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N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-09-2009 01:00 AM
N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down
Published - Mar 08 2009 11:43PM EST
By JAE-SOON CHANG - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/03/08/7100021/192xX.jpg)
A U.S. military vehicle passes by South Korean protesters as they hold a rally denouncing a South Korea-U.S. joint military exercise in front of the South Korean and United States War Command Center, in Seongnam, South Korea, Monday, March 9, 2009. The joint drills across South Korea began as concerns mounted that Pyongyang could be gearing up to test-fire a long-range missile capable of reaching U.S. territory. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
North Korea ordered its armed forces on standby and warned Monday it will retaliate against anyone seeking to block its planned satellite launch, which many fear will disguise a missile test.
The threat was the North's latest attempt to escalate tensions on the divided peninsula and a strong sign that the communist nation intends to push ahead with the launch despite mounting international pressure to drop the plan. Analysts say Pyongyang is trying to grab President Barack Obama's attention as his administration formulates its North Korea policy.
Monday's warning came hours before United States and South Korea kicked off annual war games involving tens of thousands of troops, which the communist nation has condemned as preparations for an invasion.
The joint drills across South Korea began as concerns mounted that Pyongyang could be gearing up to test-fire a long-range missile capable of reaching U.S. territory. North Korea says it plans to launch a communications satellite, but neighboring governments believe it is a cover for a missile test.
Analysts have said a launch could come late this month or in early April when the North's new legislature, chosen in Sunday's election, is expected to convene its first meeting to confirm Kim Jong Il as leader.
U.S. and Japanese officials have suggested they could shoot down a North Korean missile if necessary.
"If the enemies recklessly opt for intercepting our satellite, our revolutionary armed forces will launch without hesitation a just retaliatory strike operation not only against all the interceptor means involved but against the strongholds" of the U.S., Japan and South Korea, the general staff of the North's military said in a statement.
"Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war," said the statement, carried by Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency.
The North's military ordered all personnel to "be fully combat ready" so that they could "deal merciless retaliatory blows" at the enemy, KCNA said in a separate dispatch.
North Korea also cut off a military hot line with the South during the 12-day exercises, leaving the sides without any means of communication, triggering fears that even an accidental skirmish could develop into a battle as the sides have no way of contacting each other.
The two sides have used the hot line to exchange information about the crossing of goods and people through the industrial North Korean border city of Kaesong. Its suspension halted traffic and strand about 570 South Koreans staying in the zone.
About 700 South Korean who had planned to enter Kaesong on Monday could not, the unification ministry said.
South Korea urged Pyongyang to restore the line immediately and stop raising tensions.
"As the government has made it clear many times, the joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises are annual defensive drills," said Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon. "The government again urges North Korea to stop acts that raise tensions."
Also in Seoul, the new U.S. special envoy on Pyongyang met with South Korean Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan and Defense Minister Lee Sang-hee on Monday to discuss the tensions. Stephen W. Bosworth is scheduled to hold a series of meetings with President Lee Myung-bak and other senior officials later in the day.
"I have no illusions about what I've agreed to try to deal with. It's a very difficult mandate," Bosworth told Yu.
The U.S. envoy has urged Pyongyang to refrain from firing a missile, stop threatening neighbors, and defuse tensions through dialogue. The envoy arrived in Seoul on Saturday as part of an Asian tour that has already taken him to China and Japan.
The United States and South Korea have conducted annual military exercises a few times a year for decades, and Pyongyang has routinely condemned them as rehearsals for invasion.
The North had stepped up its war rhetoric in the run-up to the drills that began Monday. It has threatened South Korean passenger planes flying near its airspace, claiming the maneuvers pose grave threats to its security.
Seoul and Washington have repeatedly said the drills, which involve its 26,000 military personnel in South Korea, an unspecified number of southern soldiers and a U.S. aircraft carrier, are purely defensive, and the allies do not have any intention of attacking the North.
Ties between the two Koreas have badly frayed since Lee took office last year, taking a tougher stance than his liberal predecessors on Pyongyang, and halting unconditional aid to the impoverished neighbor.
An angered North Korea suspended the reconciliation process and key joint cooperation projects with Seoul, while making a stream of belligerent threats against the South.
