Category: Inter-Korean Issues

I think Nomad is on to something with the fact that the North Korean Arirang Mass Games are going to continue despite the flooding, but the Second Inter-Korea Summit has been delayed.  Someone else who is on to something is OFK who finds the damage statistics from the flooding very suspicious:

Beyond that, things are less certain.  North Korea officially claims that the floods killed 300 people and left 300,000 homeless.  Those figures don’t jibe with each other.  In a mountainous and underdeveloped country, any disaster large enough to make more than a quarter of a million people homeless — the size of a small city — would have claimed more lives. 

OFK also links to this Bloomberg report that offers plenty dubious statistics as well:

The UN said today that 58,000 homes were damaged in the flooding, 50 percent of the country’s health clinics were destroyed, and as much as 70 percent of arable land was under water. More than 800 public buildings, 540 bridges, 70 sections of railway and 500 high-voltage power towers also were destroyed, according to the UN.  [Bloomberg]

It doesn’t make sense that the Arirang Mass Games would continue if these statistics that represent a nation wide mass disaster are true.  That is because these statistics are probably not true and the flooding is being used as a convenient excuse to delay the summit  to October so it has maximum impact on the South Korean presidential election, allow NK to have more time to make demands, ask for increased international aid that will not be monitored, as well as exact maximum propaganda value from the summit:

Moreover, October is a month for a series of celebrations in the North. October 8 marks the 10th anniversary of Kim Jong Il’s inauguration as the Secretary General of the Korean Workers’ Party (KWP), while the 9th marks the first anniversary of the country’s nuclear test, and the 10th is the 62nd anniversary of the foundation of the KWP. If the South Korean president’s visit to Pyongyang coincides with these dates, North Korean propagandists could likely attempt to make the most of it. [Donga Ilbo]

Finally the biggest reason for playing up the flooding damage is that President Roh can use it as cover when he locks South Korea into an extended bribery yearly humanitarian aid package to North Korea.  He can claim it is the "North Korean Marshall Plan" to rebuild the country after the flooding.  Talk about a well time flood.  I bet Roh and Kim were both jumping at the chance to delay the summit when the rain started falling.

Choe Sang-hun has written an interesting article today about the Peace Dam in Hwacheon: 

For two decades now, the erratic fortunes of the massive Peace Dam here near the demilitarized zone have mirrored the tortuous relationship between North and South. As the two sides’ leaders prepare for their summit meeting in early October, a review of its curious history suggests the barriers they must overcome in the quest for reconciliation.

The story goes back to 1986, when, as South Korea was busy preparing for its biggest-ever international event, the 1988 Summer Olympics, North Korean soldiers broke ground on a gigantic dam project just above the DMZ.

As South Koreans wondered what their unpredictable Communist neighbor was up to this time, the military dictator of the South, Chun Doo Hwan, offered his own terrifying scenario: a killer flood. [International Herald Tribune]

You can read the rest here.  I drove from Chuncheon to Paro Lake via the Peace Dam before and the scenery up north of the Samyeong mountains is quite beautiful.  It is actually hard to believe you are in a possible war zone, but the occasional army outpost tends to remind you.   

OFK has two excellent postings I recommend everyone check out.  The first posting is about the apparent death of the US-ROK FTA.  Joshua as well as Brendon Carr provide some excellent insight into why this agreement is finally dead.  The second posting is about the agenda of the Second Inter-Korean Summit.  As I expected human rights, the closing of forced labor camps, and the freeing of South Korean hostages in North Korea is no where on the agenda. 

The Second Inter-Korean Summit has been officially postponed today due allegedly to the severe flooding that hit North Korea.  However, knowing that things with North Korea are never what the appear to be I have to wonder if the flood damage is being exaggerated in order to get more concessions from the South Korean government?  As the South Korean presidential election gets closer President Roh and his ilk will be growing more and more desperate for the summit and thus North Korea can demand more aid and use the flood damage as cover for their demands. 

