Archive for November, 2004
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 10:11 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
I have company in raising the question, at least when you’re not talking about Israeli politics in frigging Hebrew. You don’t call a Hispanic-American leftist a Fidelista simply because he’s Hispanic.
Two guys walk into a bar. Both have identical political views. Both vote Republican. One’s Jewish, one isn’t. Which one gets called a “likudnik?” The one who’s part of the Israeli fifth column, silly. And we know who that is, don’t we (wink, wink)?
I spent seven and a half years serving in the Army of the one country to which I have any loyalty–this one. Call me an anything-nik, and I promise to tear off your head and shit down your neck.
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 10:07 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
. . . or the sneakier “Made in DPRK” will be the marking on stuff made in Kaesong. So just how much embodied slave labor would it take to make a product carry that label? What if, the leather and plastic come from South Korea and the cutting and stitching are done in the North? Two years ago it was already common to see North Korean stuff for sale in Seoul. I remember several specific examples–walnuts, shoes, generators. The opportunities for laundering are endless. That’s why Korea and China are both on my “don’t buy it unless there’s no other choice” list.
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 10:07 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
. . . or the sneakier “Made in DPRK” will be the marking on stuff made in Kaesong. So just how much embodied slave labor would it take to make a product carry that label? What if, the leather and plastic come from South Korea and the cutting and stitching are done in the North? Two years ago it was already common to see North Korean stuff for sale in Seoul. I remember several specific examples–walnuts, shoes, generators. The opportunities for laundering are endless. That’s why Korea and China are both on my “don’t buy it unless there’s no other choice” list.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 30, 2004 at 6:49 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
(Sankei News Service) Unnamed sources in China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs have confirmed that a single bullet fired by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas in November 1963 has struck a third major political leader–North Korea’s Kim Jong Il. The latest relevation puts to rest persistent rumors stemming from the disappearance of Kim’s portraits from prominent public venues in North Korea. (Full story)
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 30, 2004 at 3:04 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
I will print the nearly unedited correspondence between Rev. Douglas Shin and Dr. Vollertsen for you to add to your own mix of information. Clearly, however, the South Korean government is desperately worried that the nascent North Korean human rights movement has cost South Korea needed international support for its appeasement policy. It looks like that desperation has led them to the verge of what is either a colossal blunder or an ill-conceived bluff–banning Norbert Vollertsen from Korea. Here’s the correspondence:
Norbert, Good to hear that you’re back in. Even better to know that the Seoul gov’t again lacked the guts to block your re-entry. So shall we play a relatively harmless tourist/filmmaker for the next few months? I’m sure you’ve read about my press conference in LA on your upcoming film–”the Last Days of Kim Jong Il (by Norbert Vollertsen)” or something like that. It’s on Yonhap News (English) too. The temporary date forHollywood press conference/presale with 3-5 minutes trailer is mid-January. [ ] BTW they gave me visa at the SK Consulate here in LA even though I wrote in my visa application “NK human rights and democratization activities” as my purpose of entry. See you soon. [ ]
Blessings, Doug
* * * * *
Hi Doug, I was detained in Pusan for 10 hours. Thanks to Donalds activities and Chosun Ilbo now on the way to Seoul…. Got a “Notice” that I shall stay away from any political activities etc. only act as a tourist - so at the next press conference will act as a “tourist”. Please infrom the journalists. Best regards, Norbert
Clearly, these guys have no respect for censorship.
Let me be perfectly honest about my regard for Roh Moo Hyun. I wish him nothing but ill, at least politically speaking. Not only would I like to see him hang himself, politically speaking, I’d be willing to braid, knot, coil, and hand-deliver the rope if I could. So, Roh, please, please ban Norbert Vollertsen. Not only would that scissor off diplomatic relations with the U.S. Congress, but it might even cause more human rights friction with squishy Old Europe (“friction” and “squishy”: I promise never to put those two words in the same sentence again, k?). I think the immediate setbacks for Dr. Vollertsen’s cause would be greatly outweighed by the long-term benefits, which are:
First, it would disabuse more Americans of their lingering Cold War misconceptions–prolonged by the facade of Korean troops hiding behind the protection of Kurdish irregulars in the safest part of Iraq–that South Korea remains an ally and moral kindred spirit.