The two Koreas technically remain in a state of conflict as the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty. Hundreds of thousands of troops are amassed on each side of the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas, making the Korean border one of the world's most heavily armed.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9002/7099372/N_Korea_threatens_war_if_satellite_is_shot_down/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - icehole3 - 03-10-2009 05:42 AM
Where did you find this story because it'll never make the Clinton news networks? CNN (Clinton News Network) ABC (All Bout Clinton) NBC (Nobody But Clinton) CBS (Clinton Broadcasting System) WCET (Willie Clinton's Extreme Telecasts)
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-10-2009 08:51 AM
NKorea reopens border to stranded SKorean workers
Published - Mar 10 2009 07:28AM EST
By JEAN H. LEE - Associated Press Writer
North Korea allowed South Koreans across the border Tuesday to manage factories that are a key source of currency for the isolated nation, a day after severing all communication with its rival and barring all traffic through the heavily fortified zone.
Pyongyang on Monday cut off the only remaining military hot line between the two Koreas to protest joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises being held in the South at a time of heightened tensions on the peninsula.
The two Koreas are divided by the Demilitarized Zone, and the North banned most cross-border traffic in December amid deteriorating ties with Seoul's conservative government.
However, the regime had been allowing a skeleton staff of South Koreans into the northern city of Kaesong to run factories that produce everything from shoes to clocks using North Korean labor and are a lucrative source of cash for the impoverished country.
But with the hot line cut, border officials _ who rely on it to exchange details about goods and workers bound for the industrial park _ were forced to shut the frontier down completely on Monday.
That left hundreds of South Koreans stranded on both sides of the DMZ, including those who had planned to head back to the South after work and others seeking to get into the North, South Korean officials said.
North Korean officials agreed Tuesday to let them through, Unification Ministry officials said in Seoul. But with the hot line still severed, officials were forced to walk over to North Korea's border office next door with written requests for passage, the ministry said. More than 220 South Koreans crossed the border Tuesday, it said.
One South Korean said he wasn't too concerned about being able to return to the South _ but was worried he wouldn't have anything to eat.
"I had concerns whether I could have a meal because there's no gas in restaurants" in Kaesong, Kim Moo-ju told South Korean reporters after crossing the border Tuesday. "I bought instant noodles and drinks and brought them back to my dormitory."
Pyongyang said the hot line would remain suspended throughout the duration of the joint U.S.-South Korean military drills, set to last through March 20.
North Korea also put its 1.2 million troops on alert, state-run media said, warning that even the slightest provocation _ by land, air or sea _ could trigger war, and threatened South Korean passenger planes flying near its airspace during the military drills.
Washington, which has 28,500 military personnel in South Korea, says the drills are routine defense exercises.
The North also warned against attempts to interfere with its plan to send a satellite into space _ a launch that regional powers fear may be a cover for the test-fire of a long-range missile.
"Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war," North Korea's military said in a statement carried Monday by the official Korean Central News Agency.
South Korea's defense minister said the North has nothing to gain by raising the war rhetoric.
"The recent series of provocative and tension-raising rhetoric and acts are not only straining inter-Korean relations but also making it impossible to rule out the possibility of clashes in land, sea and air," Lee Sang-hee told graduates at a military academy in Seoul.
In Montreal, the U.N. aviation safety agency called on North Korea to retract the warning against South Korean passenger planes, calling it a "grave threat," South Korean officials said.
The International Civil Aviation Organization was expected to send a letter expressing its concerns to North Korea, South Korea's Foreign Ministry said Tuesday.
On Yeonpyeong, an island off the west coast just 7 miles (12 kilometers) from North Korean shores, residents tried not to think about the possibility of a naval skirmish in the surrounding waters.
"It does make me a bit nervous now that the tension with North Korea is rising," said Choi Ok-sun, 53, who has lived on the island for 26 years. "But we will continue our fishing and the rest as normal."
___
Associated Press writers Kwang-tae Kim in Seoul and Siyoung Lee on Yeonpyeong contributed to this report.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/6818193/7099372/NKorea_reopens_border_to_stranded_SKorean_workers/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-10-2009 10:35 PM
NKorea vows to protect itself amid US war games
Published - Mar 10 2009 09:28PM EST
By JAE-SOON CHANG - Associated Press Writer
North Korea vowed "every necessary measure" Wednesday to defend itself against what it calls U.S. threats, claiming American military exercises in South Korea are a preparation to invade the communist nation.
