Kim Jong il birthday gifts 2009

February 4th, 2009

UPDATE 2/20/2009): According to the Daily NK:

“Special holiday provisions,” which have long been provided to all the people of North Korea on the three major holidays, Lunar New Year’s Day, Kim Il Sung’s and Kim Jong Il’s birthdays, and provided a rare moment of modest luxury in the year, are becoming scarce and discriminatory in their application by the authorities.

A source from Yangkang Province reported in a telephone interview with Daily NK on the 17th, “There were no holiday provisions in Hyesan provided to the citizens.”

The source explained some of the causes, “In the past, the authorities prepared holiday provisions and handed them over in one lump to each city, county and province. But now, factories, working places or collective farms prepare provisions for associated workers and farmers by themselves. In this situation, cadres cast their obligation to prepare and distribute provisions onto lower managers and take their own portions first. Accordingly, many other citizens cannot have been given any provisions.”

The source from Yangkang Province continued that, “The holiday provisions had continued, even though they were nominal, until now. It was unimaginable that there could be no holiday provisions because even on October 10, 2005, the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Party, and on September 9 last year, on the 60th anniversary of the nation’s’ founding, there were special provisions of some sort.”

Historically, there have generally been three kinds of special provisions on national holidays. The first one is holiday gifts for children consisting of candies, cookies or school supplies; the second is more substantial foodstuffs like pork or liquor for everybody; and lastly the General’s special gifts for cadres and some workers or farmers who achieve impressive results.

“Get holiday provisions for yourselves!”

Until right before Kim Il Sung’s death, on the three holidays, these gifts and provisions could be taken for granted.

However, as the economic situation turned ugly, the special provisions from Pyongyang were all suspended. Since 1998, the holiday provisions have been given only to citizens of Pyongyang, aside from one kilogram of candies and cookies supplied to elementary school students.

Since 2000, the authorities have ordered other work places, factories and collective farms to provide holiday provisions by themselves from their own funds.

The order created side effects. Factories and other work places started mobilizing workers and residents to collect beans, medical herbs and bracken under the pretext of making foreign currency. They allotted certain duties to the People’s Units, factories and farms. For cadres, it appeared to be a significant business.

Regarding the Lunar New Year’s Holiday provisions for 2009, the North Korean authorities issued an instruction on December 20th entitled, “With respect to preparations for 2009 Lunar New Year’s Holiday provisions distinctively under the responsibility of the committee of each level of the Party.” It came from the Guidance Department of the Central Committee of the Party.

The source criticized that, “The cadres have used this occasion to generate benefits for themselves. Households where holiday provisions were given on Lunar New Year’s Day were just those of the “marvelous” cadres’ of the National Security Agency, the People’s Safety Agency, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and the Party.”

“On the 16th, local cadres of the Party were taken rice, pork, liquor, bean oil, and cigarettes as holiday provisions. Besides gifts to the Party in the provinces by each department, cadres of the Guidance Department under the Party in local provinces were given socks and cosmetic products produced in China,” the source reported.

He released rumors of this custom circulating among the people, “Some say that the Party in Poongseo, Yangkang Province exported 300 square meters of timber in early January [nominally in order to prepare for holiday provisions]. And, others say that deer and wild boar were offered to officials of local committees of the Party, the NSA and the PSA of the provinces.”

“When holidays come, only the people without power suffer to make foreign currency to guarantee cadres’ special provisions. Otherwise, they have to offer bribes in order to avoid doing such activities.”

Kim Jong Il’s special gifts flow into seats of power

A source from North Hamkyung Province revealed on the 17th, “For the February 16 holiday, the state supplied the authorities of Pyongyang, Hoiryeong, Samjiyeon and Kaesong Special District with provisions. In Hoiryeong, they received a bottle of bean oil, 500 grams of candies and cookies, soap, toothbrush and toothpaste.”

He additionally reported that, “In some regions of South Hwanghwa and North Pyongan Province, two or three-days of food were provided around February 16.”

The regions where the special provisions were supplied were all selected by the authorities; Hoiryeong, because it is the hometown of Kim Jong Il’s mother, Samjiyeon is the county where Kim Jong Il insists he was born, and Kaesong is a place opened to South Korea so it may have been for propaganda towards foreign visitors.

The source explained, “In 2006, in evaluation meetings for anti-socialism group inspections in Hoiryeong, chairpersons of the People’s Units brought to the attention of the inspectors the fact that many citizens had left their hometown, the Hometown of the Mother (Kim Jong Sook), for China due to the grim reality of their lives. After a petition was reported to the General, on every holiday special supplies have not failed there.”

However, he said, “Although technically I live within the Hoiryeong administrative district, those who live in rural districts, including me, were excluded from the special provisions.”

Meanwhile, Kim Jong Il’s gifts to the official class have not ceased.

“On the General’s birthday, Chief Sectaries of cities, counties and provinces of the Party and other high level cadres in local provinces receive the General’s gifts. Additionally, persons who provided distinguished service to the state or exemplary workers also got gifts, but in Hoiryeong merely seven workers and farmers received special gifts of any sort.”

He criticized, “In the past it was a pleasure that even liquor was provided equally to all the residents, but now it is in the past. Now, it is a happy day only for cadres.”