Second, it would preempt the State Department’s ability to obstruct a tougher line on North Korea in the name of our “alliance” with South Korea.
Third, it would weaken calls for more delays in U.S. troop withdrawals, which means fewer targets for North Korean artillery and more strategic flexibility for the U.S. to pursue its own interests.
Fourth, it might alarm another sizeable bloc of Korean voters into breaking with the Uri Party and handing them another beating in the next parliamentary elections.
Finally, I suspect that Norbert’s physical presence in Korea is unnecessary to his effectivness as a gadfly and general media magnet. I suspect he’d attract just as much press in Japan, perhaps more. I also suspect that his following in Korea has a fairly low ceiling, given Korea’s inherent nationalist affinity for the North and the state-sanctioned softening of North Korea’s image. Dr. Vollertsen’s expulsion would roil up a wave of bad P.R. for both Seoul and Pyongyang, leading to the retelling of Norbert’s skin graft story, of how he was beaten by the South Koreans at the DMZ and by North Koreans in Taegu, the fact that during both incidents, the KNP cops stood by (apparently checking themselves for rectal polyps) as they always seem to do when Pyongyang’s thugs get busy (more on that here). These and other sympathetic aspects of Dr. Vollertsen’s story are sometimes forgetten among some of his more incendiary statements.
Norbert and Doug may disagree, but expulsion might be the best thing to happen to them and their cause. It would be an unequivocal statement of ambiguity about who is really in charge in Seoul.
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 1:49 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
(Sankei News Service) Unnamed sources in China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs have confirmed that a single bullet fired by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas in November 1963 has struck a third major political leader–North Korea’s Kim Jong Il. The latest relevation puts to rest persistent rumors stemming from the disappearance of Kim’s portraits from prominent public venues in North Korea. (Full story)
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 1:49 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
(Sankei News Service) Unnamed sources in China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs have confirmed that a single bullet fired by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas in November 1963 has struck a third major political leader–North Korea’s Kim Jong Il. The latest relevation puts to rest persistent rumors stemming from the disappearance of Kim’s portraits from prominent public venues in North Korea. (Full story)
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 30, 2004 at 11:37 am · Filed under Uncategorized
An unnamed LiNK correspondent from Seoul sent me some, umm, links to press coverage of the human rights symposium. I will put these into the blender with other comments I’ve received.
The Joongang Ilbo gave the meeting generally favorable coverage; the South Korean students, however, seem disinterested by all accounts, even LiNK’s. I also smirked a little at this quote from Park Il-Hwan, one of the good guys: “Students in Korea look at the North Korean situation differently from Korean students who grew up abroad.” Heh? Funny, I always considered them Americans who happen to be of Korean descent, not that many Koreans are likely to claim that kind of suzerainty over my little Hebrew-Altaics, but then again, I’m still waiting for my piece of the action in that whole global banking scheme thingy. I know–how damn sensitive of me.
The Korea Times’s story grated on me for its emphasis on how non-partisan this issue is supposed to be, to the exclusion of actually remembering what the issue is. Fine, dandy, and okely-dokely, but if I did an MRI on Adrian Hong’s brain, I’m guessing that (1) that wasn’t the main point of the symposium (at least judging by its title), and (2) the “non-political” label is mostly a necessary disclaimer. Fact is, the emphasis on North Korean human rights does vary greatly by party, and I’m not personally ready to stay my poison pen from stabbing a prison tattoo into the sorry hides of those who never lifted a gavel to help us to, say, pass the NKHRA. In America, the support for the issue is bipartisan but far more uniformly enthusiastic among Republicans. There are 2 1/2 major political parties in Korea: the reinvented center-right Grand National Party mentions the issue when it’s expedient; the ruling leftist Uri Party does its best to bury the issue completely; and the Democratic Labor Party is probably gagging and dragging defectors back to Pyongyang itself for self-criticism and rehabilitative labor. Keeping the issue overtly non-partisan is a smart tactic and the just what I’d expect from a mensch like Adrian Hong, but it’s a pretty leaky journalistic vessel for pouring in the contents of (nearly) the whole seminar.
