NK NEWS BRIEF | October 16, 2013

NKorean fans cheer for their team during a women’s soccer game between China and NK at the East Asian Games on Oct. 7, 2013 | Photo: Osports via People’s Daily Online

NK INTERNAL

• Daily NK on the dramatic increase in sports and recreational facilities, which are meant to highlight the achievements of KJU and his “image as a man loved by his people.”.

• The 68th anniversary of the founding of the KWP came and went quietly. No special food or other goods seemed to be distributed to the populace.

• KJU’s recent order that children of overseas employees must return to NK has been rescinded.

• NK media confirmed Ri Yong-gil’s appointment as the KPA Chief of General Staff.

ECONOMY & FOOD SECURITY

• According to figures from the Chinese National Tourism Administration, 149,500 NKoreans legally visited China from January to September, a 12.5% increase on last year. If this rate is kept up this could be the first year that China has 200,000 legal visits by North Koreans. Of those visiting; 68,000 were for temporary work; 40,400 for business; 2,400 were for pleasure; reportedly only 100 were for family visits; and 38,600 were for “other”. 64,800 were aged 45-64 and 64,200 were aged 25-44, and ⅔ were male (114,000 male to 35,500 female).

• Due to open in July 2014, a new 3km Yalu River bridge will, according to IFES, help cut Dandong-PY travel time by half. China is covering the 3.6 USD cost of construction, and KCNA reports that the new bridge will accommodate over 3,000 55-tonne freight cars per day.

• After more than four months of repairs, a 500-foot bridge on the Sino-NK border has reopened. The bridge, located near Hyesan, is a major conduit for trade and tourism in the area.

• NK state media said it has established a civilian body, the Korean Economic Development Federation, to support the activities of foreign businesses and scholars interested in special economic zones in NK.

• Daily NK: Plans to ship the majority of this year’s potato harvest from Daehongdan County down to Pyongyang have been stopped. As a result, the mobilized citizenry have begun to receive their annual potato distribution as ration quantities are said to be larger than in previous years.

• A NK/SK investment promotion event for foreign businesses at the KIC has been postponed.

• Lankov discusses NK agriculture, markets, aid, corruption, transit, etc. with Sino-NK: “The vast majority of the adult population has a bike. It is the equivalent of having a car in the United States. You can live without one, but it’s very bothersome to do so outside a large city. The same in North Korea: you can do without a bike in Pyongyang, but even there it can sometimes be troublesome. Outside Pyongyang? Forget it; without a bike, you cannot commute, shop or do anything… Bikes have become essential with marketization: ‘Bikes are the wheels of North Korea’s market system.’”

REFUGEES

• Daily NK:  Over the last decade, 49 NKorean spies have been discovered operating in SK, and 21 of them entered the country disguised as defectors. Spies were sent to obtain state secrets; induce re-defections; analyze trends among defectors; observe the work of the NIS; foster ties with pro-North groups in the South; and launder counterfeit money.

• According to a MOU report of over 25,500 North Korean defectors who have arrived in the South, 26 have committed suicide, 583 have passed away, 51 have migrated and the whereabouts of 796 are unknown. The report also addresses mental health issues defectors face.

• Over the last five years, 155 defectors have applied for asylum in a third country. Of those defectors, 126 of them had previously settled in SK and thus were denied refugee status. Last year, the number of applicants seeking asylum rose dramatically from previous years.

• Kim Young-soon, a 77 year old defector, spoke about her time in NK during North Korean Defector’s Week in London and urged the world to support SK in pressuring NK on human rights.

• Kim Eun-ju, a 27 year old defector, has written a memoir about her life in NK and her escape to SK.  An Eleven Year Old’s Will joins a small circle of first-hand defector memoirs published in Korean.

HUMAN RIGHTS

• Myunghee Bae, Kenneth Bae’s mother, visited NK and left without her son. Bae visited her son at a PY hospital three times over the course of a five-day stay in NK. There were hopes that Bae’s visit would lead to the release of her son. Bill Richardson saw the visit as a sign that NK “obviously [wants] to lower the temperature with the United States,” however, he added the caution that “the North Koreans are excellent at mixed and confusing signals.”

• Yonhap: NK is detaining 516 SKoreans, according to a recent ROKG report.

• The ROK MOU’s human rights budget will remain unchanged for 2014, despite previous claims by the Ministry that it would increase the budget (currently 41.2 million USD). Shim Yoon Jo, a Saenuri Party lawmaker, is disappointed by the new budget, adding that “although a North Korean human rights law has yet to be implemented, the Ministry of Unification must effectively form a budget for related projects. They must also press forward in connecting with international and domestic groups to come up with practical initiatives that improve the human rights of the North Korean people.”

