Category: Kim Jong Un

North Korea’s missile tests raise stakes for Trump’s personal diplomacy with Kim

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North Korea’s return to missile testing after a long hiatus raises the stakes for President Trump ahead of planned nuclear negotiations, undermining his claim that his personal relationship with dictator Kim Jong Un has reduced the threat from North Korea and made Asian allies safer.

The short-range weapons are a threat to U.S. allies South Korea and Japan, or potentially to U.S. forces in the region. North Korea says its testing is a warning to South Korea, which is resuming joint military exercises with the United States in August and is also acquiring American F-35 stealth fighter jets.

The challenge from Kim to Trump is also clear and appears aimed at squeezing concessions from the U.S. leader when negotiators meet after months of delay. That session is expected soon, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Tuesday.

In an interview Wednesday evening on Fox Business Network, national security adviser John Bolton said the tests do not break a pledge Kim made to Trump that he would not test intercontinental ballistic missiles. He added a note of caution, “You have to ask if, when, the real diplomacy is going to begin, when the working-level discussions on denuclearization will begin.”

Trump downplayed a similar launch last week, saying many nations test short-range weapons. “My relationship with Kim Jong Un is a very good one, as I’m sure you’ve seen,” Trump said Tuesday, hours before the latest launch. “We’ll see what happens. I can’t tell you what’s going to happen. I know one thing: that if [Hillary Clinton] was president … you would be in a major war right now with North Korea.” Trump added, “I have a good relationship with [Kim Jong Un]. I like him; he likes me,” Trump said Tuesday. “We’ll see what happens.”

Kim’s calculation may be that the tests unnerve and weaken both the United States and South Korea, but that Trump would not retaliate by canceling talks or taking other actions so long as Kim does not directly confront or insult him.

[Washington Post]

Trump tells North Korean defector he’ll bring up Christian persecution in talks with Kim Jong Un

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After Donald Trump became the first sitting president to step foot in North Korea last month, many human rights groups have advocated for future talks to include human rights abuses committed by dictator Kim Jong Un, something absent from previous talks.

A few days ago, President Trump told a North Korean defector he would bring up religious persecution in his ongoing talks with Communist North Korea, which outlaws Christianity.

Ilyong Ju, a Christian from North Korea, one of 27 survivors of religious persecution invited to the Oval Office, shared his family’s story: “My aunt, all of my aunt’s family…are in political prison camp now…just because my aunt’s father-in-law was a Christian.”

Ju, a LiNK Advocacy Fellow, shared, “and my cousin’s whole family were executed because of their sharing the gospel.”

Trump shook his head and mouthed what appeared to be “awful.”

“But even though the persecution of Kim Jong Un, … North Korean citizens …want the gospel and they are worshiping in underground churches right now. …”

“I’m understanding exactly what you’re saying,” Trump said. “I’ll bring it up.”

Ju responded: “Yes, please.”

[Fox News]

North Korean economy tanks as sanctions and drought bite

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North Korea’s economy shrank in 2018 for a second straight year, and by the most in 21 years, as it was battered by international sanctions aimed at stopping its nuclear programme and by drought, South Korea’s central bank said on Friday.
– North Korea’s gross domestic product (GDP) contracted by 4.1% last year in real terms, the worst since 1997 and the second consecutive year of decline.
– Their international trade fell 48.4% in value in 2018 as toughened international sanctions cut exports by nearly 90%, the worst loss in exports since the central bank started publishing data nearly 30 years ago.
– Output in the mining sector shrank 17.8% because of sanctions on exports of coal and minerals, while the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sector contracted by 1.8% because of drought.

North Korea’s population, estimated at 25.13 million, has a per head annual income of $1,298, the South Korean central bank said.

The United States and South Korea say tightening international sanctions over North Korea’s nuclear weapon and ballistic missile programmes have been instrumental in leader Kim Jong Un’s decision to pursue denuclearisation talks with the United States.

Last week, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said rates of malnutrition and disease were increasing in North Korea as it faces a harvest that is half of what was expected. James Belgrave, an official at the U.N. World Food Programme who visited North Korea in April, said recently that there had been a drop of up to 20% in North Korea’s wheat and barley production due to an early dry spell.

[Nikkei Asian Review]

Trump is letting Kim Jong Un do almost anything he wants

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In just the past week, North Korea has unveiled a brand new submarine that could potentially launch nuclear weapons and tested two short-range missiles that gravely threaten US allies South Korea and Japan.

The casual observer could understandably expect President Donald “fire and fury” Trump and his hawkish administration to respond forcefully to these new provocations. But the opposite has happened: They’re taking the barrage with a degree of calm virtually unseen before from this administration. In fact, they’re actively downplaying — and in some cases even defending — North Korea’s actions.

Trump told Fox News’s Sean Hannity that Kim’s missile tests didn’t worry him at all. “They haven’t done nuclear testing, they really haven’t tested missiles other than, you know, smaller ones, which is something that lots [of countries] test,” he said.

That view is fairly consistent with his past statements: As long as Kim doesn’t test a nuclear weapon or a long-range missile, Trump is happy. … The potential problem, though, is that the Trump administration’s approach could produce more issues down the line.