Contrast that with Andrew Petty’s piece in The Korea Herald, which I’ve already noted below. Andrew’s article mentions the partisanship issue, too, but starts by putting the emphasis on the main issue, gives a voice to both sides, lets the actors speak for themselves, and lets the protagonist go first:
Word of the U.S. North Korean Human Rights Act has spread quickly among defectors in China, Russia and other countries, as well as to citizens in the communist state, a non-government organization says. Tim Peters, founder of Helping Hands Korea who has spoken with people in China recently, said news of the bill may encourage North Koreans to defect or refugees to seek asylum when previously they would have been “less inclined to do so.” He also sees the bill causing divisions among North Koreans not loyal to the communist party. That’s good news to Peters, but disconcerting for others with a common goal to improve human rights in North Korea who prefer the South Korean government tend to the North’s needs first, or that the United States not involve itself at all.
Finally, for those who read Korean, here’s the Chosun Ilbo’s take. If the babies sleep, my wife and I will try to pick through it. There was also this interesting bit, courtesy of LiNK–
[T]he conference was co-sponsored by LiNK and Korean Youth United (KYU). KYU is a new group of college students studying in South Korea, about half South Korean, half North Korean defectors, and a few ethnic Korean Chinese exchange students.
There are some small but active groups of South Koreans, such as NK Net and NK Gulag, which seem very well run by young and dedicated people, but they’re obviously much smaller than their lefty counterparts. Let’s hope this represents either new membership or new organization.
Reader and correspondent Brendan, who has been to North Korea and now works with defectors in Seoul, seemed pessimistic. He noted that the academic types tried to subject Adrian Hong to the “root-out-class-enemies!” treatment; the general reaction seemed a blend of apathy and hostility. On his way home, he saw the familiar green and white riot police buses (the Koreans call them ttakjangs, or chicken cages, but the cops don’t appreciate that term themselves–just ask them!) forming up in front of the U.S. Embassy, a sign of where South Korea’s real passions lay: Fallujah.
When it comes to the South Koreans, LiNK has its work cut out for it, but I doubt they expected to overthrow the Hangchonryon on their first visit. Patience, perseverence.
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 10:04 am · Filed under Uncategorized
I will print the nearly unedited correspondence between Rev. Douglas Shin and Dr. Vollertsen for you to add to your own mix of information. Clearly, however, the South Korean government is desperately worried that the nascent North Korean human rights movement has cost South Korea needed international support for its appeasement policy. It looks like that desperation has led them to the verge of what is either a colossal blunder or an ill-conceived bluff–banning Norbert Vollertsen from Korea. Here’s the correspondence:
Norbert, Good to hear that you’re back in. Even better to know that the Seoul gov’t again lacked the guts to block your re-entry. So shall we play a relatively harmless tourist/filmmaker for the next few months? I’m sure you’ve read about my press conference in LA on your upcoming film–”the Last Days of Kim Jong Il (by Norbert Vollertsen)” or something like that. It’s on Yonhap News (English) too. The temporary date forHollywood press conference/presale with 3-5 minutes trailer is mid-January. [ ] BTW they gave me visa at the SK Consulate here in LA even though I wrote in my visa application “NK human rights and democratization activities” as my purpose of entry. See you soon. [ ]
Blessings, Doug
* * * * *
Hi Doug, I was detained in Pusan for 10 hours. Thanks to Donalds activities and Chosun Ilbo now on the way to Seoul…. Got a “Notice” that I shall stay away from any political activities etc. only act as a tourist - so at the next press conference will act as a “tourist”. Please infrom the journalists. Best regards, Norbert
Clearly, these guys have no respect for censorship.
