Today’s highlights:
1) A South Korean activist stated that Kim Jong-il is undergoing kidney dialysis twice a week as a result of his diabetes
2) A Chinese investment company’s cancelled a contract with Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation, a North Korean company currently under U.N. sanctions
3) The US Treasury Department’s announced that it has put the Korea Hyoksin Trading Corporation (Hyoksin) for being owned or controlled by a North Korean entity that is already sanctioned under the US executive order that freezes the assets of WMD proliferators
and 4) North Korea seized a South Korean fishing boat on the East Sea (Sea of Japan) on Thursday after the boat apparently entered North Korean territorial waters due to a malfunction in its navigational system. On Friday, North Korea has told the South that the appropriate agency is investigating the incident and it does not have anything special to tell the South Korean government at this time. North Korean media has not covered the incident.
SEOUL – North Korea's leader Kim Jong-Il is undergoing kidney dialysis twice a week as a result of his diabetes, a South Korean activist said on Thursday, quoting unidentified sources in Pyongyang.
The health of Mr Kim, 67, is the subject of intense interest as he has not formally named someone to succeed him at the helm of the secretive communist state.
'His illness suddenly became worse last May, forcing him to receive dialysis,' Ha Tae-Keung, president of the Open Radio for North Korea, said on a radio talk show.
'The nuclear test was carried out in order to prevent Mr Kim's health problems from sparking rifts among power elites,' added Mr Ha, whose Seoul-based organisation broadcasts programmes to the North.
Mr Kim, who has a history of diabetes and heart disease, is widely believed to have suffered a stroke in August last year.
In video footage recorded in March and shown on North Korean state television last week, Mr Kim barely used his left hand. Most still photos released since his reported stroke have not shown him using his left hand.
North Korea launched a long-range rocket on April 5 and conducted a nuclear test on May 25, its second following the first in 2006. It also has fired several short-range missiles and renounced the truce on the Korean peninsula.
US and South Korean officials believe the ailing Mr Kim was staging a show of strength to bolster his authority as he tries to put in place a succession plan involving his youngest son, 26-year-old Jong-Un.
According to reports, North Koreans are being taught new songs aimed at bolstering loyalty to the next leader, addressing Jong-Un as 'General Kim.'
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N. Korea Mining Project Buckles Under UN Sanctions (Chosun Ilbo)
A Chinese investment company developing a bronze mine in North Korea with a North Korean company sanctioned by the UN Security Council has reportedly called an abrupt halt to the project.
An industry source in China said the investment firm sent a letter to NHI Shenyang Mining Machinery, the company it had commissioned to build facilities for the mine in Hyesan, North Korea, telling it to stop construction. An estimated 400,000 tons of bronze are deposited there.
The Chinese firm had signed an agreement with (North) Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation to develop the mine in November 2006. But the North Korean partner was blacklisted by the UN Security Council after North Korea carried out its latest nuclear test.
The industry source said, "When Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping visited Pyongyang in June last year, he pledged full support for the development of the Hyesan bronze mine so that it could become a model for investment by Chinese business in North Korea. This prompted NHI to hurry construction so that production could start in September this year."
But he added the Chinese government apparently persuaded the investment firm to stop the project as Beijing takes part in the UN sanctions. "Otherwise, it's unusual for a project to be stopped at this late stage," he said. The investment firm reportedly gave NHI no reason for the cancellation.
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US slaps sanctions on North Korean firm (AFP)
WASHINGTON – The United States on Thursday imposed economic sanctions on a North Korean firm that according to US officials was involved in Pyongyang's weapons of mass destruction development.
The Treasury Department said that Korea Hyoksin Trading Corporation (Hyoksin) was sanctioned for being owned or controlled by a North Korean entity, the Korea Ryonbong General Corporation (Ryonbong).
Ryonbong already was sanctioned under the US executive order that freezes the assets of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) proliferators and their supporters, and prohibits US persons from all transactions with them.
"The world community is taking forceful action against the arms and agencies of North Korea’s WMD and missile programs, prohibiting dealings with them and banning them from participation in the global financial system," said Adam Szubin, head of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control.
The United Nations Security Council designated Hyoksin for sanctions on July 16, saying it was "subordinate" to Ryonbong and for its involvement in the development of WMD.
According to the Treasury, Ryonbong, which also was sanctioned, specializes in acquisition for North Korean defense industries and support to Pyongyang's military-related sales.
Last week President Barack Obama, using emergency powers, extended a set of economic sanctions on North Korea for another year as tension soars with the communist state over its nuclear and missile programs.
North Korea has vowed to build more bombs and to start a new weapons program based on uranium enrichment in response to the sanctions.
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SEOUL – North Korea seized a stray South Korean fishing boat carrying four crewmembers and hauled it to a port on its east coast on Thursday despite repeated South Korean warnings, officials in Seoul said.
