In and Around North Korea: 09 - 15 May 2009

North Korea vows to bolster nuclear power, citing US hostility and US says North

Korea will face ‘consequences’ if it carries out its threats

• On 08 May, North Korea said there is no use in trying to talk with the US an vowe to bolster its nuclear deterrent, citing US remains “hostile” toward it.
  
• Stephen Bosworth, who was visiting South Korea on 08 May, dismissed Nort Korea’s claim saying the US continues its efforts for bilateral and multilateral dialogue with the North. He made clear that if North Korea puts its threats into action, it will face “consequences.”
  
• On 10 May, a South Korean government official said the US has no intension of sending a high-level envoy to North Korea or take any other steps to revive the Six-Party Talks. The official said in a background briefing for reporters on the results of US-ROK consultation with Stephen Bosworth added the US believes that it has done enough to convey its willingness to engage the North in both bilateral and multilateral talks and that “there can be progress in dialogue only when a partner responds (to proposals for talks) and shows interest.”
  
• He said, "They want to kill the six-party talks." When asked if he expected North Korea to carry out another nuclear test, Saymore said, "I think they will. That's what they are threatening to do." He did add, however, he would consider over the next couple of weeks whether to visit North Korea.
  
• Stephen Bosworth returned to the US on 12 May after visiting China, South Korea, and Japan. Originally, Bosworth was scheduled to visit Russia, but cancelled his trip, sending Sung Kim to Moscow in his place.
  

Russia and US calls for resumption of Six-Party Talks

• A Russian diplomat said on 13 May Russia and the US are against putting to much pressure on North Korea, and urged the resumption of the Six-Party Talks.
  
• Foreign Ministry Special Ambassador Grigory Logvinov met with Sung Kim on the same day about the nuclear issue on the Korean peninsula.
  
• The Interfax News Agency quoted Logvinov as saying after the meeting, "We discussed in detail various aspects of the situation, putting an accent on the main thing – the search for solutions should be sought on diplomatic negotiating tracks without too much fuss and without drama, to say nothing of attempts to put pressure."
  
• "The common wish is that the six-party process be resumed one way or another. And all the gains achieved – a great deal has been achieved – must be saved," Logvinov said, "We must not lose what we have done in terms of denuclearization and in terms of starting the effort to lay the groundwork for regional security in Northeast Asia."
  

A US scholar says North Korea may double its plutonium stock in half decade

• Siegfried Hecker, a Stanford University professor who has visited North Korea multiple times, said on 13 May North Korea may double its stockpile of plutonium for nuclear weapons by 2013, producing enough for one bomb each year with its existing fuel.
  
• Hecker also said the North may have started work on its 14,000 unused fuel rods as early as this month.
  
• Fuel rods are reprocessed to produce the plutonium needed to build nuclear bombs after undergoing irradiation in a reactor. North Korea reported last year it has 30 kilograms of plutonium in storage.
  
• In retaliation for the UN condemnation of its 05 Apr rocket launch, the North said last month that it was quitting the Six-Party Talks and had begun reprocessing 8,000 spent fuel rods. Hecker said in an article posted on the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, "These 8,000 spent fuel rods could contain as much as 12 kilograms of plutonium.”
  

North Korea claims nuclear weapons serves as deterrent as it continues its rhetoric against the US, commenting on the speech of the Commander of US Forces Korea

• On 12 May, North Korea reiterated that its nuclear weapons are for deterrenc and acquiring the deterrence was “entirely just,” citing the 22 Apr comments by the Commander of US Forces Korea on the US commitment to provide a nuclear umbrella for Seoul.
• The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said “Walter Sharp, commander of the U.S. forces in South Korea, recently blustered that the U.S. would be firmly committed to providing a nuclear umbrella to south Korea, asserting that the 'U.S.-South Korea Mutual Defense Treaty' would remain valid even after the transfer of the 'right to command wartime operations' to South Korea.”
  
• The KCNA said the US pressure on North Korea to dismantle its nuke while simultaneously talking about the "provision of a nuclear umbrella to south Korea," is almost tantamount to forcing it to lay down its arms.
  
• The KCNA also said, "It was entirely just for the DPRK to have acquired nuclear deterrent for self-defence to cope with the ever-more undisguised moves of the U.S. for a nuclear war.”
  
• North Korea’s Rodong Shinmun made a similar claim on 05 May.
  

North Korea subordinates the Operations Department and Office 35 under military control

• Sources said on 10 May North Korea has carried out a reshuffle of government organizations, shifting the jurisdiction over its overseas espionage and cash cow operations – Office 35 and Operations Department – from the Workers' Party to the People’s Armed Forces.
  
• The Operations Department is known to train and send agents to the ROK, US, and Japan, but its recent operations are believed to have shifted toward trades of arms, drugs and fake bills. "North Korea's Operations Department handles a large amount of cash through illegal activities such as counterfeiting currency, manufacturing drugs and exporting arms," a source said. "With the Operations Department now under its wing, the North Korean military will have a major source of independent financing."
  
• Office 35 is North Korea's intelligence unit in charge of collecting information from the ROK, Japan, China, Southeast Asia, and Europe.
  

Kim Jong-un apparently increasing his visibility in North Korea

• Open source reporting said on 11 May the third and youngest son of Kim Jong-il has been increasingly visible on official occasions and masterminded the country's major publicity stunts, such as a recent fireworks extravaganza, in an apparent bid to burnish his image as a successor.
  