Let me be perfectly honest about my regard for Roh Moo Hyun. I wish him nothing but ill, at least politically speaking. Not only would I like to see him hang himself, politically speaking, I’d be willing to braid, knot, coil, and hand-deliver the rope if I could. So, Roh, please, please ban Norbert Vollertsen. Not only would that scissor off diplomatic relations with the U.S. Congress, but it might even cause more human rights friction with squishy Old Europe (“friction” and “squishy”: I promise never to put those two words in the same sentence again, k?). I think the immediate setbacks for Dr. Vollertsen’s cause would be greatly outweighed by the long-term benefits, which are:
First, it would disabuse more Americans of their lingering Cold War misconceptions–prolonged by the facade of Korean troops hiding behind the protection of Kurdish irregulars in the safest part of Iraq–that South Korea remains an ally and moral kindred spirit.
Second, it would preempt the State Department’s ability to obstruct a tougher line on North Korea in the name of our “alliance” with South Korea.
Third, it would weaken calls for more delays in U.S. troop withdrawals, which means fewer targets for North Korean artillery and more strategic flexibility for the U.S. to pursue its own interests.
Fourth, it might alarm another sizeable bloc of Korean voters into breaking with the Uri Party and handing them another beating in the next parliamentary elections.
Finally, I suspect that Norbert’s physical presence in Korea is unnecessary to his effectivness as a gadfly and general media magnet. I suspect he’d attract just as much press in Japan, perhaps more. I also suspect that his following in Korea has a fairly low ceiling, given Korea’s inherent nationalist affinity for the North and the state-sanctioned softening of North Korea’s image. Dr. Vollertsen’s expulsion would roil up a wave of bad P.R. for both Seoul and Pyongyang, leading to the retelling of Norbert’s skin graft story, of how he was beaten by the South Koreans at the DMZ and by North Koreans in Taegu, the fact that during both incidents, the KNP cops stood by (apparently checking themselves for rectal polyps) as they always seem to do when Pyongyang’s thugs get busy (more on that here). These and other sympathetic aspects of Dr. Vollertsen’s story are sometimes forgetten among some of his more incendiary statements.
Norbert and Doug may disagree, but expulsion might be the best thing to happen to them and their cause. It would be an unequivocal statement of ambiguity about who is really in charge in Seoul.
Posted by joshua on November 30, 2004 at 6:37 am · Filed under Uncategorized
An unnamed LiNK correspondent from Seoul sent me some, umm, links to press coverage of the human rights symposium. I will put these into the blender with other comments I’ve received.
The Joongang Ilbo gave the meeting generally favorable coverage; the South Korean students, however, seem disinterested by all accounts, even LiNK’s. I also smirked a little at this quote from Park Il-Hwan, one of the good guys: “Students in Korea look at the North Korean situation differently from Korean students who grew up abroad.” Heh? Funny, I always considered them Americans who happen to be of Korean descent, not that many Koreans are likely to claim that kind of suzerainty over my little Hebrew-Altaics, but then again, I’m still waiting for my piece of the action in that whole global banking scheme thingy. I know–how damn sensitive of me.
