Category: North Korea

.@yonhaptweet reports it was a "cold launch" and the SLBM achieved ignition above the surface but flew only for a few minutes.

— Daniel A. Pinkston (康大植) (@dpinkston) April 23, 2016

This is an interesting development in the defector restaurant worker issue.  The North Koreans are willing to send the families of the defectors to Seoul.  I would assume that not all of their families would go and the ones sent would be risking the death of the families members staying behind if they too defected.  I would also think these family members would be under strict instructions to try and convince the defectors to come back to North Korea.  The ROK authorities probably understand this and this is why they denied North Korea’s request:

North Korea has notified Seoul of its plans to send family members of the restaurant workers who defected earlier in the month to South Korea, the country’s state-run news agency said Friday.

A group of 13 North Korean people defected from the same Pyongyang-run restaurant in China and came to South Korea in early April in what has become a steady stream of people leaving the isolated country.

North Korea has consistently claimed South Korea abducted the workers and demanded that they be returned to their loved ones at once. Pyongyang also threatened to take strong action against the South if its demands are not met.

“The families of the abductees are eagerly asking for face-to-face contact with their daughters as they were forced to part from their beloved daughters,” said the notification sent to South Korea by Ri Chung-bok, chairman of North Korea’s Red Cross.

The notification was carried by the North’s Korean Central News Agency.

“At their earnest requests, our side again seriously notifies your side of our decision to send them to Seoul via Panmunjom (a truce village),” it showed.

South Korea should not conceal the unethical crime under the pretext of “international practice,” but should take “immediate technical measures” for the families to reunite with the defectors, the letter said.

South Korea’s Unification Ministry refused the demand, however, saying in a press release after the report that “The latest group defection by the workers at a overseas North Korean restaurant was completely of their own free will.”

A ministry official also said the South Korean government has not received any official notification letter from North Korea on the matter of sending the family members of the defectors to Seoul.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

In an effort to probably save face after their failed Musudan test the North Koreans have now launched an submarine launched ballistic missile that may have failed as well.  Unlike the Musudan test though that may have blown up at the launch site this test did at least go 30 kilometers before possibly failing, so they did get some data from the launch to continue to improve the missile.  An SLBM is particularly dangerous because a submarine can appear anywhere and launch which makes missile defense especially challenging:

North Korea launched what appeared to be a ballistic missile from a submarine in the East Sea Saturday, the South Korean military said.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said North Korea fired a projectile that it believes was a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) around 6:30 p.m. The JCS said it is keeping close tabs on the North Korean military while maintaining its readiness posture.

The JCS added that the missile flew for only about 30 kilometers, well short of the minimum SLBM range of 300 km.

Separately, a South Korean government source said the SLBM’s engine ignited after it was ejected from a 2,000-ton Sinpo-class submarine but it only traveled a short distance.

“This projectile, which is believed to be an SLBM, was airborne for a couple of minutes,” the source added.

Last month, a U.S. news report claimed that North Korea had conducted a ground test of an SLBM, the KN-11. The Washington Free Beacon said the test on March 16 involved an ejection test of the KN-11 from a canister at Sinpo shipyard on the North’s eastern coast.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

This makes the missile test failure even worse for the North Koreans if true:

North Korea’s failed launch of its Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile last week sparked a huge fireball that damaged the launcher and could have also injured or killed missile technicians on the ground, a news report said Wednesday.

The missile blew up about 300 feet above the ground, shortly after Friday’s launch, and U.S. strategic defense surveillance systems, both airborne and space-based, videotaped the explosion, the Washington Free Beacon reported, citing U.S. defense officials.

Two road-mobile Musudan launchers were set up for the test, but the second was not fired after the explosion, the report said. It also cited a diplomatic source as saying that the likely cause of the explosion was a faulty fuel system or turbo pump failure.

The Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile is an indigenous variant of the Russian SS-N-6 submarine-launched ballistic missile, known by Moscow as the R-27, which the North obtained covertly from Russia sometime in the 1990s, the report said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

The Kim regime must be pretty embarrassed by the recent mass defection of 13 overseas restaurant workers because they are continuing to make the claim that they were all kidnapped:

In the video, the North Koreans are seen demanding the immediate repatriation of the defectors.

The defections are being labeled as an operation of the “treasonous clique of [South Korean President] Park Geun-hye,” and the two videos feature various North Koreans: restaurant workers, a student and a party cadre.

