Tag: North Korea

This looks to me to just be a psychological operation being carried out by North Korea in the wake of the THAAD decision:

North Korea has resumed the broadcasting of encrypted numbers, a method used in the past to send messages to spies operating in South Korea, a government source said Tuesday.

The source said that propaganda radio station Radio Pyongyang aired a 12-minute shortwave segment last week during which a female announcer read out numbers on what seemed to be from a book. The broadcast started in the early hours of Friday morning and marks the first time Seoul picked up on such communication from the North in 16 years.

The North halted all such broadcasting after the first inter-Korean summit in June 2000.

The encrypted number system, a relic of the Cold War espionage age, requires the sender and the receiver to have access to the same book and other types of reference materials so orders can be handed down by mentioning a page and the position of a word on that. This was a favored method employed by the reclusive country to contact and give orders to spies that infiltrated the South.

The coded radio broadcast began at 00:45 a.m. with a female announcer saying, “starting now, I will give review work to No. 27 exploration agents.”

The announcer then said, “on page 459 number 35, on page 913 number 55, on page 135 number 86, on page 257 number 2,” followed by more numbers.

South Korean intelligence authorities are reportedly scrambling to find out why Pyongyang resumed this type of communication, particularly in the digital era when it could have simply given out orders via the internet.

The revelation has put the Seoul government on alert over possible provocations that can be committed by the North’s agents living in the South.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but if North Korea was giving orders to anyone it would probably be the leftist instigators pushing lies about the THAAD radar.

I think the Musudan tests had more to do with being able to show the US they can target Guam and build Kim Jong-un profile domestically than any concerns about THAAD:

North Korea’s recent firing of an intermediate-range ballistic missile at a high angle appears to be intended to push South Korea to accept the deployment of an advanced U.S. anti-missile system here and cause a rift in Seoul’s relations with Beijing, a North Korean expert said Tuesday.

Hong Woo-taek, a research fellow at the state-run Korea Institute for National Unification (KINU), said, “Pyongyang might have sought to exploit the tension between South Korea and China over the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system issue to strengthen its hitherto weakened ties with Beijing.”

“But China is not foolish enough to alienate itself from South Korea to take sides with North Korea. Pyongyang won’t be able to achieve what it intended by firing the Musudan missile at a high angle last month,” Hong said in his recent report, titled “North Korea’s Intentions and THAAD.”

On June 22, the North fired two Musudan missiles, with one flying some 400 kilometers and reaching an altitude exceeding 1,000 km. Although the Musudan did not fly very far, some experts said the great height it achieved may mean the missile is capable of ranges up to about 3,000 km and could theoretically strike key military bases in the U.S. territory of Guam. The high angle at which the missile flew after takeoff also means it could be used to attack South Korea.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

https://twitter.com/geoffrey_cain/status/755303342377570304

Kim Jong-un’s Starving Soldiers – “Just a spoonful of oil for me” A soldier pleads for grace https://t.co/PAvdLZOwDU pic.twitter.com/7XkiadcCTD

— RimjingangNK (@RimjingangNK) July 15, 2016

Sadly if Nintendo does put Pokemons in North Korea this will probably cause a tourism boom for them which means more money for the Kim regime.  I can just picture Koryo Tours offering Pokemon Go packages to North Korea:

A whirlwind of memes and jokes about “Pokemon Go” are spiraling here because Nintendo’s location-based hunting game is known to be available in North Korea.

Memes include North Korea’s young leader, Kim Jong-un, ordering his cyberforces to distribute rare pokemons in northern parts of the inter-Korean border so game-addicted South Koreans will cross the heavily armed demarcation line to catch them.

They also include Kim pointing at a huge pink fish, with the quote: “Just caught Magikarp,” a game character.

There are rumors that rare, high-scoring pokemons are hidden in the truce village of Panmunjom. Some netizens claim the game maker has hidden “Mewtwo,” one of the strongest pokemons in the early series, in Punggye-ri, North Korea’s underground nuclear test site.

Others say a “Dragonite” is at the summit of Mt. Baekdu, the tallest mountain on the Korean Peninsula, on the North Korea-China border.