He expressed the atmosphere of the holiday, “Some singing performances were held to commemorate the birthday by the Union of Democratic Women and Socialist Working Youth League, but there were not many people in the audience. There were not many people on the streets. It was a depressing holiday.”

Regarding this mood, an NGO activist who works for defectors in China analyzed hopefully, “This trend does not imply systematic change in North Korean society. There is one significant point; that in national business regarding Kim’s birthday, centralized authoritarian rule and control are crumbling down.”

UPDATE (2/19/2009): According to the Daily NK:

In commemoration of Kim Jong Il’s birthday on February 16th, 15-days of rations were provided to the citizens of Hyangsan and Woonsan in North Pyongan Province.

According to a source, the ration consisted of 2 kilograms of rice, 2 kilograms of noodles and the rest in corn for households with more than four family members. For small households, a kilogram of rice and noodles were given and the rest in corn. Recently, on the farms, provisions have not been sufficient and stealing has grown difficult, so the expectation of our citizens regarding the special rations have been high.

The source explained, “Since last year, with the increase in the number of guards on farms and the strengthening of house searches, the stealing of food from farms has been absolutely impossible.” For the last several years, as rations failed even for farmers themselves, stealing from collective farms as a means of survival had become commonplace.

The source continued, “Inspections have also been taking place at the county and provincial levels every November and December. With the strengthening of the regulations governing grain, stealing has become more difficult. If one is caught, he or she is taken to a labor detention facility.”

All the citizens of North Korea usually receive some form of commemorative product in honor of Kim Jong Il’s birthday, though it is not always in the form of food.

  

ORIGINAL POST: Although the practice has become inconsistent since the “Arduous March” of the late 1990’s, each year the DPRK distributes gifts or special provisions in celebration the two leaders’ official birthdays (Kim il Sung: 4/15 & Kim Jong il: 2/16). 

The value of one’s gift, however, allegedly depends on one’s rank in society.  A common farmer might receive a new pair of socks.  A senior Worker’s Party official probably receives a good deal more.  The distribution of alcohol is popular.  One estimate put the value of these special gifts at USD$20m. 

This year, Yonhap informs us that children in Pyongyang will receive domestically manufactured peanut candies:

Choson Sinbo, a Korean language newspaper in Japan that usually echoes Pyongyang’s policy, said peanut candies will be added to the gift list for children this year, following the completion of a production line in Pyongyang Vegetable-Processing Factory.

The foodstuff factory that produces noodle, bread and sweets was newly equipped with a peanut candy production facility at the end of last year as “a governmental measure to enhance the people’s diet,” the report said.

It said all of the ingredients are provided by the government.

Lee Seung-yong, a coordinator of Good Friends, a Seoul-based aid group for North Korea, said the cash-strapped North often has to collect ingredients from its citizens to make the gifts for them.

Only 20 percent of North Korean factories are currently operating due to the lack of electricity and raw materials, according to the Korea Institute for National Unification, a state-run think tank in Seoul.

Though some gifts are manufactured domestically by the people,  others are donated by foreigners.  Expensive gifts are imported by the leadership. 

Last year (February 2008), the Daily NK reported that locals actually resented receiving the gifts to some degree because all of the items were available in the marketplaces. Rather than restricting market activity and providing limited goods via the Public Distribution System (PDS), the story reports that people would prefer the government to simply make it easier to conduct business in the markets.

The DPRK has been placing a lot of focus on building/repairing “foodstuff factories” recently.  Here is a link to KCNA stories about “foodstuff factories” via the very helpful Stalin Search Engine.

Read the more here:
N. Korean children to get peanut candies on leader’s birthday
Yonhap
2/3/2009

15-days of Food on the Leader’s Birthday
Daily NK
Jung Kwon Ho
2/19/2009

Un-Socialist Inequality
Daily NK
Lee Sung Jin
2/20/2009

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Posted in Food, Light Industry, Manufacturing, Public Distribiution System (PDS) | 3 Comments »

DPRK relic in Zimbabwe

February 3rd, 2009

heroes-acre-harare.jpg

National Heroes Acre is a burial ground in Harare, Zimbabwe for all Zimbabweans who have been declared a hero by the Government.

The Government started work on the Heroes Acre in 1981, one year after Independence. The design and artwork used at the site was done by seven artists from the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea and ten Zimbabwean Artists.

Over 250 local workers were involved in the project at the height of construction. The black granite stone used for the main construction was quarried from Mutoko; a rural area situated about 140km Northeast of Harare. The Heroes Acre is protected under the Natural Resources Act.

See the Site on Wikimapia here. 

Learn more about the site here.

*This location will be added to the next version of North Korea Uncovered (North Korea Google Earth).  If readers are aware of other construction projects the DPRK has supported, please let me know.  I am especially interested in locating the North Korean restaurants in China, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Bangladesh.  Are there others?

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Posted in Architecture, Construction, Google Earth, Zimbabwe | 4 Comments »

Assessment of the 2008 DPRK economy, outlook for 2009

February 2nd, 2009

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
ICNK Forum No. 09-2-2-1
2/2/2009

ASSESSMENT OF THE NORTH KOREAN ECONOMY FOR 2008

In the 2008 North Korean New Year’s Joint Editorial, Pyongyang established the year 2012 as “The Year of the Perfect Strong and Prosperous Nation,” while labeling 2008, “The Year of Turnabout,” and, “The Year of the Betterment of the Livelihoods of the People.” As the year marked the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), the regime projected a highly motivated façade, but there was no sign of new changes in the North’s economic policies.