The 29-ton South Korean boat, 800 Yeonanho, "was tugged to the port of Jangjon at 9:30 a.m.," Lee Bung-woo, a defense ministry spokesperson in Seoul, said in a briefing.
South Korea sent a message calling for the immediate release of the boat, which had been floating in North Korean waters as early as 5:05 a.m., the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said in a release.
Lee said a crewmember on the boat reported a malfunction with the satellite navigation system via commercial link shortly before it was seized 7 miles (11km) into North Korean waters at 6:27 a.m.
The seizure comes as a South Korean worker remains detained in North Korea since March over allegations that he defamed its ruling system and encouraged defection at a joint factory complex just north of the inter-Korean border.
Ties between the Koreas unraveled after South Korean President Lee Myung-bak took office early last year with a pledge to bolster pressure on Pyongyang to drop its nuclear weapons programs.
North Korea retaliated by suspending reconciliation talks and threatening armed conflict along their border. Tensions heightened further after the communist state conducted its second nuclear test in May and test-fired ballistic missiles off the east coast.
The seized South Korean boat did not respond to initial requests by South Korean naval vessels trying to identify it, JCS spokesman Park Sung-woo said.
"The ship was out of the reach of our radars when it crossed the Northern Limit Line (NLL)," the de facto inter-Korean maritime border, he said. "The boat was also tiny and built with reinforced plastics, which made it hard to identify the vessel with radars."
South Korean patrol boats moved closer to the NLL and warned North Korea twice to "reciprocate by releasing the fishing boat" after the seizure, he said.
The South Korean Navy says it sent back two stray North Korean fishing boats on June 30 and July 5, respectively.
The incident on Thursday marks the third time since 2005 that a South Korean fishing boat has been seized by North Korean authorities.
The two previous boats, which also strayed across the boundary, were released after five and 19 days, respectively, according to officials.
The 800 Yeonanho departed from the port of Geojin on the eastern coast at 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday and sailed past the NLL as far as 20 miles (32km) off the port of Jejin, officials said.
Geojin is about 150km northeast of Seoul and 15km south of the Demilitarized Zone that divides the Koreas.
Skippered by a man only identified by his last name, Park, the boat, which was operating in the East Sea and mainly fishes for squid, was scheduled to return home Friday morning, Lee said.
The NLL was drawn in 1953 by an American commander of U.N. forces that fought on the South Korean side in the Korean War, which ended in a truce rather than a peace treaty.
In the meantime, the JCS said a North Korean fishing boat briefly crossed into the South's waters on its west coast at 5:13 p.m. on the same day.
The North Korean boat, likely experiencing engine failure, was towed by a North Korean patrol boat at 6:04 p.m., it said.
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North Korean TV aims to show dark side of South (Associated Press)
SEOUL – North Korean state TV has aired South Korean footage edited to highlight social and economic problems in the far richer South in a rare move apparently aimed at quashing rumors among the North's impoverished people that the rival country is better off.
Shabby houses in slum areas, the homeless and jobless, and citizens expressing grievances toward the government were shown in 10 minutes of footage broadcast Wednesday night and monitored by The Associated Press in Seoul. The clip was culled from South Korean TV programs and logos of southern networks like KBS and MBC were visible on screen.
"The South Korean economy is now miserably crumbling," said a North Korean narrator with gloomy music playing in the background. She accused the South's conservative, pro-U.S. President Lee Myung-bak of seeking "anti-people economic policies" and called him a "traitor."
"An absolute majority of South Korean people are living miserable lives," she said.
Lee is a routine target of North Korean condemnations. His hard-line policies on Pyongyang since taking office early last year — such as cutting off unconditional aid to the impoverished country — has angered the North, prompting it to suspend all reconciliation talks and key joint projects.
South Korea, which a half-century ago was one of the world's poorest countries, has steadily grown to become one of its most economically developed. It is home to international powerhouses such as Samsung Electronics and Hyundai Motor and is known for its advanced technology.
Still, development has bypassed some. Homeless people and beggars can be seen in the capital Seoul.
North Korea has relied on outside handouts to feed its hunger-stricken 24 million people since natural disasters and mismanagement devastated its economy in the 1990s. The totalitarian regime in Pyongyang strictly controls information on the outside world, while trying to strengthen the personality cult of authoritarian leader Kim Jong Il.
Still, word appears have spread among North Koreans that the South is much richer. Thousands of North Koreans defect to the South Korea each year, usually via China, to escape harsh conditions in their communist country.
A state-run South Korean think tank reported last week that South Korean movies and soap operas, smuggled from China, are increasingly popular among North Koreans despite threats of harsh punishment for viewing them.
Hong Hyun-ik, an analyst at another think thank, the Sejong Institute, said the footage aired Wednesday illustrates the North Korean regime's unease.
"I think the North aired the edited footage after struggling over how to control word that the South is richer than the North," he said. "By showing a reality, which is of course a distorted reality, I think the North's government is trying to tell its people that it's not hiding anything and they shouldn't believe rumors."
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