Sung Kim, new U.S. special representative for North Korea, speaks during trilateral talks with his South Korean and Japanese counterparts at the Lotte Hotel in central Seoul in this pool photo taken on June 21, 2021. (Yonhap)
The United States has offered to meet with North Korea “anywhere, anytime without preconditions” and looks forward to a positive response from Pyongyang, the new U.S. special envoy for the North said Monday.
Ambassador Sung Kim made the remarks during trilateral talks with his South Korean and Japanese counterparts, Noh Kyu-duk and Takehiro Funakoshi, in Seoul, where they discussed North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s recent remarks that his country should be ready for both dialogue and confrontation.
You can read more at the link, but the Kim regime will meet when they feel like they will get something of value out of it. Kim Jong-un met with former President Trump because Moon Jae-in gave him assurances that Trump was ready for a large deal. Trump was close to signing a deal, but Kim would only give up part of his nuclear weapons program and thus why diplomacy failed.
Moon now has little creditability with Pyongyang and the Biden administration is not offering anything new thus why diplomacy is currently at a stalemate.
Chris Ahn faces extradition to Spain based on incompetent evidence by NKn officials. Ahn saved Kim Han Sol, eldest son of eldest son (Jong Nam) of eldest son (Jong Il) of #DPRK founder Kim Il Sung. #FBI: NK has targeted Ahn for murder, must not leave US. https://t.co/YhwADXiQl1
Doug Bandow writes that it is time for the U.S. to give up its policy of denuclearizing North Korea:
After three decades of insisting that the DPRK can never be allowed to possess nuclear weapons, Washington must confront the failure of U.S. policy. American policymakers should consider accepting North Korea as a nuclear state and treating it as a normal country.
It no longer makes sense to talk of preventing the North from developing nuclear weapons. It already has them. There is great uncertainty as to how many nuclear weapons the Kim regime has or could potentially make—around sixty is a common estimate. However, that could be just the start. The Rand Corporation and Asan Institute figure Pyongyang could possess some two hundred by just 2027, a scant six years away. That would give it more nuclear weapons than currently possessed by India, Israel, and Pakistan. (………..)
Most realistic would be a focus on arms control, with the hope of developing a relationship that might lead to denuclearization. Even such a more limited objective would be advanced by developing a broader and more normal relationship. Meaning diplomatic ties—officials contacts are especially important with potentially dangerous adversaries—cultural exchanges, and economic ties.
You can read more at the link, but I agree with Bandow that denuclearization is now a fantasy. What is more realistic is negotiating away North Korea’s ICBM program, capping their number of nuclear weapons, and stopping nuclear proliferation. Without ICBMs their nukes cannot threaten the United States and it is in the US’s interest that North Korea not sell nuclear technology abroad like they have done in the past.
Christopher Ahn during North Korean embassy break in.
Warmbier, along with her husband Fred, appeared in a Los Angeles courtroom last week to ask the U.S. government to stop the extradition of Ahn, who served in Fallujah, Iraq, and was arrested when he returned from Spain in 2019.
He was part of an activist group that helps high-level North Korean diplomats and officials defect. Spanish authorities are asking the Biden administration to send Ahn back to face charges that he and his group broke into the North Korean embassy in Madrid.
But Ahn and the group, Free Joseon, or Free North Korea, maintain that they were invited in as part of a planned mission to help Kim’s ambassador defect, but the diplomat got cold feet at the last moment.
You can read more at the link, but the fear is that be extraditing Ahn that he will be more vulnerable to being killed by North Korea. Considering Kim Jong-un had has own brother killed inside a international airport, it is easy to believe they could pull off a hit job on Ahn as well.
Considering the poor shape many North Korean ships are in, it is surprising more of the don’t sink like this:
A North Korean ship presumed to be on a U.N. Security Council blacklist has sunk in waters off Japan, a source said Sunday.
The 5,500-ton freighter Chongbong sank in waters off Shimane Prefecture in western Japan at around 2:32 p.m. on Saturday, according to the source from Japan’s maritime authorities.
The vessel appeared to have been on its way to Songrim Port in North Korea’s southwestern province of Hwanghae after leaving Chongjin, a port in its northeastern region.
It was said to have been carrying about 6,500 tons of iron when it sunk. All 21 crew members on board were rescued by a North Korean oil ship passing nearby, the source said.
I guess we will see what a “flexible” approach to the DPRK means in the near future. Hopefully it doesn’t mean being flexible on sanctions with little to nothing in return:
The new North Korea policy of the Joe Biden administration is designed to be flexible to enable the “best chance of diplomatic success” by learning from past unsuccessful efforts, a senior US administration official said Thursday.
“We are not going to lay out exactly our diplomatic strategy here and now, I would simply say that we’ve tried to design it to be flexible,” the official told reporters while speaking on condition of anonymity.
“We understand where previous efforts in the past had difficulties, and we’re determined to try to learn from those past efforts to give ourselves the best chance of diplomatic success,” he said.
After wrapping up its monthslong North Korea policy review last month, the United States said it will not seek a “grand bargain” with North Korea or rely on strategic patience.
The North Koreans probably see no irony in them complaining about Japan’s proposed changes to their pacifist constitution when they have in fact started a major war and launched multiple attacks against their neighbors since World War II while Japan has caused no aggressive actions. The only reason Japan wants to modify its constitution is to better respond to aggressive acts from neighboring nations like North Korea:
Yoshihide Suga
North Korea condemned Japan on Wednesday for pushing to revise its pacifist constitution, calling the move a “declaration of war against humankind.”
The North’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) made the criticism as Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga mentioned the need to discuss the possible revision of its war-renouncing constitution earlier this month to officially recognize its self-defense forces by the law.
“Japan has made desperate efforts to turn itself, which renounced war, into a war-capable country, remaining unchanged in its wild ambition for launching reinvasion to avenge the past defeat,” KCNA said in a commentary.
It is hard for the Kim regime to accept COVID vaccines when they are probably getting ready to start a provocation cycle in time for this summer’s Tokyo Olympics:
The U.S. is making efforts to facilitate talks with North Korea with an offering of COVID-19 vaccines, but the probability of Pyongyang accepting this offer seems to be low, given the Kim Jong-un regime’s ignoring of humanitarian aid offers and its strict quarantine policy.
Experts said Wednesday the U.S. move can be interpreted as a tactic of showing various benefits available to the North if it joins the party, in the wake of the Joe Biden administration’s new North Korea policy. However, they have expressed doubts whether the North will find the vaccine offer attractive, as the regime seeks to be on equal footing with Washington and has not been acting desperate for vaccines.
Here is a clever way the Kim regime is trying to keep their citizens from reading the leaflets within the balloons launched by ROK human rights activists:
North Korea’s official newspaper on Thursday urged people to stay alert against coronavirus infections through “strange objects” floating in the air, days after the regime issued a harshly worded statement against propaganda leaflets sent from South Korea.
Last week, an activist group consisting of North Korean defectors in South Korea said that it released around 500,000 leaflets into the North via large balloons despite a recently enacted ban on such cross-border leafleting.