The Korea Times’s story grated on me for its emphasis on how non-partisan this issue is supposed to be, to the exclusion of actually remembering what the issue is. Fine, dandy, and okely-dokely, but if I did an MRI on Adrian Hong’s brain, I’m guessing that (1) that wasn’t the main point of the symposium (at least judging by its title), and (2) the “non-political” label is mostly a necessary disclaimer. Fact is, the emphasis on North Korean human rights does vary greatly by party, and I’m not personally ready to stay my poison pen from stabbing a prison tattoo into the sorry hides of those who never lifted a gavel to help us to, say, pass the NKHRA. In America, the support for the issue is bipartisan but far more uniformly enthusiastic among Republicans. There are 2 1/2 major political parties in Korea: the reinvented center-right Grand National Party mentions the issue when it’s expedient; the ruling leftist Uri Party does its best to bury the issue completely; and the Democratic Labor Party is probably gagging and dragging defectors back to Pyongyang itself for self-criticism and rehabilitative labor. Keeping the issue overtly non-partisan is a smart tactic and the just what I’d expect from a mensch like Adrian Hong, but it’s a pretty leaky journalistic vessel for pouring in the contents of (nearly) the whole seminar.
Contrast that with Andrew Petty’s piece in The Korea Herald, which I’ve already noted below. Andrew’s article mentions the partisanship issue, too, but starts by putting the emphasis on the main issue, gives a voice to both sides, lets the actors speak for themselves, and lets the protagonist go first:
Word of the U.S. North Korean Human Rights Act has spread quickly among defectors in China, Russia and other countries, as well as to citizens in the communist state, a non-government organization says. Tim Peters, founder of Helping Hands Korea who has spoken with people in China recently, said news of the bill may encourage North Koreans to defect or refugees to seek asylum when previously they would have been “less inclined to do so.” He also sees the bill causing divisions among North Koreans not loyal to the communist party. That’s good news to Peters, but disconcerting for others with a common goal to improve human rights in North Korea who prefer the South Korean government tend to the North’s needs first, or that the United States not involve itself at all.
Finally, for those who read Korean, here’s the Chosun Ilbo’s take. If the babies sleep, my wife and I will try to pick through it. There was also this interesting bit, courtesy of LiNK–
[T]he conference was co-sponsored by LiNK and Korean Youth United (KYU). KYU is a new group of college students studying in South Korea, about half South Korean, half North Korean defectors, and a few ethnic Korean Chinese exchange students.
There are some small but active groups of South Koreans, such as NK Net and NK Gulag, which seem very well run by young and dedicated people, but they’re obviously much smaller than their lefty counterparts. Let’s hope this represents either new membership or new organization.
Reader and correspondent Brendan, who has been to North Korea and now works with defectors in Seoul, seemed pessimistic. He noted that the academic types tried to subject Adrian Hong to the “root-out-class-enemies!” treatment; the general reaction seemed a blend of apathy and hostility. On his way home, he saw the familiar green and white riot police buses (the Koreans call them ttakjangs, or chicken cages, but the cops don’t appreciate that term themselves–just ask them!) forming up in front of the U.S. Embassy, a sign of where South Korea’s real passions lay: Fallujah.
When it comes to the South Koreans, LiNK has its work cut out for it, but I doubt they expected to overthrow the Hangchonryon on their first visit. Patience, perseverence.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 30, 2004 at 4:23 am · Filed under Uncategorized
I promised you a run-down of coverage and reactions to the LiNK symposium in Seoul, and I’ll keep my word, but not tonight. Work was crushing today. Undone tasks missed me too much over the long weekend. I even worked for nearly two hours on the train and another hour at home while Judgment at Nuremberg played in the background. My rest? A couple of hours wolfing down leftover turkey and a few minutes lying on the living room floor with my cackling Jr. balanced on the botton of my foot, which made it all worth it.
For now, here’s the must-read story. Andrew Petty knocks another one out of the park at the often-dismal Korea Herald. He had interesting interviews with Ralph Peters, Tarik Radwan, and Adrian Hong. Radwan made the point that he’d rather not spend the rest of his life avoiding the eyes of people he didn’t help when he could. Adrian Hong also had an interesting comment on the millions in funding that will now become available to NGO’s under the NKHRA. He’s not taking:
NGOs will get a boost from the U.S. Congress since the act provides for $20 million annually to efforts related to North Korean defectors. But Hong fears competition for funding will hurt relationships between NGOs and new groups will form to try to get the money. LiNK will not apply for any funding as it fears it would be a gesture of partisanship. “Even if we could get the funding, we would refuse it. It could cost us our legitimacy,” said Hong. “The people who hate Bush would hate us.”
