Remember this criticism is occurring in the English language North Korean state media. I have seen no indications that the domestic media is sharing this sentiment in North Korea. I doubt the North Korean public even knows of the failed launch:
North Korea called its failed attempt to launch a purported military reconnaissance satellite the “most serious” shortcoming in the first half of this year and reaffirmed its pledge to put it into orbit soon, Pyongyang’s state media said Monday.
The North made the assessment following a plenary meeting of the 8th Central Committee of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea, attended by leader Kim Jong-un, that wrapped up the previous day, referring to its botched attempt to launch a rocket carrying a military spy satellite on May 31.
Via a reader tip comes this interesting article from the BBC where they secretly interview three North Koreans about life under the Kim Jong-un regime:
Under the tyrannical rule of Kim Jong Un, North Koreans are forbidden from making contact with the outside world. With the help of the organisation Daily NK, which operates a network of sources inside the country, the BBC has been able to communicate with three ordinary people. They are eager to tell the world about the catastrophic toll the border closure has taken on their lives. They understand if the government discovers they are talking to us, they would likely be killed. To protect them, we can only reveal some of what they have told us, yet their experiences offer an exclusive snapshot of the situation unfolding inside North Korea.
According to one of the North Koreans interviewed the food situation has gotten very bad due to the sealing of the border with China because of COVID:
“Our food situation has never been this bad,” Myong Suk tells us. (….)
Now when her husband and children wake, she prepares them a breakfast of corn. Gone are the days they could eat plain rice. Her hungry neighbours have started knocking at the door asking for food, but she has to turn them away.
“We are living on the front line of life,” she says.
Here is what another North Korean had to say about the food situation:
At first Chan Ho was afraid he might die from Covid, but as time went on, he began to worry about starving to death, especially as he watched those around him die.
The first family in his village to succumb to starvation was a mother and her children. She had become too sick to work. Her children kept her alive for as long as they could by begging for food, but in the end all three died. Next came a mother who was sentenced to hard labour for violating quarantine rules. She and her son starved to death.
More recently, one of his acquaintance’s sons was released from the military because he was malnourished. Chan Ho remembers his face suddenly bloating. Within a week he had died.
You can read much more at the link, but the interviewees say that COVID is being used as an excuse to crackdown on the people and stop cross border trade with China and defections to South Korea. It is apparently working because people are starving and many of those that attempt to escape now are publicly executed. Here is the final comments from the article:
Chan Ho blames the international community. “The US and UN seem half-witted,” he says, questioning why they still offer to negotiate with Kim Jong Un, when it is so clear he will not give up his weapons. Instead, the construction worker wishes the US would attack his country.
“Only with a war, and by getting rid of the entire leadership, can we survive,” he says. “Let’s end this one way or another.”
Myong Suk agrees. “If there was a war, people would turn their backs on our government,” she says. “That’s the reality.”
The problem is no one wants a war with North Korea to save starving people at the cost of destroying Seoul and possibly causing a greater regional war. Thus these poor North Koreans are stuck starving while their leader Kim Jong-un and his family get fatter and fatter.
I people are wondering why Japan is growing their military capabilities this is just another example why:
North Korea sent at least two ballistic missiles into Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in waters off Ishikawa Prefecture on Thursday, the Defense Ministry in Tokyo said, further ramping up tensions after a failed satellite launch last month.
Both missiles splashed down some 250 kilometers northwest of Ishikawa’s Hegura Island, traveling about 850 km and 900 km, respectively, Parliamentary Vice Minister of Defense Kimi Onoda told reporters, adding that there had not been any reports of damage to aircraft or ships.
Onoda called the launches into Japan’s EEZ, which extends 200 nautical miles (370 km) from its coast, “absolutely unacceptable” and “a serious matter concerning the safety of residents of the country.”
The launches were the first to land in Japan’s EEZ since mid-February.
The North Koreans are claiming the launches were in response to joint US and ROK live fire exercises:
The allies ended the fifth and last round of the Combined Joint Live-Fire Exercise, the first of its kind in six years, at the Seungjin Fire Training Field in Pocheon, just 25 kilometers south of the inter-Korean border, on Thursday to mark the 70th anniversary of the bilateral alliance.
