President Trump is as expected getting bashed for pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal with claims that it will impact his ability to negotiate with Kim Jong-un:
President Donald Trump announces Iran nuclear deal withdrawal. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal is a major setback to US negotiating credibility and will complicate efforts to reach an agreement with Pyongyang over its own more advanced weapons programme, analysts say.
Trump is set to hold a much-anticipated and unprecedented summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in the coming weeks to negotiate over Pyongyang’s arsenal, after it last year carried out by far its most powerful nuclear test to date and launched missiles capable of reaching the U.S. mainland.
But the US president Tuesday pulled Washington out of the 2015 accord with Teheran, pouring scorn on the “disastrous” agreement and describing it an “embarrassment” to the United States ― although European signatories and the IAEA say Iran has complied with its obligations.
Antony Blinken, who was deputy secretary of state under Barack Obama, said the White House move “makes getting to yes with North Korea that much more challenging”.
“Why would Kim … believe any commitments President Trump makes when he arbitrarily tears up an agreement with which the other party is complying?” he asked on Twitter. [Korea Times]
You can read more at the link, but it can be argued that if the Obama administration thought the Iran nuclear deal was so great why did they not try and lobby the Senate to consent to the treaty as the Constitution requires? Consent from the Senate would have made it much harder for the President to withdraw from the treaty. This is what I will be looking for if President Trump is able to strike a deal with the North Koreans; will he try to get consent from the Senate?
As far as impacts to negotiating with Kim Jong-un, I think it is arguable that Trump is sending a message that North Korea will need to agree to denuclearize or there will not be a deal.
U.S. Pacific Air Forces Commander Gen. Terrence O’shaughnessy (R) reviews the military at the Gyeryongdae military complex in South Chungcheong Province on May 9, 2018. On his right is Gen. Lee Wang-keun, South Korea’s Air Force chief of staff. (Photo courtesy of the Air Force) (Yonhap)
This really shouldn’t be surprising to anyone, the only thing surprising is how open this South Korean diplomat was about how pro-American diplomats have been marginalized in the Moon administration:
New Korean Ambassador to Vietnam Kim Do-hyun
The Foreign Ministry Tuesday admonished the new ambassador to Vietnam, Kim Do-hyun, for his critical remarks about the United States during an interview with a vernacular Korean paper.
The remarks in question are as follows: “The reason why the inter-Korean summit was successful is because pro-United States diplomats were not put in charge. … a majority of Korean diplomats have thought they could get promoted if they were close to Americans and if not, they would have no future.”
A ministry spokesman said, “Ambassador Kim went to his post several days ago. Since he will have many chances to have interviews with media, we have internally taken necessary steps.”
He said that he didn’t reveal what steps were taken but didn’t object when asked whether it was tantamount to a “verbal warning.” [Korea Times]
You can read more at the link, but I infer from Kim’s remarks that the Moon administration has marginalized diplomats considered pro-US and are only using North Korean sympathizers to interact with the Kim regime. This is not surprising considering the Moon administration has many left wing North Korean sympathizers. For example President Moon’s Chief of Staff, Im Jeong-seok is a former supporter of North Korea’s juche philosophy.
It looks like Kim Jong-un has paid the price for admission to a summit with President Trump:
People watch a TV news report on screen, showing portraits of three Americans, Kim Dong Chul, left, Tony Kim and Kim Hak Song, right, detained in the North Korea at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, May 3, 2018. (Photo: Ahn Young-joon/AP)
President Trump announced on Wednesday that three Americans who were being held by North Korea have been released.
“I am pleased to inform you that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is in the air and on his way back from North Korea with the 3 wonderful gentlemen that everyone is looking so forward to meeting,” Trump tweeted early Wednesday. “They seem to be in good health.”
Pompeo flew to Pyongyang on Tuesday to meet with Kim Jong Un ahead of Trump’s planned summit with the North Korean leader. Trump described it as a “good meeting” and said a date and time for his summit with Kim has been set. [Yahoo News]
I am glad these guys are back and I am sure it is a relief for all the families involved, however I hope the media does not treat them as some kind of heroes. I have said this repeatedly, but I have little sympathy for people stupid enough to travel to North Korea in the first place. Anyone going to North Korea takes the chance of the regime detaining at anytime for the most arbitrary things in order to use them as political pawns.
Here are the three Americans that were detained and I would not be surprised if the real crimes all three of them committed was promoting Christianity in North Korea:
Kim Dong-chul: Supposed Christian missionary that North Korea accused of spying for South Korea.
Tony Kim: He worked at a university in China and was teaching a course at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) for a few months before being detained at the airport when he attempted to fly back to China. He was accused of the crime of trying to overthrow the government.
Kim Hak-song: He is an ordained as an evangelical Christian pastor affiliated with the Oriental Mission Church in Los Angeles. Like Tony Kim, he was working as a professor at PUST before being detained on unspecified charges.