Faced with the inability to produce any substantial results in the realm of international economic cooperation, North Korean authorities focused on how to put a positive spin on international conditions that were tied to the progress of 6-Party Talks. However, no visible measures appeared to emerge. Internally, North Korea’s chronic supply shortages drove further disparities between official and market pricing and monetary exchange rates as authorities were unable to stabilize the domestic economy. The growing global economic instability also caused economic policy makers to act more conservatively.

In 2008, North Korea’s food production in 2008 amounted to 4.31 million tons, recording a 7.5 percent increase over the previous year, while energy production is estimated to have grown by approximately 10 percent. Through joint development projects for North Korea’s underground resources, the North received raw materials for light industries (soap and shoes) amounting to 70 million USD in 2007, and 10 million last year. In addition, DPRK-PRC trade and inter-Korean economic cooperation both grew (DPRK-PRC trade increased significantly, while North-South cooperation grew only slightly), but it is difficult to measure the extent to which these increases impacted the North’s economy.

It appears that overall, North Korean trade and industry has improved since 2007, and the 2008 economic growth rate was positive. However, when estimating the North’s economic growth rate in light of the quickly rising exchange rate for South Korean won, DPRK economic growth for 2008 could be seen as a negative value.

While North Korea’s overall industrial production grew in 2008, when compared to previous years, and the primary reason for such was the refurbishment of equipment in most stable industries, development assistance and heavy oil aid as part of the 6-Party Talks, the provision of raw materials for light industries by South Korea, and the rise in prices on goods internationally.

Because of favorable weather conditions and increased production of fertilizer in the North, the agricultural sector showed a relative increase in production in 2008, despite the suspension of fertilizer aid from South Korea. Grain production was up 300 thousand tons, for an estimated total of 4.31 million tons last year. Boosted energy production was helped by improvements in hydroelectrical production and heavy oil tied to 6-Party Talks, and the provision of parts and materials for power plants, which considerably increased power production, at least in the first half of the year. This played an important role in the increase in industrial operations, as well. As electrical supply is the biggest obstacle to raising the operating rate of production facilities, more power resulted in overall production increases.

The construction sector has focused efforts on Pyongyang, and in particular on efforts to improve the lifestyles of its residents. Housing (averaging 20,000 family dwellings per year), restaurants, waterworks, roads, and other construction and repair projects have been aggressively undertaken.

North Korean authorities emphasized the science and technology sector in 2008, although it appears that the actual impact of this campaign topped out at the supply of some practical technology and the at production facilities, power plants, and other factories, and the promotion of modernization and normalization of industrial production.

At the mid-point of 2008, inter-Korean trade had grown by 1.2 percent compared to the same period the year prior, reaching 1.82 billion USD. The freeze on the annual supply of 400 thousand tons of rice and between 300~350 thousand tons of fertilizer from the South had a negative impact on the North’s food situation. On the other hand, DPRK-PRC trade from January-November 2008 jumped by 29.3 percent over the same period in 2007, considerably more than the 14.9 percent recorded in 2005, the 14.9 percent seen in 2006 and the 16.1 percent rise last year.

The increase natural resource development and improvements in core industries, the possibility of expansion of markets, and the advantage of low-cost labor give China, Russia, and other adjacent countries positive perceptions regarding investment in the North, and as Pyongyang continued to expand economic cooperation with these countries last year, it also improved economic relations with Europe as well as Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries.

PROSPECTS FOR THE NORTH KOREAN ECONOMY IN 2009

If one looks at North Korea’s domestic economic policies, one will see that basically, in the 2009 New Year’s Joint Editorial, North Korea’s domestic and international economic policies have not undergone any significant changes. However, in order to accomplish the goal of establishing a Strong and Prosperous Country by 2012, it is expected that all efforts will be poured into reviving the economy. Based on the Joint Editorial, this year, the North’s economic policy is not one of reform due to transformation of the outside environment, but rather a revival of pas, conservatively grounded economic policy. Regarding international economic relations, the 2008 Joint Editorial specifically stressed the building of an economically strong nation based on the principle of the development of external economic relations, but there was no particular reference to this in 2009.

In 2009, resolution of agricultural problems was again prioritized as the task most necessary for the realization of a Strong and Prosperous Nation by 2012. Along with this, the North’s economic policy for 2009 will prioritize the modernization and normalization of the economy’s ‘vanguard sector’, and it is expected to continue to strengthen efforts to revive the economy. As it continues to work toward creating an environment in which it can concentrate efforts on the building of an ‘Economically Strong Nation’, North Korean authorities are expected to issue new measures to strengthen the economic management system, including the planned industrial system, the distribution and circulation framework, and an effective market management system. The North is also expected to further emphasize efforts to modernize the People’s Economy, as it considers modern vanguard science and technology to be the answer to recovery from its current economic crisis.