• Kim Jong-un, who is believed to have been tapped in Jan 09 as the North’s next leader, has been seen making efforts to elevate his reputation by organizing the 15 Apr fireworks show and initiating an economic reconstruction drive, called the "150-day campaign."
  
• The reports contend that Kim Jong-un is responsible for initiating the 150-day campaign,  nationwide movement to rebuild the country's sickly economy by maximizing its labor force during the period. The reports say the labor campaign, which started to appear in North Korean media reports this month, is a copy of the "70-day campaign" his father launched to rev up production amid a global oil price crisis in 1974.
  

North Korea seeks help from PETROBRAS to prospect for oil in East Sea

• On 11 May, North Korean Foreign Minister Pak Ui-Chun expressed to Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim North Korea’s interest in receiving assistance in its oil prospecting efforts fro PETROBRAS (Brazilian Petroleum Corporation).
  
• The deposit in question would be the hydrocarbons field in the East Sea (aka Sea of Japan)
  
• Park arrived in Brasilia on a stop during a Latin American tour that included visits to Cuba and Peru.
  
• The ministers also had a “clear” dialogue on controversial subjects, including human rights and the North Korean nuclear program, and Amorim expressed Brazil’s opinion that the North should maintain the Six-Party Talks.
  

Japanese government report says North Korea made progress in extending its

missile range

• The Japanese Defense Ministry has concluded in a report that North Korea launched a long-range ballistic missile in April to test and improve its missiles and has made progress in extending their range.
  
• The summary of the report states that the launch of what appears to have been either a Taepo Dong-2 or an improved version could lead to the enhancement of the accuracy of the Rodong medium-range missile, which is capable of striking Japan.
  

North Korea steps up force mobilization along the Northern Limit Line (NLL)

• Since the Jan 09 announcement, North Korea has breached the NLL three times in Feb 09 and Mar 09, said a ROK colonel overseeing Yeonpyeong Island.
  
• "Each ship reached about two to three kilometers into our territory," he said, adding livefire artillery training has also doubled this year along the North Korean coastline.
  
• Stating that the number of sorties by North Korean aircraft rose six times from a year earlier, he said about 100 fighter jets and surveillance airplanes took off from bases south of Pyongyang on 07 Apr, just two days after the missile launch.
  

North Korea sets date for trial of two US reporters

• North Korean state media said on 14 May that two US female journalists detained in North Korea for illegally entering the country will stand trial on 04 Jun.
  
• Analysts suspect North Korea may be following in the footsteps of Iran, which arrested, tried and released a female American journalist amid diplomatic contacts with the US over the past few months.
  
• The Korean Central News Agency said in a one-sentence report, "The Central Court of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea decided to try (the) American journalists on 04 Jun according to the indictment of the competent organ."
  

North Korea tells the South there will be no chance of serious dialogue between the two Koreas

• A spokesman for the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland said in a statement carried by the North's Korean Central News Agency said, "There simply is no need to even consider holding talks between the North and the South while the Lee Myung-bak group is publicly trying to smear the name of our republic and bluntly denying the republic."
  

Second Kaesong meeting between two Koreas is uncertain

• A ROK government official said, “The government has tried to negotiate with North Korea on the matter of holding a second Kaesong meeting sometime within the week. We see the second Kaesong meeting as necessary to maintaining momentum for inter-Korean dialogue, however, we have not been able to come to an agreement with North Korea about it due to a huge gap in opinions.”
  
• Regarding the agenda, the ROK is demanding to talk about South Korean employee, who has been detained for 45 days by North Korea, as a prerequisite to the discussions about wage and land use fees in Kaesong.
  
• In the afternoon of 15 May, the ROK proposed to the North a meeting next week to discuss the KIC issues to include that of the detained South Korean worker.
  

ROK Ministry of Unification closes North Korea humanitarian aid unit to make room for an North Korean internal politics analysis unit

• On 12 May, the ROK’s unification ministry closed its bureau on humanitarian aid to North Korea and launched a new office designed to better analyze Pyongyang's internal politics as part of the ROK government restructuring and reorganization.
  
• The Cabinet approved the ministry's proposal to shut down its Humanitarian Cooperation Bureau and set up the tentatively-named Political Analysis Bureau, Kim Jung-tae, assistant minister for planning and coordination, said in a press briefing.
  
• Kim explained, "The restructuring aims to strengthen the ministry's long-term unification policy and intelligence analysis and merge overlapped low-level units."
  

South Korea and IAEA meet to discuss North Korea and other pending issues

• Olli Heinonen, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)'s deputy director general for safeguards, held a series of meetings with officials at South Korea's foreign ministry, science and technology ministry, and the presidential office in Seoul on 12 and 13 May.
  
• Heinonen arrived in South Korea on 10 May for a five-day stay during which he will also attended a regional forum on implementing an IAEA accord. He met with the Vice Foreign Minister Shin Kak-soo, top nuclear negotiator Wi So'ng-rak, and Oh Joon, deputy foreign minister for international organizations, global issues and treaties.
  

ROKAF reports Chinese military tried to hack into the ROK Embassy in the US last

year

• According to an annual publication that details the defense capabilities of global powers, China operates a “Red Hacker” unit of about a million hackers mainly attacking the US, Japan, and Taiwan.
  
• The publication said, the hackers, including those recruited from the US institutes such as MIT, attempted to hack systems at the South Korean Embassy in Mar 08, citing ROK military intelligence.
  
• The case marks the first time the ROK has publicly asserted that the Chinese military has tried to hack into its diplomatic office abroad.