More than 610 military assets were mobilized for the drills, including F-35A fighters and K9 self-propelled howitzers from the South Korean side, and F-16 fighter jets and Gray Eagle drones from the U.S. side.
The North’s defense ministry accused the allies of escalating tensions, saying the drills warrant its “inevitable” response.
“Our army strongly denounces the provocative and irresponsible moves of the puppet military authorities escalating the military tension in the region despite its repeated warnings and warns them solemnly,” the spokesperson said in the statement carried by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency.
This shouldn’t be too surprising because it will likely be months before North Korea’s scientists are able to asses the data and repair whatever went wrong with their previous space launch. Additionally they likely have to build another satellite to put on top of the rocket:
The office of President Yoon Suk Yeol said Sunday it is not letting its guard down even though the window for North Korea’s satellite launch has expired, as the country can go ahead with a launch at any time.
North Korea had set a period between the start of May 31 and the start of June 11 as the window for a satellite-carrying space rocket launch. The country fired the rocket on the first day of the window, but the launch ended in failure with the rocket crashing in the Yellow Sea.
It makes me wonder if their were marital difficulties and the wife defected knowing what the consequences for her husband would be:
Authorities in Vladivostok, a port city in the far eastern region of Russia, have launched an investigation into the disappearance of two North Koreans, Russian news outlets reported Tuesday.
The missing North Koreans are believed to be wife and son of an official working at the North Korean consulate general there, according to the Arguments & Facts weekly owned by the Government of Moscow.
The two — 43-year-old Kim Kum-sun and 15-year-old Park Kwon-ju — were last seen leaving the North Korean consulate general office in Vladivostok on Sunday morning and have been unaccounted for since, the report said.
The report said the cab driver who picked them up outside the consulate general office told authorities he dropped them off near a building on the city’s Russkaya Street, which was confirmed by closed-circuit TV footage.
The investigation was opened following a missing person report filed by the North Korean consul general office.
Kim Yo-jong is unhappy with the condemnation of their recent failed space launch and claims it is hypocritical. Her point is that many other countries conduct space launches to why can’t North Korea? If North Korea was not threatening neighboring countries with nuclear destruction and launching deadly provocations against South Korea the UN would not have sanctions against their rocket and missile programs:
The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Sunday lambasted last week’s meeting of the U.N. Security Council (UNSC) on the country’s recent failed space rocket launch as “the most unfair and biased act of interfering in internal affairs.”
In a statement carried by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), Kim Yo-jong expressed displeasure over Friday’s open UNSC briefing, stressing the North will continue to exercise “all the lawful rights” as a sovereign state, including one to launch satellites.
The North launched what it claimed to be a satellite-carrying rocket Wednesday, but it fell into the Yellow Sea following an abnormal flight, according to the South Korean military. The U.S. and other nations called the launch a breach of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions. North Korea is banned from any use of ballistic missile technology under U.N. resolutions.
“I am very unpleased that the UNSC so often calls to account the DPRK’s exercise of its rights as a sovereign state at the request of the U.S., and bitterly condemn and reject it as the most unfair and biased act of interfering in its internal affairs and violating its sovereignty,” Kim said, referring to her country by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
This would be a big intelligence gain for the ROK if they are able to salvage the second stage of North Korea’s failed rocket launch:
An apparent part of a purported North Korean space launch vehicle is seen in waters some 200 kilometers west of the southwestern island of Eocheong on May 31, 2023, in this photo provided by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. (Yonhap)
The South Korean military is still in an operation to retrieve a sunken part of a purported North Korean space rocket that appears to be the second stage of the ill-fated vehicle, Seoul’s defense chief said Thursday.
Defense Minister Lee Jong-sup made the remarks during a parliamentary session, as the Navy is trying to recover the 15-meter part that currently lies at a depth of 75 meters underwater in the Yellow Sea. The retrieval may take two more days, he said.
The North fired what it claims to be a satellite-carrying rocket Thursday morning, but it crashed into the sea due to the abnormal starting of the second-stage engine, the North’s state media said, in a rare acknowledgement of such a failure.
“We are continuing to trace the third stage and the payload,” Lee told lawmakers, noting the already identified wreckage appears to be the second stage of the rocket.