There is a possibility North Korea’s foreign trade, including that with China, will shrink in the future, as its external economic activity is hit by the current international economic situation and the rising value of the U.S. dollar and Chinese Yuan. Just as was seen in 2008, with the shrinking growth of the Chinese economy, DPRK-PRC trade will be hit negatively. Progress on the rail link being promoted between Rajin and Hasan, as well as the redevelopment of the Rajin Harbor is also expected to face difficulties. This is likely to lead to further efforts by the North to expand economic cooperation with the EU and Middle Eastern countries.

Despite North Korea’s removal from the U.S. list of terrorism-sponsoring states, because sanctions against North Korea still remain, the North will need to make progress in non-proliferation, human rights improvement, and marketization in order to see real economic benefits from improved relations with the Obama administration. However, because of a lack of confidence regarding market reform, differing stances between the U.S. and DPRK on denuclearization, and deeply rooted mistrust, there is a more than a small chance that progress on the nuclear issue will be stretched out over the long term.

Looking at prospects for the main domestic economic sectors of North Korea, firstly, the amount of development in the energy and mining sectors could take a favorable turn if there is movement on the nuclear issue, and this would have an overall positive effect on the entire industrial sector. The drop-off of demand due to the international financial crisis could have a considerable impact on the North’s mining sector, making it difficult to see much growth past the levels seen in 2008.

In 2009, the supply-demand situation regarding North Korean grains is expected to improve over last year. North Korea requires 5.2 million tons of grain, and is expected to harvest 4.9~5 million tons, falling only 200~300 thousand tons short. This is an improvement over the 790 thousand ton shortfall the North suffered in 2008. However, the actual amount of grains distributed to the people may not increase, because some of the 2008 shortage was relieved through the release of emergency rice reserves, and so some portion of the 2009 harvest will need to be set aside to restock that emergency reserve.

In the manufacturing sector, the increase in electrical production and increase in large-scale equipment operations in metalworks, chemicals, construction materials, and other heavy industries, the supply of materials for light industries as well as fertilizer will be extended, but the reduction of inter-Korean economic cooperation and foreign capital will mean a reduction in the ability to import equipment and materials, making it difficult to meet 2008-level growth in industrial production numbers.

In the construction sector, housing construction in Pyongyang and other areas will not fall off suddenly, but with the anniversary of the founding of the Party Museum upcoming and the impact of the furious construction activity that has been underway, it is likely to slow down in 2009. With North Korean authorities restricting private-sector economic activity, controlling the size of markets, and other measures controlling commerce in the North are expected to strengthen, which will considerably restrict anti-socialist commercial activity. To what extent official commerce networks will absorb this activity will be pivotal.

Trade between North Korea and China is expected to shrink as the global economic crisis drives down the price of raw materials that the North exports to the PRC. Following the North Korean authorities’ enforcement of a measure reducing inter-Korean economic cooperation on December 1, 2008, without improvement in the North Korean nuclear issue, and in U.S.-DPRK relations cooperation between Seoul and Pyongyang will gradually shrivel. Trade with other countries is also expected to fall as a result of the current global economic situation. Therefore, reduction of inter-Korean economic cooperation, North Korea’s principle provider of foreign capital, and sluggish trade between Beijing and Pyongyang will weaken the North’s foreign reserves supply-and-demand situation.

As for the investment sector, if North Korea is to succeed in its push to build a Strong and Prosperous Nation by 2012, it must attract foreign investment through aggressive policies of opening its economy. In order to improve the investment environment, Pyongyang must work more aggressively to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, but despite the demands of the surrounding countries, it is likely North Korea will insist on recognition as a nuclear power, making it difficult to expect progress on this front. Therefore, foreign investors’ interest in North Korean markets, and North Korea’s assention into international financial institutions through improved relations with the United States, appears to be a long way off.

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Posted in 2012 Strong and Prosperous Nation (Kangsong Taeguk), Agriculture, Agriculture statistics, Construction, Food, Foreign aid statistics, GDP statistics, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Kim's New Year Address (Joint editorials), Light Industry, Manufacturing, Statistics, Trade Statistics | Comments Closed

US might not have a DPRK envoy, but…

February 1st, 2009

US slaps sanctions on DPRK companies
According to the Associated Press (Via CBS):

The United States is imposing sanctions on several Chinese, Iranian and North Korean companies for violating arms export regulations governing missile technology and other proliferation activities.

The sanctions are largely symbolic as they bar the companies from trade with the U.S. that they were not likely involved in. Although they were in the works for some time, the Obama team signed off on the sanctions on Jan. 21, a day after it took office, signaling a continuing tough stance from Washington on weapons technology transfers.

U.S. Slaps Sanctions On Overseas Companies
Associated Press (via CBS)
2/2/2009

Here is a link to the text from the US Federal Register. 
Below is a summary:

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Pursuant to Section 73(a)(1) of the Arms Export Control Act (22 U.S.C. 2797b(a)(1)); Section 11B(b)(1) of the Export Administration Act of 1979 (50 U.S.C. app. 2410b(b)(1)), as carried out under Executive Order 13222 of August 17, 2001 (hereinafter cited as the “Export Administration Act of 1979”); and Executive Order 12851 of June 11, 1993; the U.S. Government determined on January 15, 2009 that the following foreign entities had engaged in missile technology proliferation activities that require the imposition of missile sanctions described in Section 73 of the AECA (22 U.S.C. 2797b)  and Section 11B of the EAA (50 U.S.C. Appx 24710b) on these entities:

—Korea Mining and Development Corporation (KOMID) (North Korea) and  its sub-units and successors
–Mokong Trading Corporation (North Korea) and its sub-units and successors
–Sino-Ki (North Korea) and its sub-units and successors

And from the Donga Ilbo:

This is the eighth time for the mining company, which has been closely watched by Washington as an exporter of Pyongyang’s ballistic missiles and conventional weapons, to get U.S. sanctions.

