China steps up repatriation of North Korean refugees

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China is taking a more active role in repatriating North Korean refugees, as relations between Beijing and Seoul have deteriorated in recent weeks over the deployment of THAAD. The repatriation is a break from a trend toward “looking the other way” when North Korean defectors make their way into China, a source said.

Chinese security officers now encourage local residents to report defectors, providing award money to Chinese citizens who turn in undocumented North Koreans. Chinese public security officials are offering $150 to individuals reporting a defector. For Chinese citizens who directly apprehend and turn in a defector, the award is $300. There is also a fine of $450 for anyone assisting a North Korea refugee, according to the report.

The policy has resulted in an increase of arrests and decreased chances of a successful defection, the source said.

The source also said the new measures are connected to a recent trend by the government in Beijing to come to North Korea’s defense as China has grown increasingly critical of Seoul’s decision to deploy a U.S. anti-missile defense system on the peninsula.

[UPI]

Despite international sanctions, North Korea keeps food and fuel prices stable

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The prices of food staples and fuel are reported to have remained steady in North Korea despite coming under international pressure over Kim Jong-un’s nuclear and missile programs.

A rare set of data from the country shows that so far the UN-mandated sanctions have not hurt its ordinary people as both the prices and currency have been stable. This is seen as a contrast to the economic situation under his father Kim Jong II’s leadership.

The stability is attributed to the younger Kim’s decision to introduce a booming system of jangmadang, which translates to North Korean markets that are semi-legal but regulated. The system permits wholesalers and retailers to buy and sell imported and privately-produced goods. The number of stalls in the jangmadang has reportedly grown by hundreds, according to defectors who work for Daily NK.

“Since Kim Jong-un came to power, there has been no control or crackdown on the jangmadang,” Reuters reported Kang Mi-jin, a North Korean defector as saying. “Keeping the markets open has had a positive effect on the people. He had no other option. He can’t feed the people, and he can’t completely shut the markets down.”

The prices of rice, corn, petrol and diesel largely remained steady over the last year. The market is said to be making up for the shortfall in sales made through the country’s centrally-planned rationing system, which reportedly has not recovered from the 1990s famine that struck the North. According to a recent World Food Programme report, the state has handed out only 360gms of rations per person per day, the lowest quantity in five years.

[International Business Times]

Bangladesh expels North Korean diplomat over smuggled goods

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Bangladesh has kicked out a North Korean diplomat after he was caught smuggling more than one million cigarettes as well as electronics into the country in a shipping container, Dhaka officials said on Monday.

Han Son Ik, the first secretary of the North Korean embassy in Dhaka, has been ordered to leave the country after failing to declare the goods worth nearly half a million dollars to customs.

“We have asked North Korea to take him back for violating diplomatic norms,” Bangladesh foreign secretary Shahidul Haque told AFP, declining to give details. The goods were suspected destined for the blackmarket.

A senior customs official told AFP the North Korean used his diplomatic immunity earlier this month to import

In March last year, another North Korean diplomat was forced to apologize after he was caught at Dhaka airport trying to smuggle nearly 27 kilogrammes (60 pounds) of gold, worth $1.7 million, into the country.

Last year, a North Korean restaurant in Dhaka was shut down after officials found it was selling wine and drugs such as Viagra without permission.

[AFP]

Rio Olympics give peace a chance

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Two Koreas Olympic selfie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The power of the Olympic Games to connect and inspire is still unrivaled. And sometimes, the most impactful moments can come away from competition, like when gymnasts Hong Un-Jong of North Korea and Lee Eun-ju of South Korea (pictured on right) came together to take a selfie.

Former Kim bodyguard describes North Korean prison camp

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Dozens of purple scars crisscross Lee Young-guk’s lower legs. He says many are the result of beatings endured while imprisoned in Yoduk, North Korea’s most notorious prison camp. Removing his dentures, Lee shows just five or six original teeth, wonky and cracked; the only ones he has left after countless punches to the head. Being hit with the butt of a rifle, he says, left him blind in one eye.

Lee was the bodyguard to Kim Jong Il for more than 10 years. A once loyal servant of the regime, Lee says he left Kim’s employment without issues. While trying to defect to South Korea, he thrown into the infamously brutal Yodok political camp.

“If you are a political prisoner, Yodok’s main goal is to kill you,” he says. He remembers when he first arrived seeing inmates who looked like walking skeletons. “It was tough enough that they barely fed me,” he says. “What was worse was they kept on beating me, and they executed people once a week, which we were forced to watch. You have to be mentally strong, then the cycle repeats itself.”

In the five years between being arrested in China and his release for good behavior, Lee says he lost almost half his body weight. He says inmates were so weak from the lack of food, they were rarely able to life their heads unless ordered to do so by guards. If they were unable to complete their physical work for the day, Lee says they weren’t fed.

[CNN]

North Korea attempting to ban the crucifix?

