Category: China

It looks like the Chinese are attempting to stop the expected North Korean rocket launch by sending an envoy to North Korea which was likely prompted by reports that the ROK was considering deploying the THAAD missile defense system to Korea:

China’s top nuclear envoy made a surprise visit to North Korea on Tuesday, a news report said, amid rising tensions over the North’s fourth nuclear test last month.

Wu Dawei, China’s top delegate to the long-stalled six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear program, flew into Pyongyang in the afternoon, Japan’s Kyodo News agency reported.

China is currently under international pressure to exert its leverage on North Korea to make sure Pyongyang ends its nuclear program.

Wu is expected to meet with North Korean officials over the Jan. 6 nuclear test, which Pyongyang claims was a successful detonation of a hydrogen bomb.

The test has raised security tensions in the region to a new high, with the U.N. Security Council pushing to adopt another sanctions resolution against Pyongyang.

South Korea appears to be inching closer to introducing an advanced U.S. missile defense system to counter the threats posed by North Korea’s missile and nuclear programs.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

Until the Chinese government changes its mind that a nuclear North Korea is a less a threat than a destabilized North Korea they are going to continue to stop harsh sanctions against the Kim regime.  This ultimately only encourages the Kim regime to advance their nuclear and missile programs and commit further provocations:

Apart from the more hard-line thinkers in Washington, virtually no one wants to have to deal with what might happen if concerted international action were to actually destabilize Kim Jong Un’s regime, however strongly they may feel about its human rights record, authoritarian government and militantly defiant attitude toward Washington, Tokyo, Seoul and anyone else it sees as a threat.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry ran into that wall this week during talks in Beijing with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi. After meeting for more than four hours Wednesday, Kerry expressed his frustration with what the United States sees as China’s failure to do more to rein in Pyongyang, noting that “more significant and impactful sanctions were put in place against Iran, which did not have a nuclear weapon than against North Korea, which does.”

“All nations, particularly those who seek a global leadership role, or have a global leadership role, have a responsibility to deal with this threat,” Kerry said.

In response, Wang said China, which is North Korea’s most important ally, chief trading partner and a key source of economic assistance, agreed on the need for a new U.N. resolution. But he suggested Beijing would not support new penalties even though it condemned the Jan. 6 test.

“Sanctions are not an end in themselves,” Wang said bluntly. “The new resolution should not provoke new tension in the situation, still less destabilize the Korean Peninsula.”  [Associated Press]

You can read more at the link.

https://twitter.com/freekorea_us/status/693434661138206720

China firm against sanctions-only approach toward North Koreahttps://t.co/hWZ52sJACS

— NorthKoreaRealTime (@BuckTurgidson79) January 27, 2016

U.S. to ask China to ban oil exports to North Korea, report says https://t.co/FknBvjYSLH

— Elizabeth Shim (@GlobalAsianista) January 22, 2016

It appears that the US and South Korea has finally come to the conclusion that the country they need to be negotiating with to halt the Kim regime’s nuclear program is not North Korea, but instead China:

Since President Park Geun-hye expressed skepticism over the efficacy of the long-stalled six-party talks and called for five-party talks — excluding North Korea — last Friday, the allies and China seem to be split with Beijing in favor of keeping the six-party format intact.

The talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia have not been held since late 2008. Park thus proposed exploring “various and creative ways” including holding the five-party talks to tackle the North’s nuclear conundrum, her aides said.

Washington has offered support for Park’s proposal for the five-party talks, while Beijing urged the early resumption of the six-party talks that it has hosted — a move that observers say displayed its disapproval of the five-way formula.

“The United States supports President Park’s call for a five-party meeting. We believe coordination with the other parties would be a useful step in our ongoing efforts to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula through credible and authentic negotiations,” a spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Seoul said in a statement to the local media.  [Korea Herald]

You can read the rest at the link.

Global Voices has an interesting article posted that shows a variety of reactions from Chinese Internet users in regards to North Korea’s recent nuclear test.  It seems at least some people in China are beginning to realize what a danger North Korea is to not only the ROK, US and Japan, but China now as well:

Instead of condemning the nuclear test, Beijing took a more moderate stance, saying it “firmly opposes” the test and urged North Korea to “remain committed to its denuclearisation commitment”.

On the other hand, Chinese netizens grew more and more impatient with the government’s tolerance of their “insane” neighbor. It wasn’t only polarizing US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump who said China is the one who should deal with North Korea. On Chinese Twitter-like Weibo, many voiced their criticism of the government’s diplomatic policy in a news thread discussing North Korea’s H-bomb test.