Well, I can’t say I agree. Many of the people who hate Bush will never be mollified; they hate everything he stands for by nothing more than association and often admire truly awful regimes for no better reason than the fact that Bush doesn’t. Money can empower you to do a lot of good. But it can also corrupt you, so I can’t say I disagree, either. What impresses most about the LiNK people is that on the one hand, they’re completely lacking in the creepy jihadi will to martyrdom so often seen among those who call themselves “activists.” At the same time, you sense that they’d walk into the jaws of hell and never expect anyone to reward them with a commemorative stamp or a taste of the screen rights. There is something exceptional enough to be worth preserving.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 30, 2004 at 12:14 am · Filed under Uncategorized
Today Singapore, tomorrow Zimbabwe. The gulag labor juggernaut rolls on . . . but fast enough to save Kim Jong Il from that new urban underclass?
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 30, 2004 at 12:04 am · Filed under Uncategorized
As self-parody goes, this effort by North Korea’s official quisling, Alejandro Cao de Benos, is a beaut. When he’s not ransacking hotel rooms, he’s patiently explaining the unworthiness of mere mortals.
In a sort of Torquemada-meets-Jerry Lewis way.
Posted by joshua on November 29, 2004 at 11:23 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
I promised you a run-down of coverage and reactions to the LiNK symposium in Seoul, and I’ll keep my word, but not tonight. Work was crushing today. Undone tasks missed me too much over the long weekend. I even worked for nearly two hours on the train and another hour at home while Judgment at Nuremberg played in the background. My rest? A couple of hours wolfing down leftover turkey and a few minutes lying on the living room floor with my cackling Jr. balanced on the botton of my foot, which made it all worth it.
For now, here’s the must-read story. Andrew Petty knocks another one out of the park at the often-dismal Korea Herald. He had interesting interviews with Ralph Peters, Tarik Radwan, and Adrian Hong. Radwan made the point that he’d rather not spend the rest of his life avoiding the eyes of people he didn’t help when he could. Adrian Hong also had an interesting comment on the millions in funding that will now become available to NGO’s under the NKHRA. He’s not taking:
NGOs will get a boost from the U.S. Congress since the act provides for $20 million annually to efforts related to North Korean defectors. But Hong fears competition for funding will hurt relationships between NGOs and new groups will form to try to get the money. LiNK will not apply for any funding as it fears it would be a gesture of partisanship. “Even if we could get the funding, we would refuse it. It could cost us our legitimacy,” said Hong. “The people who hate Bush would hate us.”
Well, I can’t say I agree. Many of the people who hate Bush will never be mollified; they hate everything he stands for by nothing more than association and often admire truly awful regimes for no better reason than the fact that Bush doesn’t. Money can empower you to do a lot of good. But it can also corrupt you, so I can’t say I disagree, either. What impresses most about the LiNK people is that on the one hand, they’re completely lacking in the creepy jihadi will to martyrdom so often seen among those who call themselves “activists.” At the same time, you sense that they’d walk into the jaws of hell and never expect anyone to reward them with a commemorative stamp or a taste of the screen rights. There is something exceptional enough to be worth preserving.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on November 29, 2004 at 11:11 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Here is today’s list of unsubstantiated rumors and CIA disinformation about North Korea. Always happy to pass those along, in addition to chucking a little more gasoline onto the stove burners. First entry:
In a sign of investor concern about North Korea, rumors swirled in financial markets in Tokyo and Seoul that leader Kim Jong-il had been shot dead. But a diplomat in Pyongyang said nothing out of the ordinary seemed to be happening, a view shared by a Japanese Foreign Ministry official.
