In and Around North Korea: 28 February - 06 March 2009

• South Korea on Monday (02 Mar) appointed Wi Sung-lac, special assistant to Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan, as its new chief envoy on the North Korean nuclear issue, the ministry said. Wi served as minister for political affairs at the South Korean embassy in Washington from 2004-2007 after leading the foreign ministry's North American affairs bureau from 2003-2004.

• The U.S. pointman on North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, has no plans to meet with North Korean officials during his three-nation Asian trip this week, the State Department said Monday (02 Mar). Not as far as I know," deputy spokesman Gordon Duguid said in a daily news briefing. "That's what I know today." Bosworth, special representative for North Korea, Monday embarked on a nine-day trip to Beijing, Tokyo and Seoul to discuss resumption of the six-party talks, stalled over North Korea's refusal to accept a protocol for verification of its nuclear facilities.

• Russian Vice Foreign Minister Aleksei Borodavkin, who heads the country's delegation to the six-way talks on North Korea's nuclear program, will visit South Korea next week to discuss Seoul-Moscow relations and ways to advance the stalled negotiations, a diplomatic source said Tuesday(03 Mar). He may also meet Stephen Bosworth, the new U.S. point man on Pyongyang, during his trip here, the source added. Bosworth is scheduled to arrive in Seoul on Saturday (07 Mar) for a four-day stay as part of his regional tour that also includes stops in China and Japan.

• U.S. special representative on the issue of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Stephen Bosworth said that the new U.S. administration remained committed to removing nuclear facilities on the Korean Peninsula. Bosworth made the remarks at a briefing here Wednesday (04 Mar) after meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, saying that the United States' aim of removing nuclear facilities will not change.

• North Korea warned Saturday (28 Feb) that U.S. troops stationed in the South should stop what it called "provocative actions" along the military demarcation line, pledging to take stern action if its message goes unheeded. North Korean military officials notified their counterparts in the South, the North's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said, claiming that provocations by U.S. troops in the area are intensifying and could trigger "unpredictable military conflicts." "If the U.S. forces keep behaving arrogantly in the area under the control of the North and the South, the KPA (Korean People's Army) will take a resolute counteraction," the statement read.

• DPRK Delegate on UN Peace-Keeping Operations (KCNA): It is abnormal that the "UN Command," unhampered by the UN, remains in Korea, without getting any orders or financial support from the UN, still now though over half a century has passed since the ceasefire there. The "UN Command" present in South Korea is nothing but the U.S. command and the "UN forces" there are no more than the GIs. The U.S. insistence on the upkeep of such "UN Command" is aimed to perpetuate the U.S. military occupation of South Korea and cover up the aggressive nature of its forces by abusing the name of the UN.

• North Korean leader Kim Jong Il made more than three times the number of public visits this month than the same month last year, the Seoul government said Friday (06 Mar). Kim appeared publicly 15 times this month, compared to an average 5.3 visits he made in February between 2000 and last year, said the Unification Ministry. This year's figure was the highest since he took the reins of the country after his father and North Korean founder Kim Il Sung’s death in 1994.

• Conservative newsletters in South Korea specializing in North Korean affairs on 01 Mar said Kim Jong Un, the youngest son of the North’s supreme leader Kim Jong Il, is the heir apparent. Rumors are also swirling that the son threw a party Feb. 16 for high-ranking military officials to mark his father’s 67th birthday. Citing North Korean sources, Cho Bong-hyeon, a researcher at Industrial Bank of Korea Research Institute in Seoul, said, “Kim Jong Un invited the top brass to his father’s birthday party Feb. 16.” “His rating badge indicated he was a lieutenant general at the operations department of the (North) Korean People`s Army.”

• A report of the Central Election Committee was published on 04 Mar. According to the report, since leader Kim Jong Il sent an open letter to all voters throughout the country to inform the citizens that he decided to register as a candidate for deputy to the Supreme People's Assembly at Constituency No. 333 for the election of deputy to the 12th Supreme People's Assembly, the nomination and registration of candidates for deputies to the 12th SPA have been successfully finished at all other constituencies of the country.

• The results of general elections in North Korea slated for Sunday (08 Mar) will present a clearer picture of which politicians will support supreme leader Kim Jong Il and his successor. A report by the South Korean Unification Ministry presented to the National Assembly yesterday mentioned six politicians among the 20 most frequently mentioned by the North’s official daily Rodong Shinmun last year as rising stars in Pyongyang’s hierarchy. The six were not mentioned in 2007. One North Korea expert said, “North Korea’s leadership has been controlled by Kim Jong Il. Those frequently mentioned by media can be considered powerful politicians. After the elections Sunday, North Korea’s political elite will be replaced. In the process, we need to pay more attention to the rising stars.”

• Shanghai Dongfang Weishi (Dragon TV) in Mandarin carried during its regular midday news cast a report on the DPRK lifting its ban on cell phones. The report says the DPRK government recently lifted the ban on cell phones. It says that a rush to buy cell phones developed shortly after the announcement. The report says that people expect cell phones to dramatically change their lives. Footage shows a man telling reporters that cell phones make life more convenient. To this date, more than 6,500 own a cell phone, according to the report.

