NK NEWS BRIEF | July 10, 2013

Suh Ho, the head of South Korea’s delegation (L) and his NKorean counterpart Park Chol Su during their meeting on the fate of the joint industrial zone. | Photo: AP

NK INTERNAL

• Daily NK: A high-ranking NKorean military official who defected last year has spoken about an internal struggle for military influence between National Defense Committee Vice Chairman Jang Sung-taek, and the director of the General Political Department of the Chosun People’s Army Choi Ryong-ha.

• Daily NK: NKorean authorities are mobilizing members of the Chosun Union of Democratic Women to improve the appearance of Hyesan. Members of the union have been exempt from agricultural labor, but have been complaining about the arduous work involved with managing the city. Source: “Workers must go into the mountains to find trees, which is not easy, and sometimes they have to go back for more if the ones they bring down do not meet the appropriate standard. They also have to carry the wreckage of old buildings on their backs in the scorching sun. For women it is tortuous work.”  

• Daily NK: NKorean authorities have mobilized students as young as ten to take part in special patrols designated to ensure that no unforeseen incidents occur during the nationwide period of mourning commemorating the 1994 death of Kim Il Sung.  Source: “Parents think it’s out of order. Not least since kids of ten and eleven are unable to cope with problems even in the event that they do occur.”

• Daily NK: In additional preparation for the period of national mourning, non-residents were expelled from Pyongyang, and those who applied for entry in the month of July were denied.

• NFI: While cell phone usage in NK is becoming more widespread, is difficult and expensive to maintain. “To use cell phones in North Korea, you need to pay in advance. At the basic rate, you get 200 minutes of call time. If you go over that, your cell phone is disconnected. Even if you use the phone sparingly, it’s hard to make the allowance last even 15 days.”

ECONOMY & FOOD SECURITY

• After 6-hour-long, 12-round marathon discussions during the low-level talks held in the Tongil Pavilion, NK and SK reached an agreement in principle to reopening the KIC:  “South and North [Korea] will let the companies in the Kaesong complex restart the operation when all preparations are completed.” However, during the following meetings, no concrete agreements were made, and additional talks will be postponed until July 15. Owners of the 123 SKorean companies were allowed to enter the complex for a maintenance check on their facilities, and remove products for sale to their business partners.

• PGH: “If we want South-North relations to proceed well going forward then we must make an agreement [regarding the KIC] that meets common sense and international norms. That agreement must then be unstintingly respected so that trust can build and improved relations can come about.” The Park administration is also reportedly considering internationalizing the KIC in order to make it more difficult for NK to unilaterally shut down the facility.

• Daily NK: Experimental farming initiatives in the Hyesan region are set to fail due to unsuitable land. “Some areas of Hyesan were designated as places to implement the farm management improvement policy on an experimental basis, and additional manpower was brought in for those areas. However, the areas are on steep slopes or in places where the soil is full of rocks, so farming there is impossible.” In addition, plans to lease land to non-farmers have been postponed or are no longer mentioned.

• Daily NK: NKoreans have found themselves powerless to prepare for the recently arrived rainy season.  Source: “People living around Baekcheol Bridge in Yeonpung-dong [an area of Hyesan] who saw damage in the floods last year are sweating over being inundated once again. But even if they build up defenses of rock and mud, they know that the waters will break them down, so they are just worrying about it; not doing anything.”

• Several SKorean private aid groups are preparing to resume their humanitarian assistance operations in NK after their suspension due to the nuclear tests.

• Foreign direct investment in NK has steadily increased over the past three years, but the investment amount still remains at one of lowest levels in the world.

• A total of 1,749 NKoreans are working in Mongolia, with most of them employed in the construction sector.

HUMAN RIGHTS

• NFI: NKorean human rights activist Lee Man-bok of NKDW launched balloons into NK containing DVDs of the SKorean military. “The DVDs show the strength of South Korea’s military, which will persuade the North Korean recipients of the fact that the DPRK state has been lying about its military superiority.”

• UNHRC began its probe into the “systematic, widespread and grave violations of human rights” this week.

REFUGEES

• Recent NKorean defector: “There wasn’t a single person among my friends who hadn’t seen a South Korean show. Even if we couldn’t talk about it in public, we talked about it openly when it was just us. My friends and I would copy the way South Korean children played, and that would sometimes even end up with us mimicking a one-hundred-day celebration.”

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS & SECURITY

• A delegation led by Wilfried Lemke, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s special adviser on sports for development and peace, visited NK on Saturday, possibly to promote peace on the Korean Peninsula through sports exchanges.

• Jang Il-hun, manager of the international organizations division in the NKorean foreign ministry will replace Han Sung-ryul as NK’s new Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations (representative on the New York channel).

• PGH: “This or that can be said about the expression of the Korean Peninsula denuclearization, but it became like that as we gave China considerations. When I actually met with President Xi Jingping and Premier Li Keqiang and the nuclear issue came up, their thoughts were firm that nuclear weapons are never acceptable.”

• Yonhap: The USG has sanctioned Myanmar Lt. Gen. Thein Htay for purchasing weapons from NK in violation of UN sanctions.

• Uriminzokkiri released propaganda criticizing the US over “America’s illegal spying activity”, referring to NSA’s surveillance programs leaked by Edward Snowden.

• China has banned its trawlers from fishing off the eastern coast of NK due to the NKorean demand that Chinese fishing vessels purchase fuel from its own suppliers rather than making their own arrangements.

• Russian Deputy Prime Minister: “A number of substantial differences remain… The positions (of Russia and North Korea) for the moment diverge.”

• Studies show that the US and SK military have been targeted by NK cyber spying operations. James Lewis (CSIS): “I used to joke that it’s hard for the North Koreans to have a cyber army because they don’t have electricity, but it looks as if the regime has been investing heavily in this.”  

• NK has allegedly redeployed 300,000 soldiers to assist with kickstarting its economy, about one quarter of its 1.19 million man army. However, SKorean intelligence agents have expressed their skepticism: “North Korea has already deployed a lot of troops to economic projects and we have seen indications of more soldiers being sent to construction sites… but this does not signify troop downsizing.”

MISC

• SKG has granted permission for the NK women’s soccer team to travel to SK to participate in a regional tournament. This will be the first time they have travelled South since 2005.

• Interview with Blaine Harden, author of Escape from Camp 14.

• VII Photographer Tomas Van Hourtryve’s portraits of NK defectors.

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