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NK NEWS BRIEF | February 8, 2012
POSTED February 8, 2012
NK INTERNAL
- A diplomat based in Pyongyang says the capital is facing its worst electricity shortage in years.
- NK state media described KJU’s youth as an asset to the nation.
- Daily NK: Members of the National Security Agency and People’s Safety Ministry in Musan County, North Hamkyong Province, are engaged in a power struggle, each accusing members of the opposing agency of transgressions, marking a contrast from previous times when agents largely overlooked illegal activities among their ranks.
- Daily NK: Authorities are reportedly cracking down on the enforcement of state-designated prices, confiscating illegally priced goods, transferring them to state stores, and banning offenders from trading for a month.
- NK authorities have reportedly called on the citizenry to provide plastic sheeting to improve greenhouses cultivating Kimjongilia.
- Dong-a Ilbo has reported on organized fruit exports from Dandong, China to NK; an estimated 16m USD worth, for consumption by the nation’s elite.
- An addition of 449 NK workers to the Kaesong Industrial Complex has brought the total to 50,315. 20,000+ workers needed to cover an existing shortfall are likely to be bussed in from increasingly further afield as the available labour in surrounding areas have largely been tapped. 72% of the workers are female.
- Orascom Telecom revealed that NK now has more than 1 million cell phone subscribers.
- A NK economic quarterly advocated the use of commercials to promote exports.
- Arirang performances are reportedly being held in locations outside of Pyongyang, following a policy attributed to KJI in 2010.
REFUGEES
- The Love North Korean Children charity, an organization funding bakeries to feed starving NK children, is aiming to open a home for stateless children in China.
- The Canadian Embassy in Seoul is to launch a program teaching Canadian English, values, and concepts such as multiculturalism and parliamentary democracy to North Korean defectors.
HUMAN RIGHTS
- Human rights activist Robert Park reportedly plans to press charges against NK for his treatment while imprisoned there, an effort meant to raise awareness. Haggard Analysis.
INTERNATIONAL POLITICS & SECURITY
- The NK govt issued conditions that SK must meet before there can be improved ties between the nations. WSJ answers on Seoul’s behalf.]
- SK Minister of Unification: “To continue alleviating the difficulties of the North Korean people, we will continue with exchanges and cooperation for humanitarian support.”; “If North Korea tries to recover its people’s economy and takes the road of mutual coexistence, then we are more than willing to prepare to help.” SK senior nuclear negotiator: “The prospects of the normalization of the relationship between Pyongyang and the international community, and eventually a lifting of sanctions, all those benefits will be a strong incentive for the new leadership.”
- The SK govt has banned political activists, South Side Committee, from meeting their NK counterparts in China, but the group has said it plans to push ahead regardless.
- A SK military source has stated that NK is developing unmanned attack drones based on U.S. technology, purchased from a Middle Eastern nation.
- The Russian Ambassador to NK claimed that KJU supports the building of a natural-gas pipeline stretching from Russia to SK through NK.
- A bipartisan group of SK lawmakers are to visit Kaesong Industrial Complex on February 10 with the “hope that the representatives of the SK people and both governments will cooperate to develop relations.”
- A SK lawmaker has claimed that much of the methamphetamine coming into SK originates from state and private sources within NK, and encouraged better SK/China coordination to stop the flow.
- Representatives of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization are reportedly planning to call for NK to repay 1.89b USD for the termination of collaborated on light-water reactor project.
ANALYSIS & OPINION
- Prof. Coppola’s analysis of a recent NK propaganda film about KJU.
- KJU’s January analyzed by Daily NK and NK Economy Watch.
- NYT on KJU’s succession and similarities to KIS.
- Daily NK on bottom-up change in NK and the prospect of marketization benefiting the govt.
- Sinonk.com: Introduction to NK’s Rason Economic Trade Zone.
- Noland on NK attempts to limit foreign exchange usage.
- World Policy Blog on “genocide” in NK.
- AP on KJU’s inner circle of advisers.
- Haggard on Chinese aid and contingency plans regarding NK.
- The Daily Beast on Bush administration “track two” NK intermediary, Dong-Moon Joo.
MISC.
- KCNA: China denied reports touting the likelihood of China dispatching troops into NK in case of a contingency.
- SK has indicted a social media and freedom-of-speech activist for retweeting messages from the NK official twitter account. SK blocking of NK websites discussed by Hankyoreh.
- Nature: Radioisotope data suggests NK may have conducted two nuclear tests in 2010.
- A defector claimed that details concerning the bombing of KAL 858 were common knowledge within NK despite Govt denials to the international community.
- NK youth footballers were ordered not to participate in a match against SK when NK officials reportedly said the match was against Govt policy.
- Results of a recent SK survey show that a majority of SKoreans believe China, not the U.S., is the most important country to partner with over NK issues.
- Japan reportedly indicted two people for allegedly exporting 108K USD worth of computers to NK, violating sanctions.
- The SK govt revealed that three Korean-Americans visited Pyongyang to pay their respects to KJI in December.
- A video of NKoreans playing 80’s pop tune “Take On Me” on accordions has gone viral.
- A NK themed and NKorean staffed Pyongyang Restaurant has opened in Amsterdam, the first such restaurant in the western world.
- NK gasoline-baked clams “could reinvent BBQ as we know it.”
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