Category: North Korea

The South Korean National Intelligence Service (NIS) definitely has the best intelligence within North Korea because they confirmed this two months ago:

Kim Jong Un is an impatient autocrat who single-handedly decided to execute North Korean Defense Minister Hyon Yong Chol, according to Seoul’s spy agency on Tuesday.

South Korean lawmakers said National Intelligence chief Lee Byung-ho made the statements at a briefing before the National Assembly’s Intelligence Committee, Yonhap reported.

Kim also was the executive decision maker behind the undeleted footage of Hyon in the weeks that followed after his disappearance.

According to Seoul’s spy chief, North Korean television continued to run past footage of Hyon under Kim’s orders.

Kim, Lee said, believed the international community could use conspicuous deletions against Pyongyang because the erasure would serve as evidence of Hyon’s execution.

South Korean newspaper Donga Ilbo reported Hyon was executed at the artillery range at Pyongyang’s Kang Kon Military Academy.

Hundreds watched the execution, according to the NIS, and Kim forced top-ranking military officers to attend.

Kim may have executed other military personnel if they were loyal to Hyon or held grievances against Kim, Lee said, according to South Korean lawmaker Shin Kyung-min.

Shin said Kim had labeled Hyon as “anti-Workers’ Party, and a counter-revolutionary.”  [UPI]

You can read the rest at the link, but according to the article Kim Jong-un is trying to weaken the power of the military in North Korea.

Here is what I think it going on.  I have said this before that I do not believe that Kim Jong-un has the absolute power that many people believe him to have.  I believe that his grandfather Kim Il-sung had absolute power, but when his son Kim Jong-il took over that the absolute power was diluted between the ruling Kim inner circle, the Worker’s Party, and the North Korean military.  These three sectors competed for power with the military ultimately becoming the most powerful bureaucracy in North Korea under Kim Jong-il.  These sectors of power in North Korea though likely ruled by consensus and when consensus could not be reached Kim Jong-il was likely the deciding vote which was heavily influenced by his backing of the North Korean military.

After Kim Jong-il’s death these sectors of North Korean power likely competed for influence again after Kim Jong-un took over.  Kim Jong-un’s uncle Jang Song-taek appeared to be trying to challenge the status quo by increasing the power of the Worker’s Party.  With the power of the Worker’s Party increasing, the military may have felt like their power was decreasing too much and took action to get rid of Jang to put the status quo back to where it was.  However, the status quo likely meant Kim Jong-un has less power than his father did after the execution of Jang and the following purge of Party officials loyal to him.

His recent purge of military officials shows that Kim Jong-un understands this and is trying to re-establish absolute power for himself like his grandfather had.  His grandfather had to rely on a number of purges to gain the power he had.  Kim Jong-un first focused on purging the Worker’s Party of people that he perceived as a possible challenge to his authority.  Now he is focusing on the North Korean military.  After the military is purged that leaves Kim and his family inner circle as the biggest power brokers in North Korea.  It is a dangerous game he is playing, but we will see over the years how well it works.

https://twitter.com/freekorea_us/status/619644495597043712

This photo, dated July 8, 2015, and released by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), shows North Korean Army Gen. Pak Yong-sik visiting Kumsusan Palace of the Sun in Pyongyang to pay tribute to Kim Il-sung, the founder of the North Korean government. KCNA said on July 11, 2015, that Pak attended a meeting on that day with a Lao military delegation as the head of the Ministry of the People’s Armed Forces, equivalent to South Korea’s defense minister. It is the first time the North has confirmed the replacement of the defense minister since South Korea’s spy agency, the National Intelligence Service, said in May that the previous minister, Hyon Yong-chol, was executed in April on charges of treason. (Yonhap)

Dieter Schmitt, who has run business tours to North Korea, looks at some of the opportunities and pitfalls: http://t.co/2BUVAq20mt

— NK NEWS (@nknewsorg) July 9, 2015

I guess it was only a matter of time, but now North Koreans get to wear another face on their clothes:

North Korea is printing new badges showing leader Kim Jong-un alongside his grandfather and father.

North Korean officials have so far worn badges with the faces of former leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il, but now the personality cult clearly includes the current leader.

A company in Pyongyang’s Pyongchon district is making the badges with the faces of the three Kims on the occasion of the anniversary of the Workers Party on Oct. 10, a source said on Tuesday.

The company is printing the first batch of 3,000 to give out to senior party officials and senior members of the socialist youth league.  [Chosun Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link.

North Korea may have capacity to produce anthrax, analyst says http://t.co/btpWTu4hVN #NorthKorea #DPRK #WMD

— NorthKoreaRealTime (@BuckTurgidson79) July 9, 2015

You have to hand it to the North Korean propagandists for finding new ways to bush the US:

You’ve probably seen Riley. He’s a dog who got internet-famous for looking super stoned at his birthday party. He’s a funny little pup. But the North Koreans aren’t laughing. They recently showed the image on state TV to prove just how decadent American culture is.

As the Guardian explains:

KCTV commentator Lee Chung-song claimed in the clip that American billionaires are buying $15,000 dog collars for their pets, paying for dog hotels and spas or even hosting expensive birthday parties for their canines, such as the one enjoyed by Riley, while many homeless people are forced to live in boxes, he said.

You can read the rest at this Gizmodo link.

This same freedom that allows North Korean women to more easily cross the border into China also makes them more susceptible to sex trafficking.  That is why today North Korean women in China are the modern day comfort women that few people care about:

SEOUL, July 6 (UPI) — North Korean defectors are overwhelmingly women, according to a South Korean government report released Sunday.

The preliminary data from Seoul’s Unification Ministry indicated of the 535 North Koreans who sought asylum in South Korea in 2015, 444 were women, South Korean news agency Yonhap reported.

Women in North Korea are not subject to the same strict surveillance in place for North Korean men, according to South Korean newspaper Hankyoreh.

The North Korean state employs men in higher numbers, and a prolonged absence from the workplace is likely to raise a red flag.

While Pyongyang maintains a system that discourages men from fleeing the country, North Korean women who are registered as “housewives” in the country are allowed more freedom.

Women participate in North Korea’s unofficial economy at higher rates and the country’s gray markets have continued to proliferate as the state looks the other way.

In the absence of scrutiny, North Korean women also cross the China-North Korea border in larger numbers — an option not available to North Korean men, according to South Korean press.  [UPI]

You can read more at the link.

https://twitter.com/pearswick/status/616081592470016000

I put this story in the category of unverifiable rumor, so who knows how true it is:

North Korean diplomats, fearful of reprisals from the state for their children’s positive remarks on life outside the country, are sending their sons and daughters to mental hospitals to protect them from state surveillance.

A source in Dandong, China who is familiar with the situation in Pyongyang told Daily NK on Wednesday that parents use bribes to cajole psychiatrists for admission into hospitals under false pretenses.

Cases of North Korean foreign service officers using mental health clinics as a refuge for their children are on the rise, according to the source.

“[Diplomats] with children who know the truth about the outside world are afraid of punishment and are sending them to mental hospitals [as a preventive measure],” the source said.

North Koreans in the foreign service are typically elites who are well cared for by the state, and take residence in Pyongyang, where the standard of living is significantly higher than in many parts of the state.  [UPI]

You can read the rest at the link.