This is a really interesting read from a North Korean defector that had a very different upbringing from most defectors:
Lee Seo-hyun, a Keynote Speaker with Freedom Speakers International, is a North Korean defector who recently launched a GoFundMe after she was recently accepted into the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University). She delivered the following speech at TEDxUCLA on June 4, 2022. Courtesy of Casey Lartigue Jr.
It has been said “Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.” My name is Lee Seo-hyun. I am a North Korean escapee who gave up the certain opportunity to thrive in hell, and instead fled my native country to face certain uncertainty.
My experience as a North Korean escapee might surprise you. I did not grow up in extreme poverty; I was not coerced into human trafficking; nor do I have horrific stories of being a political prisoner. My father was a senior-level government officer for the North Korean regime, and his loyal commitment to the nation and the leader allowed our family to live in the capital Pyongyang, a privilege as North Koreans.
Like most people in North Korea, I had no doubts about the regime because I was brainwashed. I truly believed what our leader said: “Our country is the envy of the world!” Yes, I was living in a bubble. Not of my choosing ― I wasn’t even aware of it ― but a bubble, nonetheless.
What about you? Have you ever even considered the possibility that you may be living in a bubble, regardless of your politics or religion, regardless of the color of your skin or your perceived status in life?
What if the ‘Bubble’ ― the truth I had accepted without question ― is in some way no different from yours ― although yours probably doesn’t include political oppression and torture?
North Korea provided some fireworks for President Yoon’s 100th day in office:
North Korea launches what it claimed was a hypersonic missile, Jan. 5, in this photo provided by the North Korean government. North Korea seems to have test-fired two cruise missiles toward the Yellow Sea on Wednesday. AP-Yonhap
North Korea test-fired two cruise missiles toward the Yellow Sea on Wednesday, a South Korean military official said, as President Yoon Suk-yeol held a press conference to mark the 100th day since taking office.
“(The military) has detected two cruise missiles launched by North Korea from Onchon, South Pyongan Province, into the Yellow Sea early this morning,” the official said on the customary condition of anonymity without providing further details, including the exact type of missiles and time of the firing.
The Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise is coming up later this month so the Kim regime now the Kim regime is using activist balloons as the excuse they need to launch a provocation:
South Korea’s unification ministry on Thursday voiced strong regret over North Korea’s claim that its COVID-19 outbreak had originated from the South and its threats of an unspecified retaliatory step.
Earlier in the day, Pyongyang’s state media reported that leader Kim Jong-un held a national meeting the previous day and declared victory in the campaign against COVID-19.
During the session, his younger sister, Kim Yo-jong, who serves as vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea, reiterated Pyongyang’s assertion that leaflets from the South carried the virus into the North and raised the need to take “deadly retaliatory” countermeasures.
At this point anyone living along the Imjim River should avoid it during heavy rain periods because the North Koreans are likely going to flood the river with no notification:
This file photo taken June 28, 2022, shows water gushing out of the floodgates of the Gunnam Dam on the Imjin River, which runs across the inter-Korean border in the South Korean border town of Yeoncheon, north of Seoul. The dam, built in 2010, was designed to deal with flash floods from North Korea. (Yonhap)
North Korea appears to be releasing water from a dam near the inter-Korean border without giving prior notice to the South, a South Korean government official said Monday, as the North is drenched by heavy downpours.
“As rain has fallen heavily in North Korea, the North is repeatedly opening and closing the floodgates of Hwanggang Dam,” the unification ministry official said. “It seems (the North) is adjusting the Hwanggang Dam’s water level based on the rainfall situation.”
The official said there was no prior notification from the North on the move.
Under an inter-Korean agreement signed in October 2009, the North is supposed to notify the South in advance of its plans to release dam water.
I do not see this many Soldiers being sent to fight in Ukraine by North Korea, but it appears that the Russian propaganda apparatus is trying to will this into existence:
Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ride an escalator following their talks at the Far Eastern Federal University campus on Russky island in the far-eastern Russian port of Vladivostok on April 25, 2019. Media reports in August speculated that North Korea was prepared to send a “100,000 strong army of volunteers” to fight in Ukraine alongside the Russians.
Korotchenko does not cite the source for his claim, which he made in a Thursday, August 4 broadcast, and there does not appear to be any public announcement by Moscow or Pyongyang to support it.
While some Russian outlets have repeated his claims after they were picked up by national and international news outlets, the only earlier mention of such “offer” and the “100,000” figure appears on report by the Russian news agency REGNUM, which the EU has accused of spreading “aggressive and biased propagandist narratives against Ukraine, and to promote a positive attitude to the annexation of Crimea and the actions of separatists in Donbas.”