Call me cynical, but I long ago quit believing anything from the North Korean regime that So far I have seen nothing that can definitely confirm the alleged massive flood damage in North Korea. 

You can read more over at Nomad and Marmot’s Hole.

Suzanne Scholte the President for the North Korea Freedom Coalition has a list of important questions that should be answered before the Second Inter-Korean Summit proceeds:

• Who will represent the North Korean people?

• Will South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun ask for the political prison camps to be closed?

• Will Roh ask for the return of the South Korean abductees and prisoners of war as well as the abductees from other nations?

• Will Roh ask for North Koreans to be granted freedom of movement and travel so they can avoid starving to death?

• Will Roh ask Kim to stop torturing, imprisoning and executing the refugees who are repatriated from China because they were simply trying to feed their families?

We all know the Korean government’s answers to these questions, pretend they don’t exist. 

One of the most ironic things about the whole Taliban hostage crisis is that the Korean government and public wants the hostages returned to Korea at all costs, but the fact that Kim Jong-il has hundreds of South Korean hostages that were kidnapped from South Korea; no one cares about.  Where is the endless news coverage of the crying families of the South Korean citizens kidnapped by Kim Jong-il?  Why are 66 year old grandmas having to spearhead rescue operations to free their kidnapped husbands from North Korea, while the missionaries kidnapped by the Taliban have the entire Korean government working towards their release?  All questions that the Korean government would prefer to pretend don’t exist.

There is more than just the human rights problems with this summit in regards to South Korean citizens, the human rights conditions in North Korea are the worst in the world and the South Korean government could care less about those conditions as well.  They have even been using the atrocious human rights conditions to their advantage with the opening of the Kaesong Industrial Complex Slave Labor Camp. 

I credit Ms. Scholte for definitely not mincing words about the nature of this summit and calling it for what it is:

“Unless [South Korean president] Roh is planning on raising these issues and/or arresting Kim Jong-il for crimes against humanity, then this summit will simply allow Kim Jong-il to continue to interfere in South Korea’s elections, so that he can stay in power and continue to build nuclear weapons, produce massive amounts of drugs to poison the youth in free nations, counterfeit US dollars and work aggressively to destroy South Korea’s democracy, which is already weakened terribly by Roh’s administration,” Scholte told The Christian Post.

However, President Roh has much more important things to worry about than human rights of North Koreans and rescuing kidnapped South Korean citizens, like trying to convince Kim Jong-il to let him ride the train that he recently paid the North Koreans $80 million bucks to do one test ride.  When that test ride happened, I thought that would be the world’s most expensive train ride, but now it appears that will be eclipsed by the fare Kim Jong-il will demand for a train ride to Pyongyang.  Does anyone else find it a bit pathetic the Roh has to beg Kim Jong-il to let him use a train that South Korean tax payers have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in? 

It really is amazing the divergence from reality one must take in order to keep the Myth of Progress alive.

UPDATE: One of things critics of the 2nd Inter-Korean summit have been bringing up is that Kim Jong-il promised Kim Dae-jung during the 1st Inter-Korean summit that he would visit Seoul for the 2nd meeting. The excuse that Kim Jong-il is using is that “security concerns” are preventing him from traveling to Seoul. Kim likes traveling by train when he leaves the country and the South Korean government expects people to believe that Kim Jong-il can’t take his train on the new train track laid through the DMZ that cost the South Korean taxpayer $80 million bucks to do one test run on, to come to Seoul?

In response to criticism about a secret payoff the South Korean government is claiming there was no secret pay off:

Kim Man-bok denied that there was any cash attached to the deal. Such talk, he said, is “groundless and absurd.” He said the summit was worked out in a “transparent manner.”