[R]eports surfaced last week that some portraits of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il had been removed in the secretive communist state, triggering speculation that his grip on power may be slipping. China denied reports Wednesday it had boosted troops along the border to the North.
North Korea tightly controls information so it is impossible to know for sure what is happening. Instability could have far-reaching consequences, including for the nuclear crisis. But a Beijing-based aid worker, who frequently travels to Pyongyang, said he had not heard the rumor or had reports of anything strange from their Pyongyang office. “I’ve had email traffic from there this morning and there is no hint of anything untoward,” he said.
Some North Korea experts said the removal of the portraits move was Kim’s own attempt to project a more rounded image of his leadership. Others have speculated Kim has come under pressure because of stop-start market reforms that have even prompted China to allow cross-border trade to be settled in yuan.
Rumors circulated in currency and stock markets in Seoul and Tokyo early Thursday that Kim had been shot dead. “There have been various rumors about North Korea and some do have an impact on the market, but this time there’s no reaction,” said a foreign exchange dealer at a bank in Seoul.
Second entry (and today’s must-read; too good to really edit much):
The North Korean leader’s subjects may be largely ignorant of the bleak situation in their country, owing to the country’s all-encompassing propaganda machine, but Kim himself clearly has no illusions. Shortly after the revolutions that toppled half-a-dozen communist dictatorships in Eastern Europe back in 1989, according to Japanese journalist and North Korea watcher Ryo Hagiwara, Kim informed members of his ruling circle that he and they could easily end up like deposed Romanian leader Nicolae Ceausescu if they didn’t watch their step. For a full week in early 1990, Kim forced North Korean officials to watch multiple video showings of Ceausescu’s bloody death at the hands of an angry mob and warned his colleagues of the dangers of losing control. One defector told Hagiwara that he recalled Kim obsessively repeating, “We will be killed by the people.”
The North Korean dictator remains isolated and obsessive, by all accounts, but he may be more concerned nowadays about gathering international pressure, led by a hawkish U.S. government, than an uprising by his mistreated people. For one thing, the incoming U.S. secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, is apt to take a sharper line with Pyongyang than her predecessor. Kim may be sensing that. In one account related to NEWSWEEK, a recent visitor to Pyongyang got a candid take from the North Korean leader himself. Kim confessed that the North could not give up its nuclear weapons because his conventional weapons were hopelessly outmoded and ineffective—leaving him at the mercy of the U.S. military.
For Kim, the next few months could be critical. Domestically, he must deal with the short-term fallout from the limited economic reforms he introduced two years ago. A recent report by the World Food Program states that they’ve caused even more problems for North Korea’s people. By cutting state subsidies and freeing prices, Kim has sent inflation through the roof—making basic foodstuffs catastrophically expensive. Says one recent North Korean defector: “One third of the population can eat rice and meat soup. One third can manage to eat corn. And one third is waiting to die with water-thin porridge.”
Perhaps as a result, the flow of refugees and defectors out of the country continues unabated—and so do the inevitable rumors of internal dissension. Remedies might be found on the international front—but it’s precisely there that Kim faces some of his biggest challenges. In the coming weeks Kim will come under intense pressure to return to the negotiating table for six-party talks aimed at dismantling his nuclear arsenal. If he continues to stonewall, he could find himself jettisoned by putative friends like Russia and China.
Some conservatives in Washington argue that the Bush administration should be pushing China and South Korea to ratchet up the pressure on Pyongyang. “I think we need a stronger coalition,” says Nicholas Eberstadt, a researcher at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. “We will not get a less dangerous North Korea without more outside pressure.” He says that China’s North Korea policy has been, effectively, to “kick the can down the road,” while South Korea’s government is “implacably anti-American and reflexively pro-appeasement toward Pyongyang.” [Ha!]
But giving in on negotiations could spell trouble for Kim, too. He’ll have to deal with Americans and Japanese who are being less understanding of Pyongyang’s demands than ever before. “I think Kim doesn’t know which way to move now,” says Lee Young Hwa, a North Korea analyst at Japan’s Kansai University. “His options are getting narrow.”