The company was slapped with sanctions in 1992, 1998, 2000, 2003, January and August in 2007, and August last year.

Ex-IRA figure faces US counterfeiting charge
According to the Associated Press:

Irish police arrested former Workers Party leader Sean Garland, 74, outside the entrance of the fringe party’s Dublin headquarters — more than three years after he jumped bail in the neighboring British territory of Northern Ireland while facing a similar U.S. extradition warrant there.

Garland had been living openly in the Republic of Ireland — which typically refuses to extradite citizens to face criminal charges outside the European Union — since he left Belfast and abandoned a bail of 30,000 British pounds (about $53,000 at the time) following his October 2005 arrest.

U.S. authorities that year indicted Garland with receiving, smuggling and laundering millions in “superdollars” — so called because of their expert design — that the government of North Korea allegedly began distributing in the late 1980s to weaken the American currency. If extradited and convicted, Garland could face up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Only one of the past two-dozen extradition requests from the U.S. Justice Department has been approved by Irish judges, who generally oppose extradition, citing America’s harsher sentences and penal system.

Under [Garland’s] leadership, the Workers Party appealed in 1986 to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union for funds. According to the 2005 U.S. indictment, Russian officials encouraged Garland and other Official IRA activists to take counterfeit U.S. $100 bills produced by North Korea.

Read the full story here:
Ex-IRA figure faces US counterfeiting charge
Associated Press
Shawn Pogatchnik
1/30/2009

NK Defectors’ Groups to Get US Gov’t Aid
According to the Korea Times:

The U.S. Department of State will directly provide groups organized by North Korean defectors here with financial support for the first time, according to reports Sunday.

Thus far, Washington has funded local groups working for improvement of North Korean human rights via the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a private organization supporting freedom around the world.

The move was construed as part of increased U.S. efforts to shed light on humanitarian issues in the Stalinist state.

The State Department posted a notice on the Human Rights Democracy Fund (HRDF) last September and about 50 organizations reportedly applied for the program.

Among the beneficiaries, Free North Korea Radio and the Coalition for North Korean Women’s Rights were granted $500,000 and $300,000, respectively.

The groups will receive a certain amount of money every month for two to three years in accordance with their performance.

Kang Su-jin, founder and representative of the coalition, said she thinks that the U.S. department aims at nurturing North Korean defectors as future leaders through the direct funding.

An official of the department was quoted as saying on condition of anonymity by Radio Free Asia (RFA) that a total of $3 million has been set aside for the program.

But the official refused to elaborate on grantees, saying the issue was “very sensitive.”

Read the full story here:
NK Defectors’ Groups to Get US Gov’t Aid
Korea Times
Kim Sue-young
2/1/2009

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Posted in Counterfeiting, Illicit activities, Ireland, Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation (aka Kapmun Tosong, KOMID), Mokong Trading Corporation, Radio, Sino-Ki, USA | 6 Comments »

North Korean party delegation visits Britain amid hopes for restart of dialogue

January 30th, 2009

By Michael Rank

asha_centre.jpg
Pictured above on the left: Pak Kyong Son, Vice Department Director of the Korean Workers Party Central Committee.  Pictured on the right: Glyn Ford, Member of the European Parliament.
Photo by Irina kalashnikova, [email protected]
www.irinakalashnikova.com

LONDON – Britain is hosting the first ever delegation from the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) amid hopes that this will help to restart a dialogue between Pyongyang and the European Union on human rights, denuclearisation and other issues and lead to transfers of renewable energy technology to North Korea.

Labour Party member of the European Parliament (MEP) Glyn Ford, one of Europe’s top North Korea experts who has visited Pyongyang a dozen times, told NKEW that he was pressing the delegation to agree to reopen the dialogue that was broken off in 2005 after the EU sponsored a resolution at the United Nations in Geneva that was highly critical of North Korea’s human rights record.

He said it was hard to tell whether the four-member delegation would recommend reopening of the dialogue to decision-makers in Pyongyang. “It’s not the style of North Korea to make decisions on the spot,” Ford noted. He said he personally had opposed the resolution, which was supported by the US and Japan, because it was almost certain to result in suspension of the highly sensitive dialogue which had only just begun.

The four-man delegation is visiting Britain for a week and they are also going to Bristol and Cambridge. Ford accompanied the group to Bristol as this west of England city lies in his Euro-parliamentary constituency, and it is close to the possible site of a giant barrage across the river Severn which is currently being considered as a source of generating green electricity.

He said a deal on the nuclear issue and on reviving the human rights dialogue could result in the EU agreeing to provide wind, tidal and other renewable technology to North Korea, just as the EU has provided €500 million ($640 million) in humanitarian aid over the last eight years.