If the Roh administration has not provided any secret bribe than that means the likelihood of Roh signing an agreement which makes South Korea have to give unconditional aid to North Korea for a fixed number of years is more likely. I began digging through my archives a bit more and found what Roh administration may have planned:

The government provides rice and fertilizer to the North on humanitarian grounds. But that is not enough to address the fundamental poverty there, and a different approach is needed. Lee appears to be thinking of comprehensive economic aid so Pyongyang can overcome poverty. Experts speculate that the government is thinking about a large-scale economic package similar to the Marshall Plan that revived Europe after World War II.

(…)

On Tuesday, the unification minister said, “We need to offer aid to North Korea from a more productive and longer perspective beyond what is currently being done. We need to restate our concept of aiding the North so that it can continue under the next administration.” Kim Tae-hyo, a political scientist at Sungkyunkwan University, says “it sounds as if the government wants to help North Korea in infrastructure or logistics systems, beyond cooperative projects like package tours to Mt. Kumgang or the Kaesong Industrial Complex. It seems to have concluded that it must do it in a way so the next government can’t change the policy on aid to the North it has set.”

I think it is now pretty clear that this is what the Roh administration has in store, a massive unconditional aid package that when the conservatives come into power, they cannot over turn. The fundamental problem with poverty in North Korea that such a massive aid package won’t fix is that the cause of poverty in the country, the North Korean regime! You can give them fertilizer and food, you can pave all the roads in North Korea, but poverty will remain because it is in the regime’s interest to keep the people poor and the South Korean government knows it and does not care.

It is all about the photo op and maintaining the “Myth of Progress“. Sadly I believe most people in South Korea want to believe the myth is true, which means people like this 66 year old grandma will be left fighting to expose what the regime really is.

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I come home from work today and find out that peace in our time is at hand, with the announcement of a second Inter-Korean summit. At least that is what would think after reading this South Korean government’s press release:

President Roh Moo-hyun will visit Pyongyang Aug. 28-30 to hold a summit meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, Roh’s office Cheong Wa Dae said in a statement Wednesday.

“The two Koreas have agreed to hold a summit in Pyongyang Aug. 28-30. For the summit, Roh will remain in the North Korean capital for three days,” said the statement.

“The second inter-Korean summit is expected to contribute to peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula. The talks will also provide momentum to settle the North Korean nuclear problem,” it said.

Hmmmm, “peace and prosperity on the Korean peninsula”? I don’t know about the peace portion, but I guarantee there will be some prosperity for at least one person, Kim Jong-il. The last inter-Korean summit that Kim Dae-jung lined up in 2000 that earned him the Noble Peace Prize was only agreed upon after $500 million dollars was secretly sent to North Korea. The going rate for this meeting had to be much more expensive considering the lame duck status of President Roh Moo-hyun. Whatever the bribe is this time, it won’t be found out after the election, but as usual it will be the Korean taxpayer that will lose out.

President Roh has already put down some pretty good down payments on the inter-Korean summit bribe. Anyone remember the suitcase stuffed with $400,000 in cash or the hundreds of tons of supposed humanitarian aid, not to mention all the oil the North Koreans received from the denuclearization agreement, which will never be up held. Plus Kim Jong-il is earning millions more from his slave labor camp at Kaesong. Also don’t forget the one billion dollars in aid sent to North Korea this year along with the $80 million to Kim Jong-il to allow the South Koreans to test drive one train across the DMZ in what I like to call the World’s Most Expensive Train Ride. Remember all the unification talk and feel good stories about riding trains from Seoul to Paris via North Korea after that train ride? Well what has that train ride accomplished since then? Well nothing, and that is what this summit is going to accomplish for the people of South Korea.

Roh thinks he is going to get some kind of legacy over this and the leftist politicians think this summit will help them in the presidential election this year. They will end up losers in all of this and the only winner of this summit will be Kim Jong-il who has been banking in the money from all the South Korean extortion payments and may get what my biggest fear of all is, some kind of agreement for unconditional aid for a set number of years that a future conservative president cannot over turn. Why would Roh Moo-hyun care about the loss of Korean tax payers dollars when he has scored the World’s Most Expensive Photo Op.

