states, says North Korea continues to face regular food shortages. The agency says more than 80% of North Korean households don’t eat adequately during the so-called lean season from May to August, with many limiting portions or adding water to food.

The WFP works in North Korea through a partnership with the government. Since 1998, the WFP has been producing fortified biscuits enriched with vitamins and minerals in 14 government-operated factories across the country. But now only two of these factories are now operational, Mr. Oshidari said.

A lack of funding has also forced the WFP to scale back a two-year, $200 million operation aimed at feeding 2.4 million of women and children in North Korea. Mr. Oshidari said the program is now targeting 1.8 million women and children because of cutbacks. “Without further donor support, the WFP’s nutrition-based programs are at risk.”

[Wall Street Journal]