The delegation includes a scientist with a background in renewable energy, added Ford who has an MSc in marine earth science. He said the west coast of Korea has a tidal range of 11 metres (36 feet), which could make it highly suitable for an electricity-generating barrage. The Severn has a tidal range of 14 metres, the second highest in the world.

Tidal barrages are an attractive means of generating electricity because tides, unlike wind, are highly predictable, but the environmental cost of building a barrage over the Severn, up to 10 miles long, could be huge and there is considerable public opposition to the plan. But such factors are likely to loom less large in North Korea.

Ford said he had met three of the four-man delegation on previous visits to Pyongyang, and that he knew two of them fairly well. He is hoping to visit Pyongyang again with a European Socialist delegation at the end of March.

The group have already had a meeting with Foreign Office officials, who Ford said had presumably also pressed the North Koreans on human rights and the nuclear issue.

Apart from the North Korean visit to the UK, Britain’s Lord Alton, a veteran campaigner for human rights in North Korea, is due to visit Pyongyang early next month. Alton, a devout Catholic, is scheduled  to meet the chairman of Korean Religion Association and visit the Russian Orthodox church and the Jangchung Catholic church in Pyongyang. He will be one of the first Western visitors to the Russian Orthodox church, which opened in 2006 amid considerable official fanfare.

The WPK delegation’s visit to Britain has received little if any media attention so far. In fact hardly anyone would have known about it if the generally extraordinarily uninformative North Korean news agency KCNA had not announced on January 27 that “A delegation of the Workers’ Party of Korea led by Pak Kyong Son, vice department director of its Central Committee, left here today to visit the UK.”

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Posted in Energy, Environmental protection, EU, Political economy, Wind | 4 Comments »

DPRK rattles more sabers

January 30th, 2009

On Friday, the DPRK announced it is rescinding the 1991 Agreement on Reconciliation with South Korea (h/t to Nautilus Institute).  The document is brief—so it is worth a read.

Among all of the stipulations in the document, the media has focused on the appendix in which the DPRK agreed to respect the NLL (the de facto, but disputed, maritime border in the West Sea).  The DPRK’s actions have led some analysts to predict that the DPRK will resort to staging provocations along the border in the near future.

Why the drastic policy change?  Well, we are talking about North Korean policy making here, so in a sense unpredictable changes in foreign policy should be…predictable.

Although the DPRK claims it is taking this action in response to South Korea’s ‘hostile policy,’ (which is what Pyongyang euphemistically calls South Korea’s decision to end unconditional financial and economic subsidies), some have speculated that Pyongyang is experincing a bit of a power struggle.  Others believe the DPRK is merely raising tensions to get the attention of the new Obama administration which has been so busy with domestic issues that it has not yet named a North Korea envoy. If this is merely a play for more financial assistance from both South Korea and the US, then the use of provocative language and tactics is rational on the part of the DPRK as they have generally yielded results in the past.

Of course, as with any sequential game, players do adjust to adversarial strategies.  For now, South Korea is simply ignoring the DPRK’s complaints.  Financial markets also seem unimpressed:

“Market participants are sick and tired of the North’s rah rah … investors remain pretty much unmoved now,” said Y.S. Rhoo, an analyst at Hyundai Securities.

Major ratings agencies said they saw no reason to adjust their view on South Korea following the threats.

And according to Reuters:

Credit ratings agencies played down the impact on South Korea’s ratings of Friday’s threat by North Korea to scrap all key agreements with the South, calling the remarks yet more diplomatic manoeuvring.

“We have tolerance for both positive and negative news flow out of North Korea up to a certain limit,” James McCormack, Head of Asia-Pacific Sovereign Ratings at Fitch Ratings, said by telephone from Hong Kong.

“But I think what we’ve seen today is probably within the tolerance band,” he added.

Kim Eng Tan, a sovereign ratings official at Standard & Poor’s Ratings, also predicted little immediate impact on South Korean ratings from the North Korean remarks.

“Unless things develop to the point where there is a real threat to security or stability on the Korean peninsula, we are unlikely to change our assessment of the South Korean government’s creditworthiness as a result of this declaration,” he said in an email to Reuters.

Fitch has an A-plus sovereign rating on South Korea with a negative outlook while S&P has an A rating with a stable outlook. They have said security concerns regarding North Korea are among the main constraints on South Korean ratings. 

If this is true, then the South Korean government is not under any pressure from financial markets to resolve the situation quickly…which is not good news for the DPRK.  Could it be that the DPRK is now unable to credibly project itself as a threat to the South?  

What an interesting scenario that would be.

See also: DPRK Studies, One Free Korea, and the Economist. 

UPDATE: The full statement in KCNA:

DPRK to Scrap All Points Agreed with S. Korea over Political and Military Issues
 
Pyongyang, January 30 (KCNA) — The Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea issued a statement Friday in connection with the situation on the Korean Peninsula growing tenser as the days go by due to the south Korean conservative authorities’ reckless moves to escalate the confrontation with the DPRK.

Citing facts to prove that the Lee Myung Bak group, far from reflecting on the treacheries of pushing the north-south relations to a serious crisis, shamelessly is challenging the north, raising a hue and cry over the “threat from the north” and “adherence to principle,” the statement said:

The inter-Korean relations have reached such pass that there is neither way to improve them nor hope to bring them on track. The confrontation between the north and the south in the political and military fields has been put to such extremes that the inter-Korean relations have reached the brink of a war.