One interviewee condemned the South Korean puppets for “kidnapping our people 10 at a time,” adding “the [South Korean] presidential Blue House, the devil’s lair, should be destroyed and our people delivered as soon as possible.”

On April 7, North Koreans – a man and 12 women – had arrived in the South after they sought asylum at Seoul’s embassy in Bangkok.

North Korea has slammed Seoul, claiming South Korea “dragged” the North Koreans to a “Southeast Asian country.”  [UPI]

You can read more at the link.

https://twitter.com/pearswick/status/721633900913557504

Like many things with North Korea who knows if this is true, but I would not be surprised if it was:

North Korea has embarked on a nationwide crackdown on residents who wear Western clothing or have Western hairstyles. This includes wearing jeans and having piercings.

According to Japan’s Asia Press, the country is placing tight controls ahead of its 7th Congress of the Workers’ Party in May. The clampdown is mainly focused on North Hamgyong province and Yanggang province which are close to China.  [IB Times]

And look at this, Kim Jong-un even has his own “brownshirts” to carry out his edicts:

It is believed that ‘inspection units’ comprising teenagers dedicated to Kim, are on the streets looking for those who dare to break the new dress code. “They target supposed capitalist tendencies such as length of skirts, the shape of shoes, T-shirts, hairstyles and clothes,” Rimjin-Gang reported.

The North Korean Youth Union which is made up of volunteers who sign up once they reach 15 years old. They are tasked with preventing “the corruption of public morals.” The volunteers also target unmarried women who carry out business in marketplaces as this is forbidden.

You can read the rest at the link.

It looks like President Park must have put some pressure on the Mexican government to go ahead and seize the North Korean ship they detained two years ago when it ran aground on a reef and the North Korean government refused to pay fees for its release:

Mexico has confiscated a North Korean commercial ship affiliated with a North Korean firm blacklisted by the U.N. Security Council for suspicions of shipping weapons of mass destruction, an official notice revealed Friday.

In an official gazette, the Mexican prosecution said it has decided to seize the 6,700-ton Mu Du Bong, adding the decision will immediately take effect.

The prosecution said the decision was largely based on consideration for government expenses such as mooring fees, which North Korea has been refusing, or unable, to pay.

However, decision also comes after the Mexican president, in a meeting with his South Korean counterpart earlier in the month, said his country will handle the North Korean ship in a manner that faithfully carries out its obligation as a member of the United Nations.

The North Korean freighter had been detained at Mexico’s Tuxpan port since July 2014 when it was rescued after becoming aground on a reef off the Mexican city. The ship was later determined to be affiliated with a North Korean firm blacklisted under U.N. Security Council resolutions aimed at punishing the communist North for its military provocations.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but I maintain that the US should pursue sanctions that not only allow the seizing of North Korean ships conducting illicit activity, but also the selling of them to pay reparations to the victims of the Kim regime’s various terrorist attacks and deadly provocations over the decades.

This undated photo shows a passport and Chinese documents held by one of the 13 North Korean restaurant workers stationed in China who participated in a successful group defection to South Korea last week. The photo, taken and kept by the restaurant operator, shows that the passport is marked as being for official use, as is commonly issued to North Koreans sent abroad to work. The document shows a foreigner’s registration of resident address in China. China’s foreign ministry had said that the defectors left the country carrying valid passports. (Yonhap)

If North Korea was to conduct an above ground nuclear test it would be interesting to see what the Chinese reaction to it would be since they would be affected by the fallout:

A Japanese daily says North Korea could go ahead with a nuclear test in the atmosphere as its final means of a threat to hold direct talks with the United States.

The Nihon Keizai Shimbun said in a Thursday column that there are skeptical views of North Korea conducting an anachronistic atmospheric nuclear test. However, it noted the North’s past behavior such as the shelling of South Korea’s Yeonpyeong Island, torpedoing of the South’s Cheonan vessel and infiltration of special forces into the South using a submarine.

The paper argued the North will find it necessary to bring forth something even more shocking to draw U.S. attention, and quoted expert opinions that the possibility of an atmospheric nuke test can no longer be excluded.

At atmospheric nuclear explosion causes radioactive fallout in all directions and poses a devastating impact on the environment.

No country in the world has conducted such a test since China in 1980.  [KBS World Radio]