This guy must have been pretty desperate to attempt a high risk defection like this. Hopefully he doesn’t have any family left in North Korea that will be punished for his defection:
A North Korean man defected to South Korea after he swam down the coast and evaded armed border guards with orders to shoot anyone fleeing Kim Jong Un’s regime.
The unidentified man was detected late on the evening of July 30, according to South Korean officials, who made the defection public on Thursday. He used tied-on plastic foam for buoyancy and swam down the Korean Peninsula’s west coast.
After a journey of around 10 hours, the man, who reportedly waved his hands and declared his intention to defect, was retrieved by South Korea’s military about 1.6 miles south of North Korean soil.
Defections to the South have become extremely rare in recent years after Kim ordered extra fortifications and boosted security along the border. That has left only dangerous routes and the risk of a death sentence if caught.
Here is an interesting read about how a down on her luck American woman became a laptop farmer for North Korea:
Soon, more laptops arrived. Zhonghua got back in touch and told her she’d receive $300 a month for each one she hosted. Her dream job had landed on her doorstep, or so it seemed.
Instead, it would prove to be the beginning of a long nightmare. Zhonghua’s company wasn’t a company at all, but a front for agents of the North Korean government, who were using the laptops to work remote IT jobs for oblivious US businesses. And the promise he’d recognized in her was not as a software engineer. It was as a “laptop farmer”—an American providing geographic cover for North Korean IT workers, making it appear they were Americans working on US soil. All told, the United Nations estimates the wages paid to these illicit telecommuters generate $250 million to $600 million for the regime each year, much of which is funneled directly into its rocket program.
North Korea easily won the first Korean War. The US and 16 other countries bailed out the puppet state of South Korea by intervening. The US then tried to conquer the North in the second phase, an illegal war of aggression, and lost.
It is interesting that Kim Yo-jong is coming out and saying that relations between the U.S. and North Korean leaders is “not bad”. It makes me think there is likely much communication going on behind the scenes:
The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said Tuesday personal ties between the leaders of the North and the United States are “not bad,” while ruling out talks on Pyongyang’s denuclearization.
Kim Yo-jong, vice department director of the ruling party’s Central Committee, made the remarks as U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed his intent to reengage with the North’s leader.
“I do not want to deny the fact that the personal relationship between the head of our state and the present U.S. president is not bad,” Kim said in a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
“However, if the personal relations between the top leaders of the DPRK and the U.S. are to serve the purpose of denuclearization, it can be interpreted as nothing but a mockery of the other party,” she said.
What is notable about this report is that Kim Jong-un did not launch any criticisms towards South Korea or the U.S. signaling that Kim may not have any current animosity towards ROK President Lee Jae-myung or U.S. President Donald Trump:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has visited the Friendship Tower in Pyongyang on the anniversary of the signing of an armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War, pledging not to forget the contributions of fallen Chinese soldiers, state media reported Sunday.
Kim also appeared to refrain from criticizing South Korea or the United States, as state media made no mention of him making such remarks during the ceremony.
Kim laid a wreath before the tower the previous day, saying that North Korea “would never forget the militant feats and merits of the fallen fighters of the Chinese People’s Volunteers,” the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.
The armistice was signed on July 27, 1953, bringing the Korean War to a halt. Since 1996, North Korea has marked the date as Victory Day, claiming it won the Liberation War against U.S.-led aggression.
I once saw Mt. Kumgang through a telescope along the DMZ on South Korea’s east coast. It looked like a pretty amazing mountain. I hope to visit it one day when the Kim regime is no longer around:
North Korea’s Mount Kumgang, noted for its striking natural beauty, has been inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site on Sunday.
During the 47th session of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee in Paris, the decision was made to inscribe the mountain and the historical relics in and around it on the list of protected landmarks and sites of internationally recognized cultural, historic or scientific value.
For more than a thousand years, Mount Kumgang (Geumgang in South Korean romanization) has enchanted artists, lyrists and travelers alike with its breathtaking panorama of craggy granite peaks, tumbling waterfalls and mist-veiled gorges.
Hopefully Ukraine’s allies are keeping pace with Russia’s allies in the production of artillery rounds:
North Korea has continued to provide Russia with artillery shells to support its war against Ukraine, which amounts to more than 12 million rounds of 152 mm shells, according to South Korea’s military intelligence authorities Sunday.
North Korea is believed to have provided around 28,000 containers containing weapons and artillery shells to date, according to a report by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) submitted to a lawmaker of the main opposition party.
“If calculated with 152 mm single shells, (the number of supplied shells) are presumed to have reached more than 12 million,” the DIA under the defense ministry said.
Russia has exported to North Korea and air defense system that failed to shootdown any Israeli jets that executed the bombing campaign over Iran. After the Israeli bombing campaign, Kim Jong-un cannot possibly have much faith that this system will protect his capitol against a U.S. bombardment:
North Korea has already been using the Pantsir-S1 air defense system provided by Russia to defend the North’s capital of Pyongyang, a Ukrainian online newspaper reported Wednesday, citing Kyiv’s intelligence chief.
Kyrylo Budanov, head of Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR), made the remark in an interview with Hromadske Radio the previous day (local time), according to The Kyiv Independent.
The Pantsir missile system is made up of self-propelled, medium-range surface-to-air missile and anti-aircraft artillery systems.
Budanov said the first Pantsir-S1 installations have already been deployed in Pyongyang and are on combat duty. He added that the Russians are retraining North Korean personnel, who will soon be working autonomously on this technology.
The North Korean media for the first time is showing that North Korean Soldiers have been killed in Ukraine:
North Korea’s state media aired Monday images of its leader Kim Jong-un mourning over his soldiers believed to have been killed in Russia’s war against Ukraine.
The images, released by Korean Central Television, showed Kim solemnly placing a North Korean flag over a coffin during a ceremony for the return of the remains of North Korean soldiers who were deployed and killed in Moscow’s war against Kyiv.
As long as the Ukriane-Russia war continues there is no reason for Kim Jong-un to pursue any diplomacy with Trump. Kim is getting the money and military aid he needs from the Russians for now. If he started diplomacy with Trump it would look like he is backstabbing Putin:
Joseph Yun, the acting U.S. ambassador in Seoul, said Tuesday that any renewed talks between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un hinge on mutual willingness.
“I have no doubt that President Trump considers his engagement with North Korea during his first term as unfinished business, and he wants to reengage with North Korea,” Yun said.
“But it takes two to tango,” he added. “We have not really heard from the North Korean side whether they too want to reengage. And to me, that’s the bigger unknown.”