• 38 North on NK’s chemical weapons capabilities includes section on reported human testing: “Taken as a whole, and within the context of what is currently known about the treatment of political prisoners within the DPRK, such reports suggest a long-standing DPRK policy of low-level lethal testing of chemical agents on unwilling human subjects.”

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS & SECURITY

• In response to the new chairman of the ROK Joint Chiefs of Staff’s comment regarding a preemptive strike against a NKorean nuclear attack, the Rodong Sinmun said SK will “face [NK’s] merciless revenge” in such a circumstance. Admiral Choi Yoon-Hee, nominated by PGH, stated he would “prevent [NK] from doing [a nuclear or missile attack] by conducting a preemptive strike using the Kill Chain.”  

• NK’s National Defense Commission: “If the US wants to escape the pent-up grudge and retaliation of the army and people of the DPRK, it should drop its old way of thinking and outdated stand and make a bold decision to roll back its old hostile policy toward the DPRK before it is too late. The US should clearly understand the meaning of the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and lift all steps for isolating and stifling the DPRK.”

• SK has identified 15 nuclear facilities in NK but has not obtained detailed information on the number of employees.

• NK may be developing a ground-to-ship ballistic missile with a range of 200-300 km. SK’s current weapon system is incapable of intercepting ballistic missiles due to their high speeds.

• According to The Rodong Sinmun, NK wants to reunify with SK through a federal system, rather than pursue SK’s current hope to merge the two Koreas’ political systems because such a move “undermines the North’s socialism.”

• SK’s nuclear envoy: NK has “very serious nuclear capabilities” and is able to conduct another round of nuclear tests “any time.”

• Yonhap: Five of the six nations involved in the long-stalled talks to denuclearize NK may hold a meeting later this week in Seoul. NK is not expected to participate in the meeting.

• SK has incurred 806m USD in damages from NK cyber attacks from 2009-2013, according to the findings of SK’s military cyber command via a SKorean lawmaker.

• Fyodor Lukyanov, head of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy research group in Moscow: “Russia’s position is to get North Korea involved in profitable projects to make them realize that cooperation is better than isolation.” The new Khasan-Rason rail link will enable transport from Western Europe to Rason in 14 days, compared to 45 days by ship, however it will be more expensive and therefore will likely become a “niche product”.

• Noland: According to a recent TNS Korea survey, a large majority (77%) of SKoreans do not believe NK will denuclearize.

ANALYSIS & OPINION

• WSJ: Jiehae Blackman has tallied and mapped all of the foreign humanitarian, development, educational, and business groups operating in NK since 1995. Blackman found hundreds of organizations that have conducted over a thousand projects throughout the country. Click here for her project’s interactive map.

• Roberta Cohen, Brookings: While food aid linked to denuclearization has been seen to undermine humanitarian goals, the linkage of food aid to economic reforms should enhance those goals. To this end, donors should consider developing a new framework that over the long term conditions their food aid and any agricultural investments on reforms. Initially, they should insist that any food assistance be linked to high level discussions about food sustainability… ’No reform, no aid’ would be the ultimate objective.

• Lankov: “If the North Korean government had conducted a land reform along the lines of that which occurred in China during the 1990s not one single North Korean would have died from starvation… World history has shown us that farmers with improved living standards do not start revolutions… Most farmers give no thought to starting a revolution if they receive 100% of their hard-earned harvests. Ultimately, I believe that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has made a mistake by not implementing land reform like China did in the late 1990s. Unlike other types of reform, a land reform would provide major benefits without incurring a threat to the regime.”

• Hyeon Seong Il, Institute for National Security Strategy: With the exception of war or a massive natural disaster, it is unlikely that substantive change in North Korea would create huge outflows of refugees.

• Foster-Carter: “Ri Yong Gil is the KPA’s fourth CGS in 15 months. Similarly when Jang Jong Nam, an even more obscure and fast-rising general was made Minister of People’s Armed Forces in May, he was already Kim Jong Un’s third appointee to that position. So North Korea has also had four different defense ministers in just over a year. This isn’t normal. In Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il’s day, the top brass kept their jobs.”

• Is NK going capitalist? Noland plays down the possibility here, commenting on a recent story from the Dong-A Ilbo suggesting NK’s new economic system plan “will likely bring a huge change in North Korean society.”

MISC.

• The AP named its new chief of its PY bureau, Eric Talmadge.

• Lee Joo-Haeng, Emeritus Professor at Chungang University, wants to halt the widening culture and language gaps between NK/SK. Lee believes NK/SK TV and radio programs should be allowed for viewing across the border and a joint translation research center should be established.

• NK’s cyber attacks on SKorean computer systems cost more than 805 million USD in damages between 2009 and 2013, recent government data estimates.

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