On the December Dandong-Sinuiju bridge closing

By Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

Yesterday, Japan’s Yomiuri Shimbun reported that the Dandong-Sinuiju bridge will be closed during the coming weeks. The bridge is to be closed for ten days. Ostensibly for repairs, they said China was also closing the bridge for political reasons.

Should the bridge be closed for any longer period of time, that would be very problematic for North Korea (and for traders on the Chinese side, too). Around 70 percent of trade between the two countries is estimated to go through this connection point. Given North Korea’s poor infrastructure, re-routing goods transports through other parts of the country would likely be difficult.

But the closing most likely is not a measure taken to punish North Korea or the like, despite the current context. First, as many travellers going across the bridge attest to, repairs are in dire need. Second, the end of the year typically sees a lull in goods flows across the border anyway. Transport volumes are cyclical and no one point in the year is fully representative for the rest. Third, simply closing up the bridge would seem like an odd blanket-type measure, and should China want to punish North Korea, there are certainly much more efficient ways of doing so.

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