KCNA: "Anyone, who values truth in sincerity, should instead ask for an investigation into the cause of Warmbier's sudden death soon after his arrival in the U.S., whose health indicators were all normal at the time of his release."
Here is another indication that the Moon administration is getting played by the Kim regime over the NLL issue:
The current NLL is depicted with the Blue line and North Korea’s claimed NLL is depicted with the Red line.
Touching on the controversy over the North’s position on the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de-facto sea border with the South, Jeong said that working-level North Korean officials have yet to accept the NLL as the maritime border, despite leader Kim Jong-un’s apparent recognition of it.
In April, the leaders of the two sides agreed to turn the tense area into a “maritime peace zone.” They used the term “NLL” in their joint statement.
President Moon Jae-in said it indicates that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has virtually recognized the NLL.
The North’s navy, however, had continued to claim its own security line until recently, sending repeated warning messages to South Korean ships crossing it.
That appears to be because North Korea’s front-line troops have not received any new related instructions from Kim, Jeong said.
He added that the North’s working-level officials have not yet agreed to accept the NLL.
Gen. Park Han-ki, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the South urged the North not to take issue with the NLL during the bilateral general-grade talks last week.
“(We) clearly told (the North) to stop sending such inappropriate radio messages,” he said. [Yonhap]
It looks like the leaders of South Korea’s banks are not about to break sanctions like the Moon administration has been pushing them to do:
FSC Chairman Choi Jong-ku. (Yonhap)
South Korea will open bank branches in North Korea only after international sanctions are lifted in return for irreversible steps by the North to dismantle its nuclear weapons program, the top financial regulator here said Friday.
Choi Jong-ku, chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC), told a parliamentary audit meeting that Seoul has not discussed cooperation with North Korea in the financial sector.
“Opening bank branches in North Korea will be possible only after conditions are met,” Choi said. [Yonhap]
It’s one thing for polisci experts to discuss unification and denuclearization. But another pressing assignment, for sociologists esp, is to rly start thinking about what the post-unification national discourse should look like. And it shouldn’t be like this: misogyny and racism https://t.co/UYTMmpgYBW
I always figured that the Trump administration would try and keep the perception of progress going with North Korea up to the mid-term elections. Limiting damaging information leaks seems to be part of this strategy:
The Trump administration is drastically cutting back on who on Capitol Hill gets to see intelligence reports on North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, according to multiple congressional sources.
Under the new rules, only each party’s House and Senate leaders, along with chairs and ranking members of foreign relations and intelligence committees, get direct access to the reports. It is a drastic change from previous distribution of North Korea related intelligence reports which, for the most part, gave access to the entire committees and the staffers on those committees.
The fear on Capitol Hill is that the limited distribution, which has been implemented over the past few weeks, will leave Congress largely in the dark when it comes to what U.S. intelligence has collected about North Korea’s motivations and nuclear developments. Some on the Hill, citing President Trump’s outreach to North Korea, worry that the White House is limiting the flow of information because the reports might indicate Pyongyang is accelerating its nuclear program. [CBS News]
KCNA: "Australia is seeking to destroy the hard-won peaceful atmosphere of the Korean peninsula and the region. It has become clear that Australia is displeased with the trend of peace in the Korean peninsula and the region."
North Korean football teams arrive in South Korea on Oct. 25, 2018, to compete in an international youth tournament. The North sent three teams to the 5th Ari Sports Cup, organized by the South-North Inter Korean Sports Association, that this year drew eight teams from six countries. (Yonhap)
This map shows the West Sea peace-cooperation special zones proposed by South Korea at the 2007 inter-Korean summit. (Yonhap)
Pyongyang’s version of a military pact signed by both Koreas last month mentions the northern limit line (NLL) in angle quotes, which may mean it doesn’t acknowledge the maritime border between the two Koreas in the Yellow Sea.
Seoul’s version doesn’t place any punctuation marks around the same words.
A lawmaker from the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) exclusively revealed the North’s version of the agreement to the JoongAng Ilbo on Thursday. Former South Korean National Defense Minister Song Young-moo signed the military pact with his North Korean counterpart, No Kwang-chol, on Sept. 19 during the third inter-Korean summit in Pyongyang.
If the North had indeed refused to acknowledge the NLL in September, it would contradict remarks made by South Korean President Moon Jae-in earlier this month.
The Blue House chief said on Oct. 11 that the North acknowledged the NLL in the latest summit. Both Koreas agreed to create a so-called peace zone around the area to prevent possible military clashes and establish a joint fishing zone, he said. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but Moon’s maritime peace zone that the Kim regime is so happy to sign an agreement on will surrender sovereignty of the NLL to the North Koreans by allowing joint fishing along the maritime border. This plan actually dates back an entire decade to the Roh Moo-hyun administration when Moon Jae-in was President Roh’s Chief of Staff. This map shows why the North Koreans are happy with the is arrangement:
The current NLL is depicted with the Blue line and North Korea’s claimed NLL is depicted with the Red line.
Moon’s peace zone would allow the North Korean boats to pass the current NLL to nearly the red line the North Koreans claim. The giving up of sovereignty of this maritime territory will make it harder to defend the South Korean islands along the NLL. Such an agreement would also set a precedent that the Kim regime’s claim against the legitimacy of the NLL is valid. The last time a South Korean leftist government tried to give away the NLL the ROK Defense Ministry was furious. That is likely why the Moon administration cleaned house at the Ministry of Defense before moving forward with this plan.
South Korea has made all these concessions to weaken their defenses against a North Korean attack and the Kim regime has yet to move one artillery battery away from the DMZ in return.
I hope the US pushes back hard on this proposal because this is a total concession to North Korea which has few aircraft to fly along the DMZ compared to the US and ROK. USFK should be respond by saying that North Korea should withdraw all of their artillery 80 miles away from the DMZ if they want this no fly zone. Now that would be a more equitable agreement:
The Freedom bridge cross the Imjin river. It is a former railroad bridge which was used by repatriated POWs/soldiers returning from the north. The only bridge connecting South and North Korea at the Demilitarized Zone.
Last month, North and South Korea signed an agreement that is designed to de-escalate tension at the demilitarized zone between the two nations, which have technically been at war since the 1950s. One major feature: a no-fly zone over the border.
At the time, some South Korean government officials called the agreement the “equivalent to declaring an end to the Korean War.” But the call for a no-fly zone over the Korean demilitarized zone (DMZ) is facing pushback from the South’s biggest backer, the United States.
Last week, South Korea’s Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha told reporters that U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo expressed “discontent” with the agreement during a phone call. This week the pushback seemed to escalate as unnamed officials told Reuters that U.S. military commanders are specifically unhappy with the no fly zone, which is to begin on November 1.
You can read the rest at the link, but the reason for the displeasure is because US helicopters and fixed wing aircraft routinely train in the border areas. The proposed no fly zone would extend any where from 25-50 miles from the DMZ making this training impossible and further eroding the readiness of US forces.
This proposal gets back to what I have been saying for months, the Moon administration will not openly say they want US forces to leave, but will create conditions that will make US forces withdraw on its own accord. If this agreement is implemented this is just another example of this strategy