The statement by North Korea's Foreign Ministry, however, was far less harsh than rhetoric issued by the country's military in the run-up to the annual war games that started across the South on Monday. The military has threatened South Korean passenger planes and put its troops on standby for war.
"The war maneuvers are nuclear war exercises designed to mount a pre-emptive attack" on the North, the ministry said. "Exposed to the potential threat of the U.S. and its allied forces, (the North) will take every necessary measure to protect its sovereignty."
It did not specify what the measures would be.
North Korea has long claimed that annual exercises between the U.S. and the South are rehearsals for an invasion.
Seoul and Washington say the drills are purely defensive.
On Monday, the North cut off a military hot line with the South citing the drills, causing a complete shutdown of their border and stranding hundreds of South Koreans working in a joint industrial zone in the North. Pyongyang reopened the border Tuesday, but the hot line remains suspended.
Tensions on the divided peninsula have also been running high amid fears that Pyongyang might be trying to test-fire a long-range missile capable of reaching U.S. territory.
The North claims what it is trying to launch is a satellite as part of its peaceful space program, and vowed to retaliate against any one seeking to shoot it down.
In Washington, U.S. national intelligence director Dennis Blair said he believes the North is trying to launch a satellite, but said the technology is no different from that of a long-range missile and its success means the communist nation is capable of striking the mainland U.S.
"I tend to believe that the North Koreans announced that they would do a space launch and that's what they intend," U.S. national intelligence director Dennis Blair said before a senate panel Tuesday.
"If a three stage space launch vehicle works, then that could reach not only Alaska and Hawaii but part of what the Hawaiians call the mainland and what the Alaskans call the lower forty-eight," he said.
U.S., South Korean and Japanese officials have warned Pyongyang not to go ahead with any launch _ whether it's a satellite or a missile _ noting that missiles and satellites are the same in principle and differ only in payload.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9002/7099372/NKorea_vows_to_protect_itself_amid_US_war_games/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-11-2009 05:48 AM
NKorea accuses Obama's government of interference
Published - Mar 11 2009 05:22AM EST
By JAE-SOON CHANG - Associated Press Writer
North Korea accused President Barack Obama's government of meddling in its internal affairs Wednesday and vowed to take "every necessary measure" to defend itself against what it calls U.S. threats.
The statement by North Korea's Foreign Ministry, however, was far less harsh than rhetoric issued by the country's military during the run-up to joint U.S.-South Korean war games that started across the South on Monday. The North's military has threatened South Korean passenger planes and put its troops on standby.
Still, the Foreign Ministry's statement was significant in that it was the agency's first on the U.S. since Obama's inauguration, an analyst said.
"The Foreign Ministry is Washington's direct negotiating partner and has not engaged in criticizing the U.S. so far," said Kim Yong-hyun, a professor at Seoul's Dongguk University. "This means they have started expressing pent-up complaints."
However, the ministry's less strident tone than other agencies reflects Pyongyang's willingness for negotiation, Kim said.
"The new administration of the U.S. is now working hard to infringe upon the sovereignty" of North Korea "by force of arms," the statement said. It accused Obama's government of "letting loose a whole string of words and deeds little short of getting on the nerves of the (North) and seriously interfering in its internal affairs."
The statement did not elaborate on the alleged meddling, but Pyongyang has rejected demands from the U.S. and neighboring governments that it drop a missile launch plan, claiming it has the right to send off a satellite as part of its space program.
The North may also have been referring to comments by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton last month over a potential power struggle to replace North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, who is believed to have suffered a stroke last year.
The North's statement also called the annual military drills in South Korea "war exercises designed to mount a pre-emptive attack" on the North. It said the country "will take every necessary measure to protect its sovereignty." It did not specify what the measures would be.
North Korea has long claimed that annual exercises are rehearsals for an invasion. Seoul and Washington say the drills are purely defensive.
The 12-day maneuvers, involving 26,000 U.S. troops and an unspecified number of South Korean soldiers, include live-fire drills. The aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis arrived Wednesday at a naval base in the southern port city of Busan for the exercises.
Tensions on the divided peninsula have also been running high amid fears that Pyongyang might be trying to test-fire a long-range missile capable of reaching U.S. territory.