If President Roh had any ounce of decency and moral courage in him he would demand that Kim Jong-il return the 3,790 South Korean citizens kidnapped by North Korea over the years along with accounting for the many thousands more of Korean War POWs. If he was able to win the release of these people from the gulag that is North Korea, than Roh would be worthy of some legacy, but I fully expect that winning the freedom for these South Korean citizens will be left to 66 year old grandmas to do. But, hey “peace and prosperity on the Korean peninsula” is on its way.

Actually predicting that a second inter-Korean summit was going to happen was quite easy and predicting what is going to come out of it is even easier. Expect Kim Jong-il to only make vague promises and declarations with no substance. President Roh understands Kim Jong-il won’t denuclearize or make any major concessions, but that isn’t what a second inter-Korean summit is about. It is all about the photo-op and keeping the myth of progress alive.

Personally I think a photo of President Roh toasting Kim Jong-il, ala Madeline Albright, will be a fitting legacy for Roh.

You can read a whole lot more over at Lost Nomad and the Marmot’s Hole.

After South Korea gave North Korea $80 billion dollars for the World’s Most Expensive Tain Ride last week, you would expect North Korea would at least show some gratitude and behave for a little while, right?  No, wrong:

North Korea’s navy on Monday accused South Korea of sending warships into its waters off the divided peninsula’s west coast, warning the South would face unspecified “consequences” if the alleged provocations continue.

The South’s Defence Ministry rejected the North’s accusation.

“We never violated the Northern Limit Line,” said a ministry official, referring to the UN-drawn sea border. The official spoke on condition of anonymity citing policy.

The North’s navy command said that the South’s “warlike forces infiltrated” warships into its territorial waters many times recently, according to a statement carried by the North’s Korean Central News Agency.

“If the South’s military ignores our warning and sticks to military provocations like this, it will be forced to take full responsibility for all consequences,” the North’s navy said.

It did not elaborate on what those “consequences” would be.

It seems like this is always the time of year North Korea begins causing trouble along the maritime border.  Next month will be the 5 year anniversary of the West Sea Naval Battle where North Korea murdered six South Korean sailors which the South Korean government has done everything possible to cover up and pretend it didn’t happen.  Could North Korea be setting conditions once again to provoke another incident on the maritime border?

After an $80 million bribe a train has finally traveled a few miles across the DMZ into North Korea:

Trains crossed the heavily fortified Demilitarized Zone on Thursday for the first rail journey through the border dividing the two Koreas in more than half a century, the latest symbol of historic reconciliation between the longtime foes.The one-time test run of trains through the 2 1/2-mile-wide no man’s land along two restored tracks on the west and east sides of the peninsula comes after repeated delays since the rail lines were linked in 2003 — and despite unresolved tensions over the North’s nuclear weapons.

As all ways you can count on the South Korean uni-fiction minister to describe thing in ethnic terms:

"It is not simply a test run. It means reconnecting the severed bloodline of our people. It means that the heart of the Korean peninsula is beating again," Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said at a ceremony at Munsan station, 7 miles south of the Demilitarized Zone, before boarding the train.

Instead of trying to justify things in ethnic terms in a typical pathetic attempt to appeal to Korea’s homogenuous society, how about Minister Lee justify this one time test run in economic terms?  How the heck do you justify one test run by bribing the North Koreans with $80 million dollars:

Each year since 2004, the two Koreas had agreed to hold the trial runs and had even set a date, but cancelled each time because North Korea’s military did not promise a guarantee of security or safe passage. During the latest round of general-level talks, North Korea insisted it would provide only a one-off security guarantee.

As if it was doing South Korea a huge favor, North Korea got US$80 million worth of raw materials from the South to manufacture shoes, soap and other goods, for allowing one trial run of the reconnected railways.

This is just like the June 2000 Inter-Korean summit where approximately $500 million dollars worth of bribes were paid by the Kim Dae-jung government to secure a photo op with Kim Jong-il and justify the Sunshine Policy.  The Inter-Korean summit was nothing more than the world’s most expensive photo op.  Likewise this news today is simply the world’s most expensive train ride.