• The U.S. House of Representatives has set aside US$2.5 million for energy aid to North Korea this year despite stalled six-party talks over how to verify its nuclear facilities. The enabling legislation, formally known as the 2009 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill, which passed through the House last week, pegs the release of the funds on North Korea's fulfillment of its obligation under a six-party deal to disable its nuclear infrastructure. "None of the funds made available under the heading Economic Support Fund in fiscal year 2009 may be made available for obligation for energy-related assistance for North Korea unless the secretary of state determines and reports to the Committees on Appropriations that North Korea is continuing to fulfill its commitments under the six-party talks agreements," the bill says.

• South Korea urged North Korea to take "necessary measures" to address its abysmal human rights record at the regular session of the U.N. Human Rights Council on Tuesday (03 Mar). "My government, sharing the serious concerns of the international community regarding the dire human rights conditions in the DPRK (North Korea), urges that the latter take necessary measures to improve its human rights situation in full compliance with its obligations under international human rights law and relevant treaties to which it is a party, said South Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Shin Kak-soo.

• North Korea appears to have begun assembling a rocket that it claims will carry a satellite into space, a South Korean source said Friday (27 Feb), despite warnings to stop what neighbors call preparations to test-fire a long-range missile. "It appears that (North Korea) has begun assembling the rocket on the ground," the source said, expecting the work to be completed in a week at the earliest. The North has moved what appears to be its longest-range Taepodong-2 missile to a base in its northeast several weeks ago, and has begun assembling radars and other monitoring equipment. "Considering the brisk activity at the Musudan-ri base, we've concluded that the North's authorities have started testing radars and other equipment as they assemble them," a South Korean official said earlier Friday, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not allowed to disclose such information to the media.

• In an exclusive interview with ABC News' Martha Raddatz, Adm. Timothy Keating, head of the U.S. Pacific Commands, said that the military is prepared to shoot down any North Korean ballistic missile -- if President Obama should give the order. "If a missile leaves the launch pad we'll be prepared to respond upon direction of the president," Keating told ABC News. "I'm not a betting man but I'd go like 60/40, 70/30 that it will, they will attempt to launch a satellite. There's equipment moving up there that would indicate the preliminary stages of preparation for a launch. So I'd say it's more than less likely." "Should it look like it's not a satellite launch -- that it's something other than a satellite launch -- we'll be ready to respond."

• The Heritage Foundation, a U.S. conservative think-tank, has released a documentary film which stresses the necessity of a missile defense system in a bid to protect America from "enemies'' including North Korea and Iran. Introducing a seven-minute preview of the film "33 Minutes,'' sub-titled "Protecting America in the New Missile Age,'' the institute claimed the government should establish the defense system against ballistic missiles capable of hitting the country within 33 minutes.

• Japan plans to deploy an Aegis-equipped destroyer carrying the Standard Missile-3 interceptor to the Sea of Japan to prepare for a possible North Korean missile launch in case it is aimed at Japan, defense sources said Tuesday (03 Mar). North Korea says it is preparing to launch a satellite but Japan's missile defense guideline provides that the defense minister may order an intercept when a rocket to launch a satellite is feared to fall onto Japanese soil or into Japanese territorial waters. ''We would have no other choice but to intercept,'' said a senior Maritime Self-Defense Force officer, referring to a scenario in which a missile or a rocket is launched and judged headed for Japan.

• North Korea's preparations for what it claims will be a satellite launch continue apace, though an actual launch does not seem imminent, Seoul's unification minister said Wednesday (04 Mar). Hyun In-taek, a foreign policy expert who took office last month as Seoul's point man on Pyongyang, also said South Korea takes "seriously" the North's continuing criticism of President Lee Myung-bak and demanded Pyongyang stop its verbal attacks. "I don't think the launch is very imminent, but various preparations are underway," Hyun said in his first meeting with the press.

• US Congressional Research Service (CRS) claimed through a report that North Korea produced 20 Taepodong-2 (TD-2) missiles by 2006. In a report titled “North Korean Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States”, CRS stated that, “Some believe North Korea first started the TD-2 missile production in 2005 and that by 2006, 20 TD-2 missiles were manufactured.”

• North Korea has exported more than 1,000 scud missiles and missile-related parts to the Middle East region, earning nearly $1.5 billion annually, a report said. The Independent Working Group, a U.S. foreign policy think tank, claims in its newly released report "Missile Defense, the Space Relationship & the Twenty-First Century" that the Stalinist regime has expanded arms trade and is providing technologies associated with its Taepodong-2 intercontinental ballistic missile to Middle East countries including Syria and Iran. "Missile exports, which net North Korea some $1.5 billion a year, constitute one of its largest sources of revenue," said the report. "The Kim Jong-il regime has become a principal supplier of ballistic missile components and associated technologies to the Middle East."