The North claims what it is trying to launch is a satellite as part of its peaceful space program, and vowed to retaliate against any one seeking to shoot it down.
In Washington, U.S. national intelligence director Dennis Blair said he believes the North is planning a space launch, but said the technology is no different from that of a long-range missile and its success would mean the communist nation is capable of striking the mainland U.S.
"I tend to believe that the North Koreans announced that they would do a space launch and that's what they intend," U.S. national intelligence director Dennis Blair said before a senate panel Tuesday.
"If a three stage space launch vehicle works, then that could reach not only Alaska and Hawaii but part of what the Hawaiians call the mainland and what the Alaskans call the lower forty-eight," he said.
An official at Seoul's presidential Blue House said it is too early to determine whether North Korea is trying to launch a satellite or a missile. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity citing the issue's sensitivity, did not elaborate.
U.S., South Korean and Japanese officials have warned Pyongyang not to launch either a satellite or missile _ noting that both are the same in principle and differ only in payload.
North Korea is banned from any ballistic missile activity under a U.N. Security Council resolution adopted after the country's first-ever nuclear test blast in 2006.
Seoul's Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan renewed the warning that any launch would violate the U.N. resolution. "It's not that a satellite is OK and a missile is not," Yu told reporters.
___
Associated Press photographer Ahn Young-joon contributed to this report from Busan, South Korea.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9002/7099372/NKorea_accuses_Obamas_government_of_interference/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-13-2009 09:35 AM
Japan protests NKorea's rocket launch plan
Published - Mar 13 2009 06:50AM EST
By JAE-SOON CHANG - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/03/13/7138641/192xX.jpg)
Map shows areas given by North Korea as "danger" zones where parts of its rocket would fall 2c x 2 7/8 inches; 96.3 mm x 73 mm;
Japan strongly protested North Korea's planned rocket launch, warning Friday it could shoot it down after the North said it would fly over Japan and designated a "danger" zone off the country's coast.
North Korea has given U.N. agencies coordinates forming two zones where parts of the multiple-stage rocket would fall, unveiling its plan to fire the projectile over Japan toward the Pacific Ocean sometime between April 4 and 8.
One of the "danger" zones where the rocket's first stage is expected to fall is in waters less than 75 miles (120 kilometers) from Japan's northwestern shore, according to coordinates released Thursday by the International Civil Aviation Organization and the International Maritime Organization.
The other zone lies in the middle of the Pacific between Japan and Hawaii.
In Tokyo, Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura told North Korea to abandon the launch and said Japan was ready to defend itself.
"Legally speaking, if this object falls toward Japan, we can shoot it down for safety reasons," he said.
Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada said Japan would "deal with anything that is flying toward us. We are preparing for any kind of emergency."
Japan's prime minister expressed anger.
"They can call it a satellite or whatever, but it would be a violation" of a 2006 U.N. Security Council resolution banning Pyongyang from ballistic missile activity, Taro Aso said. "We protest a launch and strongly demand it be canceled."
Japan's coast guard and Transport Ministry issued maritime and aviation warnings, urging ships and aircraft to stay away from the affected regions.
Hisanori Iizuka, a spokesman for Japan Airlines Corp., Asia's biggest carrier, said the airline will reroute some flights during the April 4-8 period.
"We will take every measure to ensure safety for our passengers," Iizuka said.
South Korea also warned the North.
"If North Korea carries out the launch, we believe there will be discussions and countermeasures from the Security Council," a Foreign Ministry statement said, referring to possible sanctions.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Thursday a North Korean satellite or missile launch would "threaten the peace and stability in the region."
Though it is an international norm for countries to provide such specifics as a safety warning ahead of a missile or satellite launch, it was the first time the communist North has done so. It did not issue a warning ahead of its purported satellite launch in 1998 over Japan and a failed 2006 test-flight of a long-range missile.
The North's notification to the ICAO and IMO underscores that it is intent on pushing ahead with the launch in an attempt to gain greater leverage in negotiations with the United States, analysts say.
"They want to do the launch openly while minimizing what the international community may find fault with," said Kim Yong-hyun, a professor at Seoul's Dongguk University. "The launch will earn North Korea a key political asset that would enlarge its negotiating leverage."
U.S. State Department spokesman Robert Wood called the North's plan "provocative."