There is even talk of a legendary pokemon under Kim’s palace in Pyongyang. [Korea Times]

Source: NK fishermen up in arms over new China-deal vessels; protest tactics include preventing them from docking. https://t.co/eZhkFkKt4G

— Richard Horgan (@LiberateLaura) July 13, 2016

Ambassador @YeonmiParkNK talks to @businessinsider about life in the West after escaping from #NorthKorea https://t.co/29cXn2Mpjv

— One Young World (@OneYoungWorld) July 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/MarkASauter/status/752648219360890880

North Korea is once again threatening to turn Seoul into a Sea of Fire™ due to the decision to deploy a THAAD battery to the peninsula:

North Korea on Monday warned it will take “physical” actions against South Korea and the United States over the allies’ decision to deploy an advanced U.S. missile defense system in the South.

North Korea’s military issued a strong warning that it will deliver military strikes from the moment the two countries decide on where to place the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in South Korea, according to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

“We once again warn the enemies that it is the steadfast will of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) to make merciless retaliatory strikes to reduce South Korea to a sea of flames and debris once an order is issued,” the military’s artillery bureau was quoted as saying by the KCNA.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but President Park has come out to strongly defend the decision to deploy the THAAD battery to South Korea:

President Park Geun-hye on Monday mounted a strong defense of the recent decision by South Korea and the U.S. to station an advanced antimissile system here, stressing it won’t undermine the security interests of any other countries.

Park also underscored that the decision to station a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in South Korea is a “purely defense measure” to cope with growing nuclear and missile threats from a provocative North Korea.

After some five months of consultations, Seoul and Washington announced Friday that they had agreed to deploy a THAAD battery in South Korea. The announcement riled Beijing and Moscow, which have argued THAAD would hurt their security interests.

“As (South Korea) has repeatedly said, THAAD will not target any country other than North Korea, and will not encroach upon the security interests of any third country. (We) have no reason to do so,” the commander in chief said during a meeting with her senior secretaries.

“The international community should understand that Seoul does not have any intention of targeting other countries or threatening other countries,” she added.

Pointing to Pyongyang’s relentless provocations, including its weekend test of a submarine-launched ballistic missile, Park highlighted that the communist regime has been posing “explicit” threats to the South.

“Growing nuclear and missile threats are a very critical issue where the future of the Republic of Korea and the lives of our people are at stake,” she said. “As president, I have an obligation to protect our people and nation.”

The allies plan to determine where to place the THAAD battery in South Korea as early as later this month. They have faced strong opposition from local residents that are concerned about the electromagnetic waves emanating from the THAAD radar.

“(South Korea) will select the optimal site for the THAAD deployment that can certainly ensure military efficiency, and protect the safety and health (of the residents) from all problems, including the influence of electromagnetic waves,” the president said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but North Korea making more threats to attack the country only strengthens her argument on why the THAAD battery is needed in South Korea.

I doubt these sanctions will do much considering how North Korea is skilled at avoiding sanctions largely because of Chinese aid, but it is always fun to watch the Kim regime squirm a bit:

North Korea said Monday it will end a diplomatic communication channel with the United States and hinted at harsher punishment for Americans detained in the country in retaliation for U.S. sanctions that target leader Kim Jong Un.

The U.S. government last week imposed penalties on Kim and 10 other top officials for alleged human rights abuses. North Korea is already sanctioned because of its nuclear weapons program, but it was the first time that Kim has been personally sanctioned. The North called the sanctions tantamount to a war declaration.

On Monday, the North’s state media said it told the United States it will terminate contact through a U.N. channel in New York that allowed diplomats to communicate.

The New York channel refers to a method for North Korea’s U.N. diplomats to communicate with U.S. diplomats in New York. This is needed because the countries don’t have diplomatic ties and their animosities have deepened because of the North’s nuclear and missile programs.

The North also said it informed Washington that it will handle all issues between the two countries according to an unspecified wartime law, including Americans detained in North Korea, according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency.

South Korean media have suggested that North Korea might use the wartime law to hand out harsher punishments on Americans detained in the North.  [ABC News]

You can read more at the link, but if they do increase the punishment on the two detained Americans that is once again the risk they took by traveling to North Korea in the first place.  I feel bad for their families, but US foreign policy with North Korea should not be compromised because of idiots who decided to travel to North Korea knowing fell well the risk of being detained.