NK NEWS BRIEF | Nov 28, 2014

A mass rally staged in KIS Square, PY, to criticize the UNGA resolution on NK human rights. | Photo: KCNA/EPA

NK INTERNAL

• Daily NK: A tree-planting campaign is going ahead regardless of the cold weather. Source: “There are rallies at the provincial, city, and county level to attain KJU’s goal of afforestation across the entire country… All residents, including elementary school students, have been mobilized for this abrupt tree-planting campaign… But residents in farming areas worry that the trees will be planted in their plots, which would in effect deprive them of their farming grounds.”
• Daily NK: Wealthy Chinese merchants are entering NK despite the Ebola quarantine. Source: “Recently I’ve heard North Korea say it won’t isolate traders who have a lot of money… If people receive health certificates from China and agree to be tested for Ebola in the North, it claims they are exempt from the isolation process.”
• Daily NK: Musan Mine, the largest iron ore producer in NK, has stopped operating due to electricity shortage. Source: “The little electricity that was being sent to the mine had to be rerouted to threshing machines on collective farms [for harvest threshing], and the result is that the production of iron ore at Musan stopped… Kim Chaek Steel Mill and Songjin Steelworks, which both use iron ore, are facing major interruptions to iron and steel production.”
• Reuters: State media identified Kim Yeo-jong, KJU’s younger sister, as a department vice director in the Central Committee of the Korean Workers’ Party.

ECONOMY & FOOD SECURITY

• Yonhap: Representatives of the ROKG and SKorean companies POSCO, Hyundai Merchant Marine Co., and Korail Corp visited Rason to oversee a pilot shipment of Russian coal going from Rason port to Pohang in SK – a cheaper alternative to the current route from Vladivostok. It is seen as a test run for trade and logistics linking the two Koreas and Russia.
• Chosun Ilbo: NKoreans born in the 1980s and 90s are becoming more active making money as they were able to embrace a wave of changes caused by the nascent market-based economy. They use smartphones to gather information for their business and form nationwide sales networks. Business enterprises include selling real estate and phones, running gas stations and retail stores, and lending money.  
• Daily NK: The price of rice has been rising again due to drought and poor harvest yield. Source: “Rice used to sell at 4800-5000 KPW earlier this month, but now the price is 500 KPW higher at 5600 KPW… There are voices complaining that they would not need to worry about rice if the farmers were given their own land.” (Korean).
• Chosun Ilbo: Orascom’s audit report reveals that the cash balance of Koryolink, NK’s mobile phone network, reached 540 million USD in late September. However Orascom is thought to face difficulties in repatriating those profits despite its 75% stake in Koryolink.
• RFA: A portion of NKorean-manufactured goods intended to be exported to China are being sold in markets within NK at bargain prices. A Korean-American in China who supplies fabric to his NKorean manufacturer: “I calculate that about 20 percent of the order volume remains with the processing company in North Korea… It’s hard to do consignment business with North Korea if I don’t prepare for these losses.”

HUMAN RIGHTS

• Joongang Ilbo: SK’s National Assembly began formal discussions on long-stalled opposing bills on NK human rights. Mirroring their different approaches to NK, the Saenuri Party bill calls for financial support for NK human rights NGOs in SK and a national archive documenting NK human rights abuses, while NPAD’s bill focuses on improving the human rights and standard of living of NKoreans through humanitarian aid in a way that will not offend PY.
• Daily NK: ROK SNP Rep to Moscow: “It has been many years since Russia has repatriated North Koreans found to be in its territory… As of now, it is set in place so that if North Korean residents hope to enter third countries, UNHCR procedures are followed in the spirit of humanitarianism and a respect for human rights.” Moscow’s response: “The agreement is on how to handle the admission and transfer of individuals who have violated related immigration laws of the country in question. It is still undecided when the agreement will be signed.”
• KCNA: The DPRK Association for Human Rights Studies released another report criticising the UN COI and the UNGA resolution on NK human rights. “The recent farce orchestrated at the UN is a shameless political chicanery to put down justice with injustice and conceal truth with lies and the height of brazenfaced burlesque to deceive the world people with intrigues and fabrications.”