The group of traitors has already reduced all the agreements reached between the north and the south in the past to dead documents.

Under such situation it is self-evident that there is no need for the DPRK to remain bound to those north-south agreements.

The statement vehemently denounced on behalf of all the Koreans the Lee group for having pushed the inter-Korean relations to the brink of a war through its moves to escalate the confrontation with the DPRK in gross violation of the inter-Korean agreements.

In view of the prevailing situation the statement solemnly clarified as follows:

First, all the agreed points concerning the issue of putting an end to the political and military confrontation between the north and the south will be nullified.

Second, the Agreement on Reconciliation, Non-aggression, Cooperation and Exchange between the North and the South and the points on the military boundary line in the West Sea stipulated in its appendix will be nullified.

Holding the Lee Myung Bak group wholly accountable for the present grave situation to which the inter-Korean relations have been pushed, the statement continued:

Never to be condoned are the crimes the Lee group has committed against the nation and reunification by bedeviling overnight the inter-Korean relations that had favorably developed amidst the support and encouragement of all the Koreans and ruthlessly scrapping the inter-Korean agreements.

The Lee group seems to wait for something, calling for “adhering to the principle” but it will only face a heavier blow and shameful destruction.

Read more on this story below:
North Korea Ramps Up Rhetoric Against Seoul
Wall Street Journal
Evan Ramstad
1/30/2009

North Korea, trying to jolt Obama, warns South
Reuters
Jonathan Thatcher
1/30/2009

North Korea Scrapping Accords With South Korea
New York Times
Choe Sang-hun
1/29/2009

NKorea ditches nonaggression pact with SKorea
AP (Via Washington Post)
Jae-Soon Chang
1/30/2009

Ratings agencies play down North Korea remarks
Reuters
Yoo Choonsik
1/30/2009

Power struggle suspected in N. Korea
Washington Times
Andrew Salmon
1/31/2009

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Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

Friday fun: Kim to bring moon to DPRK

January 30th, 2009

For a good laugh, check out The Onion’s latest (well researched) “story” from North Korea (h/t to Rich at www.Asiabizblog.com for this one).

moonplan.JPG

My favorite line: “The People’s Great and Harmonious Moon Hand of Kim Jong il will be the largest moon hand pedestal ever constructed”

I am told the English subtitles and the Korean voice-over actually come pretty close to matching.

The Onion recently published this piece as well.

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Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

DPRK relic in Ethiopia

January 29th, 2009

dergmonument.jpg

The Dialachin Monument (a.k.a. Victory Monument, Derg Monument) was a gift from Pyongyang to Addis Ababa’s Derg regime in the 1970s.

You can see the location of the monument in Wikimapia here.

You can learn more about the Derg here.

See more photos of the monument here.

*This location will be added to the next version of North Korea Uncovered (North Korea Google Earth).  If readers are aware of other construction projects the DPRK has supported, please let me know.  I am especially interested in locating the North Korean restaurants in China, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Bangladesh.  Are there others?

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Posted in Architecture, Construction, Domestic publication, Ethiopia, Google Earth, Kim's New Year Address (Joint editorials), Mansudae Overseas Development Group | 10 Comments »

Kim Jong Nam meets the press

January 29th, 2009

Kim Jong Nam, Kim Jong il’s eldest son (and a “nice” guy I am told), has recently been fairly amenable to speaking to foreign journalists—in English—about developments in the DPRK.  He has largely avoided giving much away except that he is not interested in succeeding his father—who is healthy.

Here is a video interview of KJN at Beijing Capital Airport where he boarded another plane to Macau. (Is Air Koryo flying into Beijing’s new terminal?)

Bradley Martin, author of Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader, reports on KJN’s activities in Bloomberg:

Kim Jong Nam, who was wearing large sunglasses and a knit cap, said he was in Macau, Asia’s largest casino destination, for a “holiday trip.” “I never gamble out here,” he said before climbing into a taxi, with no sign of accompanying bodyguards.

At Beijing’s airport earlier in the day, Kim Jong Nam told Asahi Television that he had “no information” on whether Megumi Yokota, a Japanese national abducted by North Korean agents in 1977, might still be alive.

When asked whether he was interested in succeeding his father as North Korea’s leader, Kim said “I am not interested by the issue, sorry.”

Kim Jong Nam went to boarding school in Switzerland (as did his younger brother Kim Jong Chol).  Aside from English, Korean, and French, I would bet he also speaks some German, Mandarin, and Cantonese.  He was also rumored to be the target of an assassination plot in Austria in 2004.  Since my source with Austrian intelligence has gone dormant, I cannot confirm this. 

Read the full article here:
Kim Jong Il Seems Healthy, Eldest Son Tells Fuji News in Macau
Bloomberg
Bradley Martin and Taku Kato
1/27/2009

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Posted in Aviation, Political economy | 3 Comments »

CFR: US must prepare for potential instability in DPRK

January 28th, 2009

Council on Foreign Relations
1/28/2009

Download report here (PDF)

Continuing uncertainties about the health of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il and possible succession arrangements “warrant heightened attention and preparation” by U.S. policymakers, says a new Council on Foreign Relations report. “The risks are too great and the stakes too high” for U.S. policymakers “to rely on last-minute improvisation for a peaceful and stable outcome” in nuclear-armed North Korea, says the report sponsored by CFR’s Center for Preventive Action (CPA).