Below are a selection of popular comments that have received more than 1,000 likes:  [Global Voices]

You can read the various reactions at the link.

Also of interest is that One Free Korea in a great opinion piece that I highly recommend everyone read included a link to a Yonhap article that shows that even the Chinese state controlled media is confirming increasing public frustration with North Korea:

In China’s strict-controlled online media, public resentment against North Korea’s fourth nuclear test is growing with some social media users criticizing their government for not taking a tougher response to the North’s test.

Since North Korea announced that it had successfully carried out a hydrogen bomb test last Wednesday, a newspaper published by the Chinese Communist Party has conducted five rounds of online opinion polls about the North’s test.

In one opinion poll of some 42,500 people by the state-run Global Times, 81 percent say the North’s nuclear test poses a threat to China’s security.

In another poll of 4,900 people by the same paper, 82 percent responded that they support new sanctions by the U.N. Security Council against North Korea.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

If he some how gets elected it will be interesting to see if Trump is able to back up his big talk because getting China to do something on North Korea is not as easy as he makes it sound:

Calling North Korea a “disgrace,” Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump said Sunday that China should solve the problem as Pyongyang’s main benefactor or be forced to see its trade with the United States suffer.

It was the latest in a series of remarks that Trump has been making since the North’s nuclear test last week to underscore his point that China has “total control” over Pyongyang, and the U.S. should force Beijing to fix the problem of the North.

“I think North Korea is a disgrace,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.” “I would get China, and I would say, ‘Get in there and straighten it out. You’d better straighten it out.’ And, if you don’t straighten it out, we’re going to have trouble because we have power over China. We have trade power over China.”

Trump also said that while Iran is expected to have nuclear weapons due to what he calls a “stupid agreement” that the U.S. and other world powers concluded with Tehran last year, North Korea already has “very dangerous weapons of some sort.”

In another FOX TV interview, Trump again said that China is the one that should fix the North Korea problem.

“People ask me a number of questions. They were asking me how do you solve North Korea? Well, China should be solving North Korea; they have total power,” Trump said.   [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

As I posted earlier this week, it is business as usual on the Sino-NK border which is something that Secretary of State John Kerry says has to stop.  Despite this the Chinese government is claiming there is no “key” for them to use to stop North Korea’s nuclear program.  If the border was shutdown this is a key that would greatly pressure the Kim regime to halt their nuclear program:

China said Friday that it holds no “key” to curbing North Korea’s nuclear ambition, while the United States is urging Beijing to put more pressure on Pyongyang after the North’s fourth nuclear test.

The remarks by Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying were seen as a rare public acknowledgment that China’s influence on its unruly ally North Korea is limited.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, during a telephone conservation on Thursday, “There cannot be business as usual” after North Korea claimed it successfully conducted a hydrogen bomb test.

Kerry said he reached the agreement with Wang, after making clear to his Chinese counterpart that the latest nuclear test has proven that Beijing’s approach to the North Korean nuclear issue “has not worked.”

The Wednesday nuclear test by North Korea is viewed as a diplomatic failure by Chinese President Xi Jinping in trying to rein in North Korea.

In response to such a view, Hua said, “I want to emphasize that the origin and frictions of the North Korean nuclear issue do not lie in China. The key of resolving the issue does not lie in China.”

However, Hua repeated that, “China urges the North Korean side to stick to reaffirming its commitment of denuclearization and stop taking actions that make the situation worse.” [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

The Kim regime knows that Beijing will not do anything that would undermine the stability of their regime and thus why they continue with their provocation strategy:

Trucks rumbled across the Chinese-North Korean border Thursday in a sign that trade was continuing despite Beijing’s anger over the North’s avowed hydrogen bomb test, which could spark economic retaliation and further estrangement between the once-close communist allies.

There were no obvious signs of disruption in the northeastern city of Dandong that sits on the Yalu River directly across from North Korea’s Sinuiju. The twin cities are the conduit through which much of North Korea’s international trade passes.

China condemned Wednesday’s purported test, which sent tremors across parts of northeastern China near the North Korean border and alarmed residents.

“I think it is a threat and sabotage to China and to the world peace for such a country to own nuclear weapons,” Dandong resident Tian Zhibin said in an interview with The Associated Press on Thursday.

Analysts say Beijing will likely join other members of the U.N. Security Council in imposing tougher economic sanctions on its communist ally.

Beijing could also introduce unilateral measures such as tighter inspections of the trucks that cross the Yalu carrying mostly consumer goods bound for the North. China-North Korean economic projects could be suspended and Chinese companies and banks discouraged from doing business with North Korea.  [Associated Press]

You can read the rest at the link.