REFUGEES & BORDER SECURITY

• Daily NK source in Yanggang province: “Travelers received prior education on the [ideological] basics at the provincial security department’s foreign affairs division before leaving for China… There were orders to be careful not to fall into traps of South Koreans, who are spies from the NIS.”

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS & SECURITY

• INTER-KOREAN: ROK military reported a live-fire drill in a SW direction near the Yellow Sea border as part of the ongoing Hoguk exercise involving 330,000 troops. Residents of Yeonpyeong and Baengyeong islands were evacuated in case of a NKorean response during the drill.
• Yonhap: NK conducted a test of an ejection launcher that helps fire missiles from submarines, in a sign that PY is moving forward with plans to develop submarine-based ballistic missile strike capabilities.
• Yonhap: ROKG sent back 10 NKorean fishermen just more than 48 hours after they were rescued in the East Sea while drifting due to engine problems.
• Yonhap: ROK Minister of Unification: “If only transparency were guaranteed, [the govt] could consider various assistance measures including small-scale fertilizer aid to North Korea agriculture and forestry support projects… For the moment, inter-Korean cooperation in infrastructure, agricultural and livestock sectors may appear difficult because of the inter-Korean tensions, but the government will make utmost efforts to take the first step toward [rapprochement].”
• UNITED STATES: KJU visited the Sinchon Museum, an important anti-US propaganda site, and was quoted by KCNA as saying, “The massacres committed by the U.S. imperialist aggressors in Sinchon evidently showed that they are cannibals and homicides seeking pleasure in slaughter.” KJU also reportedly ordered his government to step up anti-American ideological education. Meanwhile PY authorities organized an anti-US rally involving 100,000 people (KCNA figure) focusing on denouncing the UNGA resolution on NK’s human rights situation, portrayed as being led by the US.  
• FRANCE: A NKorean student, the son of a former aide to Jang Song-taek, reportedly escaped the custody of NKorean agents as he was about to be bundled onto a flight from Paris to China, and may now be under French govt protection. Four other NKorean students have failed to attend classes near Paris since the incident.   
• ISRAEL: Israeli Intelligence Minister on findings that PY and Tehran have been cooperating on nuclear weapons: “We all know that Iran, Syria and North Korea are very close to each other… If this loophole is not closed, and if Iran under an agreement can have some kind of research and development, knowledge exchange and participation in other countries like North Korea, then this is also the way to bypass an agreement by simply not doing it alone in Iran, but by cooperating with North Korea or other rogue countries.”
• MALAYSIA: An explosion in a Sarawak coal mine killed four people, including a North Korean miner named Pang Chung-hyok, aged 29. Seven other NKoreans were injured out of a reported 49 NKoreans working at the mine. Malaysian minister: “When it comes to industries such as coal mines, the jobs are very dangerous and tough… No local or Sarawakian will dare to take up such jobs — that is why [we] need foreign workers. In the coal-mining sector, only Britain, China and North Korea have highly-skilled workers.”

ANALYSIS & OPINION

• Prof Zhang Liangui (Party School of the Central Committee of the CCP): “North Korea is committed to the development of nuclear weapons, while China adheres to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula… No one can accept a nuclear North Korea. From this point of view, the effect of North Korea’s diplomatic offensive is zero.”
• Lankov: “There are tens of thousands of North Koreans employed worldwide… But are these people actually “modern day slaves?” Well, they certainly do not see themselves as such… because they are doing what they and their compatriots overwhelmingly see as a prestigious and exceptionally paid job. Indeed, the selection process is highly competitive, and nearly all those who make it have to make use of family connections and/or bribes to get selected.”
• Sheila Smith: “In the end, Abe will be judged at home on his ability to bring Japanese citizens back from North Korea. If Pyongyang proves yet again that it has no serious intent to engage in diplomatic negotiation, the domestic tolerance for continued Japanese government effort will diminish even further. If, however, Pyongyang continues to play the abductee card, then the Abe Cabinet or any future Japanese leader will be compelled to respond.”

MISC.

• NK Tech: NK’s upgraded Arirang smartphone very closely resembles the W200 handset produced by China’s Shenzhen Hongjiayuan Communication Technology, a Shenzhen-based manufacturing company.

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