In preparing for sudden change, the report recommends that the United States “continue to promote behavioral change within the current regime rather than actively seek to overthrow it unless extreme circumstances dictate otherwise.” But it cautions that: “The United States should not support efforts to prop up the current regime beyond the point at which it has clearly ceased to govern effectively.”

The report also warns against “high-handed U.S. action,” advocating that the United States “defer to South Korean wishes and leadership in the management of change in North Korea,” except if “overriding national interests compel unilateral action.” The report was coauthored by CPA Director Paul B. Stares and Joel S. Wit of the Weatherhead East Asia Institute at Columbia University.

The report also stresses that the potential political, economic, security, and humanitarian challenges presented by instability in the Korean Peninsula as a result of sudden change demand U.S. cooperation with the region’s principal powers. “Failure to accommodate [these powers’] national interests… could have profoundly negative consequences for the evolution of Korea, the stability of northeast Asia, and U.S. relations with major allies and other countries in the region,” says the report.

The report, titled Preparing for Sudden Change in North Korea, examines three potential succession scenarios, each of which poses its own set of challenges to U.S. policymakers:

1) Managed succession: the current regime, which has ruled North Korea since 1948, maintains power but under new leadership.

2) Contested succession: different factions vie for power in Pyongyang, resulting in regime change and a new policy direction. “How a power struggle would play out and who the eventual winner or winners might be is obviously impossible to predict, but a prolonged, divisive, and potentially even violent succession struggle is not out of the question,” says the report.

3) Failed succession: changes in North Korean leadership produce no clear and effective national leader, fatally weakening the state’s ability to function and leading to its eventual demise. In this scenario, North Korea’s “rapid absorption by South Korea is widely viewed as the inevitable next step.”

Regardless of how succession transpires, the report offers specific policy recommendations on how the United States can improve its ability to manage sudden change in the peninsula. These include:

1. Enhancing U.S. readiness: “The United States should upgrade its ability to discern and comprehend domestic political, economic, and other developments in North Korea.” For example, the report recommends enhancing U.S. intelligence to take advantage of a variety of new sources of information; establishing broader contacts with Pyongyang during ongoing denuclearization negotiations; and reestablishing the working relationship between the U.S. and North Korean militaries to recover the remains of American soldiers missing or killed in action during the Korean War.

2. Promoting allied coordination and preparedness: “The United States should work closely with South Korea and Japan to improve allied coordination and preparedness for contingencies in North Korea… The current joint military planning between the United States and South Korea needs to be augmented with a coordinated political, diplomatic, economic, and legal strategy to tackle the core issues likely to arise.”

3. Fostering regional transparency and capacity-building: “To reduce the risk of misunderstanding and friction in a crisis involving North Korea, the United States should pursue a quiet dialogue with the People’s Republic of China to discuss issues of mutual concern… The aim of such talks would be not only to raise potential concerns and discuss possible responses but also to minimize misunderstandings that might arise and seriously exacerbate a crisis.” The United States also should open discussions with South Korea and Japan, UN agencies, European counterparts, and nongovernmental organizations.

4. The report concludes: “Improving contingency planning, sharing the results of this planning, improving consultation on the future of the Korean peninsula, and taking concrete steps to build up generic, potentially useful capabilities—though certainly not sufficient in and of themselves to cope with these challenges—will establish a much firmer foundation for the future.”

The report is coauthored by Paul B. Stares, the General John W. Vessey Senior Fellow for Conflict Prevention and Director of the Center for Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations, and Joel S. Wit, Adjunct Senior Research Fellow at the Weatherhead East Asia Institute, Columbia University, and a Visiting Fellow at the U.S.-Korea Institute at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University.

Download report here (PDF)

UPDATE: Information from the Korea Times:

South Korea and the United States should maintain about 460,000 troops to deal with any unusual situation on the Korean Peninsula that results from internal instability in North Korea, says a new report published by a private U.S. foreign policy organization Wednesday.

The figure represents a three-fold increase in the number of U.S. troops currently deployed to Iraq.

The authors believe Pyongyang possesses six to eight nuclear weapons as well as several ballistic missiles and 4,000 tons of chemical weapons. China might also try to secure the North’s WMDs in the case of an emergency, they forecast.

The South Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command drew up a conceptual action plan to respond to sudden changes in North Korea, codenamed CONPLAN 5029, in 1999.

The plan includes outlines for joint military responses by South Korean and U.S. troops to various levels of internal turmoil in North Korea, according to sources.

Contingencies include a mass inflow of North Korean refugees, a civil war provoked by a revolt or coup, South Korean hostages being held in the North, and natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods.

The plan also includes measures to prevent Pyongyang’s weapons of mass destruction from being smuggled out of the country, if the regime was involved in a domestic crisis or suddenly collapses.

In 2005, the Roh Moo-hyun administration, which pursued a policy of greater independence from the United States, rejected a U.S. proposal to develop the conceptual plan to an operational plan involving more specific scenarios.

Read the full article here:
‘460,000 Troops Needed to Stabilize NK Collapse’
Korea Times
Jung Sung-ki
1/28/2009

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