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Britain’s Daily Express reports that North Korean government officials are confiscating items with crosses on labels and raiding shops for the markings. Clothing and hair clips are amongst items being inspected by Kim Jong-un’s regime which is opposed to organized religion.

It’s believed there are 300,000 Christians in North Korea. Many are forced to worship in secret and risk torture and death to do so. Under the country’s strict class system Christians are classed as “hostiles” receiving less food and harsher punishments.

A spokesman for Open Doors said: “Despite Christianity being strictly forbidden Open Doors estimates there are 200,000 – 400,000 Christians who worship in secret inside North Korea.

Kim Jong-un’s despotic regime is said to reserve its harshest punishments for Christians, with believers facing arrest, torture, imprisonment and death. It’s estimated 70,000 Christians are currently in prison or labor camps in North Korea because of their faith.

Defectors claim four church buildings in the capital of Pyongyang are used as showpieces by the authorities.

[Daily Express]

A summary of East Asia regional politics and tensions

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Hawkish Tomomi Inada, just installed as Japan’s defense minister, will be watched closely by China and South Korea, where Japan’s legacy of military aggression before and during World War Two remains an open wound.

Japan has already said it is upgrading its missile defenses in time for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games to counter more advanced North Korean weapons, part of increased military spending in the region that reflects worsening ties.

China is North Korea’s main ally, although Beijing disapproves of Pyongyang’s nuclear program. Japan, and Inada, may reach out to China and others as they seek to neutralize the threat to security posed by North Korea.

Japan and China both claim jurisdiction over islands in the East China Sea. Rather than confront China directly by sailing warships past its man-made island bases in the sea, Japan is providing equipment and training to the Southeast Asian nations, including the Philippines and Vietnam, which are most opposed to China’s territorial ambitions.

Lastly, Beijing’s most powerful adversary in Asia is the United States, with its Seventh Fleet operating from bases in Japan and South Korea.

[Reuters]

North Korea, slave state of the 21st Century

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The U.S. Republican Party adopted its new policy platform, calling North Korea a ‘slave state’, on July 18, the opening day of the party’s national convention. Indeed, the majority of the people in the communist country live like slaves owned by the Kim family without fundamental rights as human beings.

I experienced the life of a [North Korean] slave when I was working in Kuwait as a foreign worker, so I welcome the recent designation, albeit belated. … I worked on a residential construction site in Umm al Hayman, where an abandoned two-story school was used as lodging for North Korean workers. There were just about 20 shabby beds in each classroom and everything was in poor condition. The lodging was surrounded by a 2m-high barbed-wire fence, which was erected at the request of North Korean authorities to prevent any runaway.

We were forced to work 15 hours a day from 7 a.m. to midnight, excluding lunch and dinner breaks, under direct sunlight of the desert and with searchlight at light. What kept me going in the harsh work conditions, though, was beef soup offered with steamed rice two or three times a week. Bread was offered for lunch and noodles were offered for dinner, but the amount was not sufficient. Beef was a highly valuable food for ordinary people in North Korea, so we felt that we were privileged to eat beef soup.

We worked hard, expecting to earn $120 of the promised monthly pay and send it to family members at home. However, we could not receive any money even after a few months of labor. The manager responded to the angry workers by saying “The company is in financial trouble” or “There is no order from the party to give you a pay”. Upset, the workers criticized the ‘company’, but no one blamed the ‘Workers Party’ of Pyongyang. They did not and could not dispraise the party, because they knew that the party was equal to the supreme leader and they were also afraid of further trouble.

[Read Rim Il’s full OpEdNews article]

China and Russia developing their own missile defense systems

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During a regular Ministry of National Defense press briefing July 28, China’s Senior Colonel Yang Yujun said that Beijing is “deeply dissatisfied” and “firmly opposed” to the U.S.’s proposed THAAD deployment. He said, “We will pay close attention to the relevant actions of the US and [South Korea] and will take necessary measures to maintain national strategic security as well as regional equilibrium.”

At the monthly press briefing, Yang indicated that China is developing its own missile defense system. He stated that “to develop suitable capabilities of missile defense is necessary for China to maintain national security and improve defense capabilities.”

Yang’s statements on THAAD and China’s missile defense capabilities suggest that China is preparing to take action in order to shift the regional balance of power in its favor. What is troubling for the US and the ROK is that China may not do this alone.

At the fourth China-Russia Northeast Asia security consultation in Moscow last Thursday, China and Russia agreed to “proactively consider strengthening bilateral coordinating measures” to counter the threat posed by THAAD. During the meeting, Chinese and Russian representatives argued that the deployment of THAAD “will exert negative influence upon the strategic balance, security and stability in the world and in the region.”

At the fifth World Peace Forum held in mid-July, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Yesui said that the coverage and capabilities of THAAD would exceed the needs of the Korean Peninsula and undermine the strategic and security interests of other regional actors. Zhang also argued that this missile defense system will “harm the strategic balance in the region” and “aggravate the armament race,” severely impacting regional and global stability.