From the North’s perspective why would they want to globalize the Kaesong Industrial Complex? It has worked as a great bargaining chip for them over the years to get what they want from the South Koreans:
South Korea called on North Korea to be more cooperative in luring foreign investors to their joint industrial complex in the North on Monday, the eve of the first anniversary of its reopening.
Seoul’s unification ministry said the operation of the Kaesong Industrial Complex (KIC) has been almost fully normalized despite a six-month hiatus from March last year.
The North, however, has maintained a lukewarm attitude toward agreed-upon working-level meetings to discuss ways to develop the facilities, where 125 South Korean firms employ more than 52,000 North Korean workers, according to the ministry.
“The globalization of the KIC has made little progress due to North Korea’s uncooperative stance,” it said in a press release. “North Korea will have to do what it should do for dialogue (on the future of the KIC) and its globalization.” [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but to the South Koreans globalizing Kaesong likely means getting as many Chinese companies as possible in there to make it harder for the North Koreans to shut down again.
South Korea’s military confirmed Sunday it has detected signs of North Korea’s development of a submarine-based ballistic missile launch system.
In a report to an opposition lawmaker, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said there is an indication that the North is developing a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM).
“There is no intelligence yet that North Korea has an SLBM in operation. But the possibility of a North Korean submarine equipped with an SLBM has been detected recently,” the JCS said in the document submitted to Rep. Jin Sung-joon of the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but developing a submarine based missile launch capability is very difficult and why so few nations have this capability. It just makes me wonder if the North Koreans are just putting out fake mock ups in order to confuse intelligence analysts. They have been accused of doing this in the past.
I figured this guy had some kind of mental problem to want to defect to North Korea, but if what the North Koreans say is true Miller still has mental issues but for a different reason:
North Korea’s Supreme Court on Sunday sentenced a 24-year-old American man to six years of hard labor for entering the country illegally and trying to commit espionage.
At a trial that lasted about 90 minutes, the court said Matthew Miller, of Bakersfield, California, tore up his tourist visa at Pyongyang’s airport upon arrival on April 10 and admitted to having the “wild ambition” of experiencing prison life so that he could secretly investigate North Korea’s human rights situation.
Miller, who waived the right to a lawyer, was handcuffed and led from the courtroom after his sentencing. The court ruled that it would not hear any appeals to its decision.
Earlier, it had been believed that Miller had sought asylum when he entered North Korea. During the trial, however, the prosecution argued that it was a ruse and that Miller also falsely claimed to have secret information about the U.S. military in South Korea on his iPad and iPod. [Associated Press]
You can read more at the link, but the North Koreans have trotted out Miller like the other two Americans they have detained to plead for the US to release them by sending a senior representative. If the Obama administration does decide to send someone I wonder if Bill Clinton be interested in going back over there again?
It looks like Kim Jong-un gout is getting to him again:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was recently shown limping on state television, raising questions about the health of the 31-year-old dictator.
Some experts say that the full display of Kim walking with a limp was intended to convey that he was fully in charge and reassure, ironically, the public of his good health.
It is generally believed that an accident or health problem was the cause.
Kim looks obese for his young age. It is widely speculated that he had fattened himself to make him look like his grandfather and founder of the communist state Kim Il-sung to enable the younger Kim to ascend to power at a young age after his father, Kim Jong-il, died in late 2011.
Footage from Korean Central Television (KCTV) Tuesday showed Kim walking with a limp, favoring his left leg, during a visit to a newly built factory in August, called “the Oct. 8 Factory.” [Korea Times]
I wonder if they also complained about the display of the Chinese flag who is also responsible for the deaths of many Koreans during the Korean War and the key enabler of North Korea?:
Organizers of the upcoming Asian Games in Incheon pulled down all national flags that lined the streets of the port city after rightwing groups complained about the public display of the North Korean flag.
The flags of the 45 participating nations were hoisted along the streets of Incheon and the city of Goyang north of Seoul last week.
Under Olympic Council of Asia regulations, the flags of the council, host nation and participating countries are displayed around sports stadiums, accommodation and airports.
The North Korean flag was also hoisted during the 2002 Asian Games in Busan and Daegu Universiade in 2003.
But this time rightwing groups in Goyang protested, and the organizers took the drastic step of removing all national flags and replacing them with the OCA flag and Asian Games banner. [Chosun Ilbo]
Via the Marmot’s Hole comes this Andrei Lankov article that discusses what North Koreans really think about the South Korean dramas and movies that has infiltrated their country:
The picture of the South within North Korea is a bit more complex, though. While admiring the almost unbelievable prosperity of the South, viewers are also exposed to many of the negative aspects of South Korean society.
I just came across an interesting aspect to this trend. My North Korean friend, a smart woman in her 30s, once said to me: “there are some violent gangs in North Korea, but there are much fewer gangs than there are here (i.e. South Korea).” I was taken aback by this statement, since South Korea is, actually, a very peaceful place with remarkably low level of violent crime. However, it soon became clear that my friend’s knowledge of Seoul’s “gang life” was based almost exclusively on South Korean action movies and TV dramas that she had watched (and that frequently depict street violence).
Indeed, a number of North Korean viewers have come to the conclusion that South Korea must be a very violent place where police shoot suspected criminals more or less at random, and where massive fights between rival gangs are almost as common as traffic jams in rush hours. [NK News]
You can read the rest at the link, but this same phenomenon is not limited to just North Koreans. I have seen this same thought process happen with South Koreans that have traveled to the US for the first time. Certain urban areas of the US does have a serious crime problem, but in the vast majority of the country you are not going to see gang violence, shoot outs, and explosions like what are depicted in Hollywood movies.
