Here is the latest of the North Korea restaurant worker defector case:
Attorneys from the Lawyers for a Democratic Society hold a press conference outside the Seoul Central District Court on Tuesday. [SHIN IN-SEOP]A Seoul court held a hearing Tuesday after a group of lawyers challenged the legitimacy of the South Korean government holding a group of North Korean restaurant workers who defected in April in a state protection facility.
Last month, the Lawyers for a Democratic Society, also referred to as Minbyun, filed a petition with the Seoul Central District Court questioning whether the defectors came to the South out of their own free will, after the country’s top spy agency denied an interview with the defectors.
The defectors themselves did not attend the first hearing at the Seoul Central District Court on Tuesday afternoon, but their legal representatives did. On the same day, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) decided that the 13 North Korean restaurant workers would not be sent to a defector resettlement facility but rather be kept in a protection facility that it operates.
The group of 12 female workers and their male manager who worked at Ryugyong in Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, one of Pyongyang’s many overseas restaurants in China, defected to the South in early April. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read the rest at the link, but I am still suspicious of these progressive lawyers who seem like they are more about representing North Korean interests than the best interests of these defectors.
Hwang In-cheol holds up a sign saying “North Korea…Be Free My Father” at an event to send a letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in the border city Paju, north of Seoul, on June 17, 2016. His father Hwang Won has been in captivity since December 1969, when a South Korean plane carrying Hwang, a radio producer, and 50 other crew members and passengers was hijacked by a North Korean agent on its way from the eastern South Korean city of Gangneung to Seoul. (Yonhap)
For those interested the story of how Mr. Hwang’s dad was taken hostage can be read at the below link:
It appears the North Koreans are determined to keep testing the Musudan until they get it to work:
North Korea is said to have deployed an intermediate-range missile to Wonsan, Gangwon Province on Tuesday.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff said that it is closely monitoring the North for possible missile launches.
A military official said that such preparation follows four failed test-firings of Musudan intermediate-range missiles in April and May.
The military is said to believe that the North will launch a Musudan missile as early as Tuesday or Wednesday. [KBS World Radio]
You can read more at the link, but four of these Musudans have exploded shortly after launch. If they keep executing these tests the North Koreans will probably through trial and error eventually get it to work. The significance of them getting this missile to work is that they can then range US military bases on Okinawa and Guam with the Musudan.
Well known North Korean sympathizing professor Bruce Cumings thinks a Trump presidency would be interesting based on some of his campaign rhetoric about North Korea:
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump could bring a number of “interesting” things to the U.S. presidency, including how the real estate tycoon would deal with North Korea, an American professor said.
Bruce Cumings, a University of Chicago professor with deep expertise on Korea, made the remark in a recent article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, noting that Trump has expressed a willingness to hold direct talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
“If Hillary Clinton becomes president, she will undoubtedly continue the policy of isolation and denuclearization of North Korea. Any number of things would make a Trump presidency interesting, to say the least, but one of them is to see what he would really do in regard to Korea policy,” Cumings said. [Yonhap]
It is amazing how gullible people keep falling for these fake news stories they see pop up in their social media feeds and don’t bother to read the article. This recent example of a false news story saying Kim Jong-un was killed by a suicide bomber even impacted the Korean stock market:
A false news story that claimed Kim Jong Un was assassinated caused tremors in South Korea’s foreign exchange market on Friday.
The story published on fake news outlet East Asia Tribune alleged the North Korean leader was attacked by a female suicide bomber and killed in an explosion in Pyongyang.
The article also claimed the report was from Pyongyang’s state television network KCTV.
While the report was quickly dismissed on social media, on Friday morning in Seoul the story affected movements in the currency market, local news service Financial News reported.
The exchange rate for the South Korean won spiked to 1178 won to the U.S. dollar, before closing at 1172.7 won.
Defense stocks also rose momentarily on Friday but once rumors were dispelled trading resumed normal levels, according to local press. [UPI]
I wonder what burger joint Trump would hold this proposed summit at? Would Dennis Rodman be invited?:
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said Wednesday he would “accept” North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to the United States and hold nuclear negotiations with him while eating hamburgers, according to news reports.
“If he came here, I’d accept him,” Trump said during campaigning in Atlanta, reaffirming his willingness to meet with the North’s leader, according to reports. “Who the hell cares? I’ll talk to anybody.”
Trump first expressed his willingness to meet with Kim in an interview last month, drawing criticism not only from critics, but also from his own party that such a meeting would end up bolstering the dictator.
But while Trump has insisted on his willingness to speak to the North’s leader, but said he won’t go to the North for such talks.
Should Kim visit the U.S., Trump said he won’t throw him a state dinner.
“I wouldn’t give him a state dinner like China or all these other nations who are ripping us off,” Trump was quoted as saying. “We should be eating a hamburger on a conference table and making better deals.”
Trump said he will only “make a good deal” if he were to hold talks with the North’s leader.
The real-estate tycoon was also quoted as saying that there’s a “10 percent or 20 percent chance” he could talk Kim out of developing nuclear weapons. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but I think Donald Trump is over estimating his negotiating skills if he thinks he has up to a 20% chance of talking Kim out of developing nuclear weapons. The only deal I can see that would convince the Kim regime of stopping their nuclear weapons development would be to allow them to conquer South Korea. This is obviously something the US would never agree to so what deal does Trump have in mind that would convince them?