“Maybe they’re picking their battles to focus on resuming much-needed negotiations for a deal,” Duyeon Kim, a North Korea expert at the Korean Peninsula Future Forum in Seoul, told me. “But [they’re] telling South Korea and Americans living there that they don’t matter.”

The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that the US Defense Intelligence Agency assesses that North Korea may have produced 12 nuclear weapons since Trump and Kim first shook hands in Singapore last year. That, added to the new potentially nuclear-launching submarine and further-tested missiles, means Kim has a greater arsenal at his disposal now than when his diplomacy with Trump started.

[Vox]

North Koreans’ view of the USA

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In June 2018, a historic summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump took place, the first time a sitting U.S. president met face-to-face with a North Korean leader.

Alek Sigley an Australian student who studied at Kim Il Sung University, was in Pyongyang at the time and said there was immense interest in the summit among locals, who followed the extensive coverage of the big event on North Korea’s state-run media.

In the days leading up to the summit, Sigley said he saw long lines of people on the streets of Pyongyang waiting to collect their copies of the daily newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, which serves as the chief organ of the country’s ruling Workers’ Party of Korea. Sigley said he also had conversations with his North Korean classmates, who expressed hope that better relations with the United States could lead to sanctions relief and perhaps a peace treaty with South Korea to formally end the war.

The day after the summit, photos of Trump and Kim appeared on the front page of the Rodong Sinmun, and a documentary about the summit was featured another day later on North Korea’s state-owned broadcaster, Korean Central Television.

Sigley asked his North Korean roommate at the time how locals were reacting to the outcome of the summit. He told Sigley that they viewed it as a success on the part of their leader but were still awaiting actual change, particularly in sanctions. “People were still quite skeptical,” Sigley told ABC News.

“But then I noticed, after some time, there started to be quite a change in attitude.” In the days after the summit, Sigley said the state media toned down the anti-U.S. rhetoric and even some anti-American propaganda posted in prominent places around central Pyongyang were taken down. “There was a slogan board that said, ‘If the U.S. imperialists strike us again, we will wipe them from the face of the earth.’ That slogan board was removed,” Sigley said.

“There was another slogan board that had a picture of the White House being obliterated,” he added. “That one was taken down actually before the summit happened.” Sigley was also surprised by the impact the summit had on the attitudes of his North Korean teachers and classmates, who all described it as a “new era” and “the end” of decades of animosity with the United States. It was the first time Sigley saw some “genuine hope” that U.S.-North Korea relations could improve, he said.

Since the second Trump-Kim summit that took place in February in Vietnam? “I can still see a lot of the, like, distrust of Americans, which is historical, you know, because they remember the war,” Sigley told ABC News. “But there was more optimism than I’d ever seen before.”

[Read full ABC News article]

The case for humanitarian aid to North Korea

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Since the impromptu meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un late last month, there have been signs the United States may be prepared to make major concessions—including, so the rumors go, easing economic sanctions—in exchange for a North Korean freeze on some weapons development.

Clearly, Pyongyang would welcome any moves to ease economic sanctions, since news reports suggest that North Korea may once again be facing serious food shortages, and calls from the United Nations for the world to provide humanitarian assistance have grown. For U.S. policymakers, though, sending aid is far from an open-and-shut case. Historically, the United States and other democratic countries have provided help intended for the North Korean people. But such assistance has not always gone to those who needed it most, and Pyongyang strongly resists any kind of international monitoring to try to make sure it does.

Even so, the United States should open its pocketbook. U.S. aid will certainly not fundamentally alter the regime’s posture on security issues, nor will it resolve North Korea’s long-term problems without fundamental reforms to its system of government. But at its core, providing food and medical assistance is an issue of morality and humanity.

In May, the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report stating that some 10.9 million people in the country—approximately 43 percent of the population—suffer from food insecurity, and nearly as many lack access to water, sanitation, and hygiene services. Ten million North Koreans lack access to safe drinking water, and the U.N. estimates that 16 percent do not have access to basic sanitation. Meanwhile, UNICEF notes that while there has been some improvement in recent years, one in five North Korean children suffers from stunted growth.

Natural disasters have aggravated these conditions, but the sad truth is that much of this human misery is manmade. North Korea is a land rich in resources and human capital. Government policies and political ideologies, not droughts or floods, are responsible for the suffering. The simplest proof of this is to contrast North and South Korea. The democratic, free-market South is the 11th most prosperous economy in the world. Recent data on per capita gross domestic product is estimated at $1,700 in the North, versus $37,600 in the South. Both sides of the border have similar geographies and climates.

President Trump has dramatically reduced tensions, but to induce Pyongyang to denuclearize, he’s going to have to offer more. Providing humanitarian assistance shouldn’t be thought of as a lever to bring about political change in North Korea. While North Korea’s government may have a callous attitude toward its people, Americans believe that every life has value. Right now, lives are at stake. We can help to save them, and we should.

[Foreign Policy]

North Korea suffering worst downturn likely since 1990s Famine

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How much are sanctions hurting Kim Jong Un? North Korea’s economy hasn’t been in such bad shape since his father was battling floods, droughts and a famine that some estimates say killed as much as 10% of the population.