Questions about Kim’s hold on power have been spreading in recent weeks—fueled by mysterious details about symbolic changes leaking out of the North. Official portraits of Kim have been disappearing from walls. Badges bearing his image have begun to vanish from the lapels of party members. Signs of a creeping coup? Not likely—but in a closed society, no one knows. South Korean intelligence analysts opine that the portrait removals are merely a sign of the son’s Confucian respect for his father, whose portraits have remained firmly in place. (Kim Il Sung died 10 years ago.) Other experts speculate that some of the much-ballyhooed changes may have been underway for months or even years—part of a calculated campaign on Kim’s part to soften his international image. “No matter where Kim looks, there is no bright prospect,” says Katsumi Sato, director of the Modern Korea Institute in Tokyo. “The recent effort is one example of how hard he is trying to change his image to the rest of the world.”
If so, he’s got lots of work to do. Case in point: the new skepticism in Japan. Anger toward the North has intensified there since the failure, earlier this month, of Tokyo’s most recent effort to solve the festering issue of Japanese citizens abducted by Kim Jong Il’s minions during the cold war. A Japanese delegation dispatched to Pyongyang to clarify the fates of some of those still missing returned home with very little conclusive information. Public opinion plummeted. In one poll taken shortly after the trip, 73 percent of those queried favored “the possibility of imposing economic sanctions”—up from 45 percent in May of last year.
Japanese politicians have jumped on the get-tough bandwagon. A cross-party group of lawmakers has called publicly for economic sanctions. And a leading member of the prime minister’s team, hard-line Liberal Democratic Party Acting Secretary-General Shinzo Abe, spoke aloud what many leading politicians in Tokyo have been thinking in private: “I think we should consider the possibility that a regime change will occur, and we need to start simulations of what we should do at that time.”
The threat for the North is real. Japan is North Korea’s third largest trading partner. “What Kim fears is that Japan might restrict the exports of software and hardware that can be used as vital parts of the weapons of mass destruction like missiles and nuke facilities,” says Sato. “I estimate that 65 percent of car parts used by the North Korean Army is Japan-made. Or wireless radios for use by ships. If these things are banned, the North will be in serious trouble.” Not long ago, Japanese officials were letting it be known that the North could expect a huge economic sweetener if the two sides could normalize relations; the talk was of sums ranging up to $10 billion. Now there is far less enthusiasm for buying peace.
Things are dire for Kim on other fronts. The re-election of George W. Bush is surely the last thing he wanted. The U.S. Congress recently passed the North Korea Human Rights Act, which, among other things, offers support to defectors and allocates funds for mass drops of portable radios on the North—an attempt to break through the information blockade. In addition, trade between the two Koreas is still minimal, and Seoul’s capacity to offer aid is being curtailed by the South’s own sluggish economy. The conservative South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo recently cited intelligence sources who confirm that an erstwhile pretender to the throne, Kim Jong Il’s brother-in-law Jang Song Taek, was “purged” from the senior leadership earlier this year along with a coterie of high-ranking generals. That may sound surprising. But given the parlous state of the North’s economy, the Great Leader Kim may be running out ways to keep his house of cards from falling.
Well, people who run closed societies get to control all the information, live in luxury, keep pleasure squads, collect Daffy Duck cartoons, quaff Henessey, and do all of it without ever holding an election. It seems fair that an inherent vulnerability to sweeping panic also comes with the territory.
I don’t buy the theory that this is all made up by the CIA, but if it is, I find that a damn sight better than another year of mass starvation, mass graves, and uranium enrichment. It also beats a bombing campaing, for that matter. I’m content to report what seems reasonably credible, given that intelligent readers know that almost none of this stuff is verifiable anyway. Blame Kim Jong Il for that.
P.S.: Rip-off!! (sneezing sound)
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