The article, dated August 2, cites a Russian MP, who referenced North Korea’s “offer” to help in a speech in the Duma.
You can read more at the link, but North Korea has not publicly commented on any of these claims. North Korea definitely has the manpower, but this could be a huge embarrassment for the Kim regime if the Soldiers do not perform well or even worse start defecting. The Russian army has already lost massive prestige by being smacked around by an inferior Ukrainian military.
Part of Kim Jong-un’s deterrence strategy is the prestige of having a massive military that provides a legitimate threat to South Korea. Losing in Ukraine and having a bunch of Soldiers defect takes away from that deterrence factor.
Here is one theory on why the North Koreans have not had a massive loss of life due to COVID despite no vaccination campaign:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is surrounded by war veterans in front of a monument celebrating the country’s “victory” in the Korean War (1950-53) in Pyongyang, North Korea, on July 27, the 69th anniversary of the end of the war, in this photo released July 28 by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency. Yonhap
Given the two undeniable reports from the North ― that fever cases spiked before falling and that leader Kim Jong-un recently appeared in the middle of a crowd of war veterans without masks ― experts have laid out two scenarios: either that enough North Koreans are now immune to COVID-19, thanks partly to their stronger immune systems, or that most of the fever cases were not COVID-related in the first place.
“North Koreans may have a stronger active immunity, given that they are exposed to all sorts of infectious diseases,” Choi Jung-hoon, a former infectious disease doctor from the North, told The Korea Times. “It is important to keep in mind that its official numbers should not be trusted. If it (herd immunity) was the case, this means that a lot more people died and suffered from COVID-19 in the process than the numbers claim … The progress has also been helped by its draconian measures, which would be politically impossible in democratic countries.”
Kim Jong-un is not happy that the South Korean military under President Yoon Suk-yeol is taking measures to improve defense readiness:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un warned that South Korea’s Yoon Suk-yeol government and its “military gangsters” will face annihilation should it make any “dangerous attempt” like a preemptive strike, according to Pyongyang’s state media Thursday.
Kim issued the strongly worded, direct warning against the South’s conservative administration, coupled with biting criticism of the United States, in his speech the previous day marking the 69th anniversary of the armistice that halted the 1950-53 Korean War. Pyongyang calls the anniversary “Victory Day” and commemorates it in a celebratory mood.
Kim mentioned South Korea’s president by name three times in the address and branded its military as gangsters, citing its stated strategy to counter the North’s nuclear and missile threats through the reinforcement of the so-called three-pillar system, including the Kill Chain preemptive strike capabilities.
“Such a dangerous attempt would be punished immediately by powerful forces, and the Yoon Seok-yeol administration and his military would be wiped out,” he said, appearing in public for the first time in 19 days along with his wife Ri Sol-ju for the Pyongyang ceremony.
You can read more at the link, but it is ironic that Kim is calling Yoon a gangster when the North Korean regime has long been called the Sopranos State.
In H1 of 2022 only 19 North Korean refugees made it to South Korea. 16 female, 3 male. This is a lower rate than any point this century, and a direct result of pandemic-related restrictions on movement, especially in China. pic.twitter.com/UL5I75e58i
Hackers continue to be a major money source for Kim crime family in North Korea:
Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco attends a briefing in New York on April 27, 2022. Monaco said on Tuesday, July 19, that the FBI and Justice Department recently disrupted the activities of a hacking group that was sponsored by the North Korean government and that targeted U.S. hospitals with ransomware. (Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/AP)
The FBI and Justice Department recently disrupted the activities of a hacking group that was sponsored by the North Korean government and that targeted U.S. hospitals with ransomware, ultimately recovering half a million dollars in ransom payments and cryptocurrency, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said Tuesday.
Monaco revealed new details of the attacks during a speech in which she encouraged organizations hit by ransomware to report the crime to law enforcement, both so that officials can investigate and so that they can help victim companies try to get ransom payments back.
In this case, Monaco said, a Kansas hospital that paid a ransom last year after being attacked by ransomware also contacted the FBI, which traced the payment and identified China-based money launderers who assisted the North Korean hackers in cashing out the illicit proceeds. The FBI was able to recover half a million dollars, including the entire ransom payment from the hospital.
You can read more at the link, but besides doing this for the cash these hackers are also exfiltrating private medical information. It makes me wonder how secure the DOD’s medical record servers are?