While North Korea’s isolation, secrecy and dearth of official statistics make estimates difficult, the economy probably contracted more than 5% last year, according to Kim Byung-yeon, an economics professor at Seoul National University. “As long as sanctions remain, time is on the U.S. side,” said Kim. “Sanctions are the most effective means to draw North Korea into negotiations, so they should not be lifted or eased without major progress on denuclearization.” Read more

A decline of 5% would mean that international curbs on North Korean trade — measures crucially backed by China — have put the country on its weakest economic footing since 1997. (Back then, the isolated nation was reeling from policy missteps under Kim Jong Il and a famine so bad some defectors reported rumors of cannibalism.)

The Bank of Korea estimated a 3.5% contraction in 2017, leaving North Korea an economy roughly the size of the U.S. state of Vermont. The South Korean central bank’s annual report on its northern neighbor — due for release later this month — will provide a fresh look at the impact of U.S. President Donald Trump’s pressure campaign just as the two sides prepare to restart talks.

One thing sanctions aren’t doing: stopping Kim from developing the nuclear arsenal that prompted his showdown with Trump. (The cost launching the more than 30 ballistic missiles Kim Jong Un has tested since taking power in 2011 comes in at about $100 million, according to estimates by South Korea’s defense ministry.) Nevertheless, Trump is counting on the economic pressure to compel Kim to compromise.

[Bloomberg]

Statistics on North Korea: Sanctions bite

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North Korea is heavily reliant on China, which accounts for about 90% of the country’s trade. And Beijing’s decision to support tougher international sanctions against North Korea following its sixth nuclear test in September 2017 has put severe pressure on the economy.

  • China’s imports from North Korea have slowed to a trickle, falling about 90% year on year in 2018, according to the Korea International Trade Association.
  • The drying up of hard currency due to plunging trade is potentially creating an “economic crisis” for Kim, the state-run Korea Development Institute in Sejong, said earlier this month.
  • Exports of food and fuel from China to the North have also tumbled. The fuel crunch has exacerbated decades of economic stagnation. North Korea’s oil consumption has fallen by about 80% from 1991 to 2017, according to the United Nations World Food Program (WFP).
  • Less fuel has meant less diesel to run farm tractors and irrigation pumps, hitting farms already affected by droughts last summer. Last year, farmers had a little less than 90 milliliters (3 fluid ounces) of fuel a day to farm an area about the size of two soccer fields, according to calculations based on WFP data.
  • The sanctions have led to shortages of other necessary agricultural items, including machinery and spare parts, and farm output has dropped in the provinces that make up North Korea’s southern and western breadbaskets, the World Food Program and Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations said in a May assessment.
  • Paddy production declined at least 17% last year in South Hwanghae and North Pyongan provinces, regions that together account for half of North Korea’s rice.

In April, Kim Jong Un replaced his prime minister and leading technocrat Pak Pong Ju with Kim Jae Ryong, a veteran overseer of one of North Korea’s most impoverished provinces whose reputation for weathering tough times suggests leader Kim may also see a need to dig in rather than experiment should the sanctions continue.

[Bloomberg]

Chinese leader urged Trump to ease North Korea sanctions ‘in due course’

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Chinese President Xi Jinping urged U.S. President Donald Trump last month at the G20 summit in Osaka to show flexibility in dealings with North Korea and ease sanctions on the country “in due course,” China’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

China signed up for strict U.N. sanctions following repeated North Korean nuclear and missile tests but also has suggested they could be eased as a reward for good behavior.

A senior U.S. official said U.S. policy continued to be to maintain sanctions on North Korea until it gives up its nuclear weapons.

After Trump recently met Kim at the Demilitarized Zone along the North’s border with South Korea, Trump announced that both sides would set up teams to push forward stalled talks aimed at getting North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons. US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, said they would likely happen “sometime in July.”

[Reuters]

North Korean defectors head back to school in the South to ‘re-educate’ themselves

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North Korea claims a 100 per cent literacy rate and boasts that its free compulsory education indicates the superiority of its socialist system. But those who escape from the impoverished country often struggle in the South from a lack of basic knowledge.

One of the first things North Korean defector Ri Kwang-myong, 31, did after reaching the South was to go back to school – 12 years after finishing his education.  Ri is among a handful of adult students at Wooridul School in Seoul, an educational haven for North Korean students too old, or lagging academically and so unable to go to appropriate state schools.

One of the most important subjects in the North Korean education curriculum is revolutionary studies, which focuses on the ruling Kim family. Lee Mi-yeon, a former kindergarten teacher in the North who fled in 2010, said: “The [Kim family] are taught as mythical, God-like figures who created the country and made grenades out of pine cones.”

And for many, education is also disrupted by grinding poverty or their long journey to freedom. Lee Song-hee, a 27-year-old student at Wooridul School, said that after only four months of junior school in the North she had to drop out to help her mother as they struggled to earn a living.

At the very least, once in South Korea re-education in culture, language, social studies and history is essential.

[South China Morning Post]