Author: GIKorea

It will be interesting to see if the Poles return to the DMZ, this time on the Southern side:

Poland, once a member of the Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission (NNSC), could re-establish its presence in the demilitarized zone on the Korean Peninsula if asked to do so by its counterparts, said Polish Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz during his recent visit to Seoul. 

“At this moment the Polish mission is unable to implement its mandate in its initial location north of the 38th parallel, because after the political transformation established in Europe in 1989, the DPRK expelled Poland from the DMZ,” Minister Czaputowicz told the Korea JoongAng Daily on Monday, during his visit to meet with his counterpart South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha, using the acronyms for North Korea’s official name, which is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and DMZ for the demilitarized zone, located between the two Koreas. 

As Poland already has an embassy in Pyongyang, established in 1950, the minister was speaking of the presence the Polish government had in the demilitarized zone as a member of the NNSC, from 1953 to 1995. North Korea expelled the Polish presence in 1995 following the collapse of communism in Poland and its joining of NATO in 1989.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

The embattled ROK Justice Minister’s brother pulled the oldest excuse in the book by claiming his back hurt:

Once prosecutors entirely finish their questioning of Chung, they’re expected to decide whether to file for a pretrial detention warrant like they did for Cho’s younger brother, who faces allegations of receiving hundreds of millions of won in bribes in exchange for offering jobs to teachers at a middle school operated by the Cho family. 

Cho’s brother was supposed to appear at a court in Seoul on Tuesday morning to attend his warrant hearing and offer self-defense oral testimony, but he chose not to show up, citing physical pain after a recent surgery on his lower spine. 

The court was expected to decide whether to detain him late Tuesday night after reviewing documents on his case. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but Cho’s brother is probably trying to drag this out as long as possible to allow his brother to have more time to gather the power and influence necessary to squash the investigation.

This plan does not solve the heart of the problem which is South Korea trying to confiscate Japanese property in South Korea which Tokyo believes is in violation of the 1965 treaty that normalized relations between the two countries:

A Korean-Japanese parliamentary group is promoting an idea to break the diplomatic logjam between the two countries that involves Seoul returning to a bilateral intelligence-sharing pact and Tokyo cancelling export restrictions, a member of the group exclusively told the JoongAng Ilbo on Tuesday.

One “important opportunity” for both countries to decide on such a “simultaneous action plan” will come at the end of this month, when Seoul dispatches an official to Japanese Emperor Naruhito’s enthronement ceremony on Oct. 22 in Tokyo, the source continued.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but this whole thing could be ended if President Moon agrees that confiscation of Japanese property in South Korea will not happen.

It appears the North Koreans are up to their usual negotiating tricks:

North Korea will return to nuclear disarmament talks with the United States despite last week’s breakdown in Sweden, as it intentionally made the decision to leave the first negotiations early to increase its political leverage, experts said Monday.

Ending a months-long hiatus in their denuclearization dialogue, officials from Washington and Pyongyang met in Stockholm amid expectations of a possible breakthrough in the suspended talks.

But Pyongyang declared a breakdown just a few hours after the meeting started in the Swedish capital. It stepped up criticism of Washington for sticking to an “old-fashioned” attitude, even after the fiasco of the failed Hanoi summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in February.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

I think at this point President Moon is not going to replace his allegedly corrupt Justice Minister no matter how low his poll numbers drop:

President Moon Jae-in’s approval rating has declined to 44.4 percent amid political turmoil over his justice minister, coupled with news reports of deepening economic woes and North Korea’s firing of a submarine-based ballistic missile, a local pollster said Monday.

According to Realmeter, the rating hit the lowest in its weekly survey since the president took office in May 2017. 

Commissioned by a cable news channel YTN, Realmeter conducted a phone survey of 2,007 people nationwide, aged 19 or older, throughout last week, except for the National Foundation Holiday that fell Thursday. The margin of error is plus or minus 2.2 percentage points.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the U.S. negotiators were not about to drop even limited sanctions for little to nothing in return:

North Korea’s top nuclear envoy on Monday said it was up to the United States to decide whether the two sides will hold further denuclearization talks, pending sufficient change from Washington on its position. 

En route home to Pyongyang after much anticipated working-level discussions with the United States fell apart on Saturday, North Korea’s chief nuclear negotiator Kim Myong-gil told reporters at Beijing’s Capital International Airport that his recent exchange with the U.S. delegation was “sickening,” making clear his dissatisfaction with the United States’ unchanged position on denuclearization.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but I continue to believe that the North Koreans if they don’t get the limited sanctions dropped before the New Year, will create a “crisis” in order to get the deal they want.