How many people over the years have claimed that sanctions against North Korea won’t work? Sanctions against North Korea work if everyone enforces them. Now that the North Koreans are back to negotiate what we will see next is whether the ROK and the US will relieve the Kim regime of the economic pressure they are facing with some kind of nuclear agreement:
The economic pinch is almost certainly why Kim Jong Un is suddenly so eager to talk to the outside world, traveling to Beijing in March and then crossing the demilitarized zone to meet Moon.
“Why would he be doing this unless he was being constrained by sanctions,” said Stephan Haggard, professor of Korea-Pacific studies at the University of California at San Diego and a close monitor of sanctions. “I think he’s sweating.” (….)
But analysts generally agree that the sanctions must be inflicting serious pain on North Korea, a desperately poor country with a highly inefficient economy. (….)
The sanctions are probably putting a chill through both these economies. That has to be a huge concern for Kim, who once declared that North Korean people “would never have to tighten their belts again.”
“If I were Kim, I’d be much more worried about textile workers out of work, milling around doing nothing, than I would be about an American attack,” said William Brown, a former intelligence analyst focused on North Korea who now teaches at Georgetown University. Citing the kind of discontent that brought down communist regimes in Eastern Europe, he said, “The real dangers to the regime are internal.”
But Moon could pursue very little economic engagement without sanctions relief.
Not only has the U.N. Security Council imposed waves of sanctions on North Korea, but South Korea imposed its own direct punishment following two deadly North Korean attacks on South Korea in 2010.
Those measures are still in place, and conservative politicians are urging Moon to leave them there. Even if Moon overturned his predecessor’s order to close the Kaesong industrial park, an inter-Korean factory complex on the northern side of the border, transferring money or equipment to it would be almost impossible in the current sanctions environment. [Washington Post]
This all goes back to why the Moon administration is buttering up Trump with promises of a Nobel Peace Prize by getting on the peace train and believing that North Korea is really going to denuclearize this time.
When Japanese PM Abe came for dinner, Israeli PM Netanyahu's private chef Segev Moshe put his foot in it with the dessert: chocolates served in a metal shoe, "which is considered highly offensive in Japanese culture." https://t.co/o0aVnOGgewpic.twitter.com/Yx4f6BQp7s
The national flags of South Korea (R) and North Korea (2nd from R) are raised next to each other at the medal ceremony of the World Team Table Tennis Championships in Halmstad, Sweden, on May 5, 2018, in this photo from the Korea Table Tennis Association. The two Koreas formed a unified team during the championships and won a bronze medal. It was the second time that they played as a single squad after the championships in Chiba, Japan, in 1991. (Yonhap)
A mysterious North Korean aircraft caused speculation that Kim Jong-un was visiting China:
Japanese and South Korean media are speculating that a high-ranking North Korean official, possibly even leader Kim Jong Un, is visiting China after an airliner from the North landed in the Chinese port city of Dalian.
The South’s official Yonhap News Agency said the plane arrived Monday amid tight security. Japanese broadcaster NHK ran a picture of the Air Koryo plane that it said had been taken Tuesday afternoon at Dalian airport.
There are no regularly scheduled flights between North Korea and Dalian, although North Koreans are frequent visitors and its port has been instrumental in two-way trade. [Fox News]
It turned out that Kim Jong-un was in fact in China getting his marching orders from Emperor President Xi before Kim’s summit with President Trump:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Chinese President Xi Jinping held their second summit in about 40 days in northeast China, the two nations’ state media reported Tuesday, ahead of an anticipated summit between Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump.
In a dispatch from the Chinese city of Dalian, China’s Xinhua news agency reported that Kim and Xi held talks on Monday and Tuesday. The second summit between Kim and Xi appears to highlight efforts by the allies to restore ties that have been chilled by the North’s nuclear and missile development.
Kim and Xi “had an all-round and in-depth exchange of views on China-DPRK relations and major issues of common concern,” Xinhua said. DPRK is an acronym for North Korea’s formal name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. [Yonhap]
I have to wonder if the Moon administration is going to try and tie how much the ROK is willing to pay for the upkeep of USFK to the outcome of the Kim-Trump Summit?:
In this file photo taken on April 11, 2018, South Korea’s chief negotiator Chang Won-sam (L) speaks with his U.S. counterpart, Timothy Betts, in Seogwipo, Jeju Island, in their meeting to renew the cost-sharing agreement for American troops stationed in South Korea. (Yonhap)
South Korea and the United States are expected to hold a new round of talks next week in their ongoing negotiations over the costs for U.S. troops stationed here, a source close to the matter said Monday.
According to the source, both countries are currently discussing details about schedules and location after they decided to hold the talks next week. The source added that Washington D.C. could be the venue for the meeting.
The talks are led by Chang Won-sam, a career diplomat who was appointed in mid-November to head the negotiation team, and Timothy Betts, deputy assistant secretary for plans, programs and operations at the U.S. State Department.
It will be the third round of negotiations. The two sides previously met in Honolulu, Hawaii, in March and in Seogwipo on Jeju Island last month.
The latest meeting comes after the New York Times reported that U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the Pentagon to consider reducing American troops in South Korea. Although the U.S. government denied the report, some speculated that it could be a move to put more pressure on South Korea to shoulder more of the costs. [Yonhap]
