Tag: North Korea

The South Korean government has now responded to North Korea’s invasion drill:

South Korean officials were quick to condemn the movements.

“(We) view the drill from yesterday as a childish act to display that their system is undiminished, in response to our internal situation,” South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman Jeong Joon-hee said.

“Kim Jong Un has been continuously visiting its military units since November and it has been escalating tension. We strongly condemn it.”  [CNN]

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un visits the Wonsan Shoes Factory in the country’s southeastern Kangwon Province in this photo published on Dec. 9, 2016, by daily newspaper Rodong Sinmun. Media report said Kim “dropped by” unannounced and was satisfied with the high production at the plant. (Yonhap)

The North Koreans may not be launching any provocations in the near term due to the South Korean political crisis, but they obviously don’t want people to forget about them either:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un observed a special warfare unit’s drill to destroy specific targets in South Korea, the North’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Sunday.

Kim watched the combat drill of the service personnel of the special operation battalion of KPA Unit 525, which included artillery shelling of and infiltration into key South Korean targets, such as the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae, the KCNA report said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the North Koreans are willing to give some time to the incoming Trump administration:

A top North Korean diplomat is reported to have told her American counterparts at a meeting in Switzerland that the North will refrain from provocations until the Donald J. Trump administration’s North Korea policy is further developed.

According to Radio Free Asia on Wednesday, Choe Son-hui, director general of the U.S. Affairs Department of the North’s Foreign Ministry and a top envoy to the six-party talks, said at a meeting with her American counterparts in Geneva last month that the North “would not take action that might close the door before seeing what emerges.”

Choe reportedly told the U.S. delegation that she hopes the Trump administration will review its policy toward the North while keeping her statement in mind.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

However, she caveated her statement by saying this:

Yet, according to meeting records obtained by RFA, Choe reportedly said that should the South and the United States conduct a joint military drill, the North’s response will have to be “very tough.”

Seoul and Washington are scheduled to hold their annual Key Resolve and Foal Eagle military exercises in February.

You can read more at the link.

Why you should talk about N. Korea at dinner & call anyone who doesn't like Kim Jong-un a racist, or something. https://t.co/0MhunIbQTp

— Joshua Stanton (@freekorea_us) December 9, 2016

This screen capture from the North’s Korean Central TV on Dec. 7, 2016, shows blurs in its broadcast of a rally in downtown Seoul, apparently trying to hide tall buildings around the site. Pyongyang has been active in reporting weekend protests in South Korea demanding the president’s resignation, but analysts say it still didn’t want to show South Korea’s economic development to its people. (Yonhap)

U.S. House passes bill that would put North Korea back on terror blacklist https://t.co/4UxvJQVsu1 @freekorea_us

— NorthKoreaRealTime (@BuckTurgidson79) December 7, 2016

I would think the last thing the North Koreans would want to do is create a provocation that would distract attention away from their great enemy Park Geun-hye being impeached and removed from office:

South Korea’s defense chief called on the military Thursday to remain vigilant as North Korea might carry out a provocation amid the ongoing political crisis involving President Park Geun-hye.

On Friday, 300 lawmakers from the ruling and opposition parties are set to vote on an impeachment bill against Park. The country has been engulfed by a massive corruption scandal involving Park and her close confidante since late October.

Defense Minister Han Min-koo made the comments during his visit to the 3rd Army headquarters, one of the country’s three field armies in charge of protecting Gyeonggi Province that surrounds Seoul from any military threats by North Korea.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

North Korea’s cyber warfare teams apparently have hacked into South Korea’s cyber command:

North Korea appears to have hacked South Korea’s cyber command in what could be the latest cyberattack against Seoul, the military here said Tuesday, .

“It seems the intranet server of the cyber command has been contaminated with malware. We found that some military documents, including confidential information, have been hacked,” an official at the Ministry of National Defense told Yonhap News Agency. He said that authorities suspect North Korea is behind the latest online infiltrations.

The cyber command said it isolated the affected server from the whole network to avoid the spread of viruses. But it has yet to fully determine what data were leaked.

It marked the first time that the data of South Korea’s cyber command has been compromised. South Korea set up the command in January 2010 as part of its efforts to counter external hacking attempts on the country’s military.  [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link, but the article says that classified information may have been stolen.

Some else has jumped on the North Korean regime change bandwagon:

Regime change is the only way to get North Korea off the current path, a former top American diplomat said Monday.

Richard Armitage, former deputy secretary of state, made the point during a security forum, saying he no longer believes it’s possible to change Pyongyang’s behavior without a regime change.

“I, like some of the others around here, for years spent a lot of time talking about … we don’t really want regime change in North Korea. We just want to change the regime, their behavior change. We’re not looking to interfere with the leadership of the DPRK,” Armitage said.

“I no longer hold that view. The only way in my view that North Korea can be dissuaded from their present path is by a regime change,” he said during the forum on the Korea-U.S. alliance at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

Armitage also said that the U.S. should put greater pressure on the North over its human rights record and cut the regime off the international financial system.

“In my experience dealing with North Korea, two things have made an impression on them. One was the human rights security council resolution … and our interference in the finances of North Korea in the Macau bank,” he said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.