• Cash-strapped North Korean shippers smuggle narcotics and other contraband, but there's little evidence that the communist state's rusty merchant fleet transports illicit weapons, a report said on Thursday (05 Mar). British North Korea expert Hazel Smith said her detailed study of North Korean merchant shipping showed a fleet of only 242 ageing vessels faces too much scrutiny in the world's ports to be a significant conduit for weapons of mass destruction.

• North Korea voiced its routine criticism Monday (02 Mar) against a planned South Korea-U.S. joint military exercise at the first high-level talks with the United Nations Command (UNC) in nearly seven years, a defense source said. "North Korea filed lengthy complaints against the plan to hold the Key Resolve and Foal Eagle exercise and the situation involving the U.S. military deployment on the Korean Peninsula," the source said after the general-level talks between the North and the UNC. In response, the UNC reaffirmed that the annual drills are a defense-oriented exercise, unrelated to preparations for any attack.

• North Korea and the U.S.-led United Nations Command will hold a series of additional meetings this week to discuss ways to alleviate tension on the divided peninsula, officials said Tuesday (03 Mar). North Korea and the U.N. Command will reopen their talks on Wednesday (04 Mar) and Friday (06 Mar), South Korean officials said on condition of anonymity. Kim Yong-kyu, a spokesman for U.S. Forces Korea, confirmed the talks are scheduled for this week, adding colonel-level talks will precede general-level discussions.

• Military officers from North Korea and the U.S.-led U.N. Command held more talks Thursday (05 Mar) on easing tensions as the communist state renewed claims that an upcoming military exercise is a prelude to war. The colonel-level meeting set the agenda for a second round of talks at general-level on Friday (06 Mar), the United Nations Command said in a statement. The meeting at Panmunjom, inside the Demilitarized Zone which splits North and South Korea, lasted for 45 minutes, a Command spokesman said. Generals from the two sides met Monday (02 Mar) for the first such talks in almost seven years, but sources said the North used the occasion to criticize the March 9-20 military drill. The annual joint exercise will this year involve a U.S. aircraft carrier, 26, 000 U.S. troops and more than 30,000 South Korean soldiers. The "slightest" military conflict which may break out during the exercise can rapidly develop into "a thermonuclear war," the North's government newspaper Minju Joson said Thursday (05 Mar).

• North Korea warned Thursday (05 Mar) it can no longer assure the safety of South Korean passenger planes flying over the East Sea, protesting an upcoming joint military drill by South Korea and the United States. "Under the situation ... no one knows what military conflicts will be touched off," the North's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea said. North Korea is "compelled to declare that security cannot be guaranteed for South Korean civil airplanes flying through the territorial air of our side ... and its vicinity above the East Sea of Korea," the committee said in a statement carried by the North's Korean Central News Agency in English. The threat comes as North Korea is preparing to launch what is believed to be a long-range missile from a base on its east coast.

• The Seoul government said Friday (06 Mar) that North Korea is violating international law by threatening the safety of South Korean flights in its airspace and urged Pyongyang to stop its military warnings. "To militarily threaten the normal operations of civil airplanes not only violates international rules but is also an inhumane act that can never be justified," said Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyoun.

• "South and North Korea have agreed to seek peaceful coexistence and co-prosperity, while recognizing and respecting each other. I am going to respect these inter-Korean agreements," said President Lee Myung-bak at a ceremony marking the 90th anniversary of the March 1 Independence Movement. Lee said he is "not negative" toward two inter-Korean agreements, the June 15, 2000 Joint Declaration and the Oct. 4, 2007 Statement, which North Korea claims the Lee administration is unwilling to respect.

• North Korea has notified South Korean companies in a joint industrial complex in the North of detailed labor standards, according to the Ministry of Unification Wednesday (04 Mar). The notice stipulated that a company will be fined up to $2,000 if it fails to pay salaries to employees for one month, and face a 10-day suspension of business if delaying payment for two months, a ministry official said.

• The North Korean government has penalized a South Korean firm at the Kaesong industrial complex by banning local employees from working there, Seoul officials said Thursday, amid mounting border tension. The sanction marks the first time for the North to penalize a South Korean company for pollution time since the complex opened in 2005.

• The United States Thursday (05 Mar) reiterated that it will not develop ties with North Korea at the cost of relations with South Korea, urging the North to refrain from escalating tensions with provocations. The secretary made very clear in her press conference in Seoul that we are not interested in developing relations with North Korea at the expense of relations with South Korea," Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said in a news conference at the National Press Center. "And she also made very clear our view that North Korea should be doing much more to work on its relationship with South Korea."

• Military officials of South Korea and the United States met in Seoul on Monday (02 Mar) to coordinate the transfer of wartime operational command and the relocation of U.S. troops stationed in the country, the Ministry of Defense said. Seoul and Washington have regularly hosted their Security Policy Initiative (SPI) talks since 2005 to discuss military issues between the allies. Monday's talks, the 21st of the kind, coincided with rare military talks held between North Korea and the U.S.-led United Nations Command, during which Pyongyang criticized South Korea-U.S. joint military drills set for March 9-20.