Japanese motor companies overtook the United States in car sales last year:

Japan has regained its position as the world’s largest car producer after 13 years. China ranks third following the United States and outdistancing Germany. According to statistics for 2006 published by the Organisation Internationale des Constructeurs d’Automobiles on Monday, Japan overtook the U.S. by producing 11.48 million cars, up 6.3 percent from 2005 (10.8 million cars). Japan was the world’s top car-producing country from 1980 to 1993 but fell to second in 1994.

The U.S. slipped to second for the first time since 1994, producing 11.26 million vehicles. U.S. production decreased 5.7 percent from 2005 (11.95 million cars), registering a decrease for the fourth consecutive year. China produced 7.19 million cars in 2006, overtaking Germany, which manufactured 5.82 million cars, and becoming the world’s third-ranking car-producing nation. China’s production showed a sharp increase of 25.9% from 2005 (5.71 million cars). South Korea ranked fifth, producing 3.94 million cars, up 4.3 percent from 2005. France, the sixth-ranked country, made 3.17 million cars, down 10.7 percent from the previous year and lagging far behind South Korea.

Hopefully this will be a wake up call to the US automobile industry which appears to be poised to be by passed by China in coming years as well.  What is interesting is that China manufacturing abilities are being aided through industrial espionage being committed in Korea:

State prosecutors yesterday charged nine former and incumbent employees of Kia Motors Corp., the nation’s second-largest automaker, for leaking core manufacturing technologies to China.

The illegal transfer would cause trillions of won in loss to the domestic car industry, the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office said.

Five of them were arrested and indicted in the first industrial espionage case involving the automotive industry in Korea. Four others were charged without detention.

They are suspected of colluding to leak confidential data on nine separate occasions from Kia to a Chinese company since November. They received a total of 230 million won ($248,620) in exchange for the data, the prosecution said.

It seems like everything is made in China now a days so why not our cars as well seems to be the trend.

From the Stars and Stripes:

The trial of a sergeant first class accused of soliciting and raping a female soldier, sexually assaulting another and coercing a third to make a false statement entered its third day Friday.

Sgt. 1st Class Carlos L. Reynolds, acting first sergeant with the 2nd Infantry Division’s 302nd Brigade Support Battalion, pleaded not guilty to all charges. One charge of insubordination was dropped earlier this week. (…)

Prosecutors say Reynolds raped a private after three other junior enlisted soldiers left Spc. Renee Hoist’s barracks room on June 22.

Defense lawyers questioned whether penetration had occurred, citing statements the private made to investigators.

Prosecutors countered that her testimony met the legal standard of rape, which requires at least a slight penetration, they said. She screamed at Reynolds to express lack of consent, they added.

Sounds pretty grim right?  Well this is why it is important to presume innocence until proven guilty:

Kincaid said the private’s statements to investigators and defense lawyers were inconsistent, with differences about her clothing and whether she told her mother of the alleged rape.

The private’s former supervisor, Sgt. Shalika Worlds , rated the alleged victim’s trustworthiness as a two on a scale of one to 10.

“She’s a habitual liar, sir. She’s untrustworthy,” Worlds told Kincaid.

“I wouldn’t believe anything she told me unless I had actual proof,” former co-worker Sgt. 1st Class Jeffrey Murphy said.

Soon after the alleged rape, the private received Article 15 nonjudicial punishment for making false official statements and disrespecting a different sergeant, Foxtrot Company commander Capt. Donald Little testified.

It will be interesting to see how this trial turns out, but this just goes to show that rape cases are not always a cut and dry thing.  However, even if this NCO is found not guilty, from reading the whole article it does sound like this guy is definitely guilty of some bad judgment.  You never go into a female’s room without having a witness with you.  If you do that you are opening yourself up to not only accusations like this, but most commonly the rumor mill which can be just as destructive to a unit.