"We think the North needs to desist, or not carry out this type of provocative act, and sit down ... and work on the process of denuclearization of the Korean peninsula," Wood said.
Analysts, including Kim, say a rocket launch would raise the stakes as well as the benefits the impoverished nation might get from negotiations with the U.S. and other countries trying to persuade it to give up its nuclear weapons program. The North has repeatedly used brinksmanship in the past as a negotiating tool to gain concessions and aid.
Separately, North Korea on Friday barred overland border crossings for the second time this week, leaving hundreds of South Koreans working at a joint industrial complex in the North stranded on both sides of the border.
About 250 people, who are mostly South Koreans but also include an Australian and two Chinese, had planned to return Friday to the South from the complex in the North Korean border town of Kaesong, South Korea's Unification Ministry said, adding that some 610 people were unable to cross the border to the complex.
"Our government expresses our deep regret over the fact that this kind of situation has been repeated," Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon told reporters.
Kim called the border closing an act "tarnishing" trust between the two Koreas and creating "an obstacle" against the complex's expansion.
It was unclear why the North refused permission for the border crossings. The North closed the border on Monday after cutting off the only remaining hot line with the South to protest its ongoing military drills with the U.S. The North calls the exercises a rehearsal for an invasion.
___
Associated Press writers Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul and Mari Yamaguchi and Shino Yuasa in Tokyo contributed to this report.
(This version CORRECTS number of people unable to return to South Korea from joint complex in graf 23 to 250 instead of 560)
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-13-2009 03:30 PM
U.S. Intel Chief Says N.Korea Launching 'Space Vehicle'
The director of U.S. National Intelligence on Tuesday confirmed that North Korea appears to be preparing to launch a "space launch vehicle."
"The North Koreans announced that they were going to do a space launch and I believe that that’s what they intend," Dennis Blair said in a hearing in the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee. "There's a space launch vehicle that North Korea launches, the technology is indistinguishable from intercontinental ballistic missiles. And if a three-stage space launch vehicle works, then that could reach not only Alaska, Hawaii but also part of what the Hawaiians call 'the Mainland' and what the Alaskans call 'the Lower 48.'"
It is the first time a senior U.S. official made a public statement about North Korea's concrete preparations. If Blair's opinion becomes the official U.S. position, it seems to accept North Korea's claim that it is to launch a satellite, not a missile, and the controversy surrounding a possible missile launch is likely to die down. If the intelligence agency has concluded that North Korea is preparing to launch a satellite, the chances that the U.S. will shoot it down are slim.
But Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, the director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, in a written report to the hearing said additional missile launches or nuclear experiment could be included in the North Korean scenario.
Maples said North Korea may have a number of nuclear weapons made of plutonium from its main facility at Yongbyon, and it seems that Pyongyang at least sought a uranium enrichment program to produce nuclear weapons in the past.
North Korea expanded and developed technologies related to producing nuclear weapons, and it may have succeeded in making nuclear warheads for ballistic missiles, Maples added.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200903/200903120009.html
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-13-2009 03:33 PM
U.S. Options for Intercepting N.Korean Missile
North Korea's official announcement on Tuesday that it would launch a satellite, not a missile, could affect the response of the U.S., which has warned it could intercept any missile that was fired at the American mainland.
While few believe the satellite claim, the announcement means the projectile can only be intercepted if positively identified as a missile to avoid charges of violating North Korea's sovereignty.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Feb. 10 said that his government could intercept a long-range missile aimed at the American mainland. Both Seoul and Washington believe the projectile to be tested is a Taepodong-2 missile, whose maximum range of 6,700 km would make it capable of reaching Alaska, in which case the U.S. would intercept it.
In the vertical climbing stage after launch, Aegis ships in the East Sea or waters near Japan could intercept the missile with SM-3 missiles. In the second stage, when the missile leaves the atmosphere, the U.S. would launch ground-based interceptor missiles from Fort Greeley in Alaska. Or when it approaches Alaska, Aegis ships deployed in nearby waters could fire SM-3s.
Experts speculate that the first is least likely since it will take time to identify the projectile.
To avoid provoking a war, experts speculate that the North will probably make sure the missile flies only 3,000-4,000 km and drops into the high seas of the North Pacific, which would the warhead will likely drop into an area outside the range of the U.S.' GBI or SM-3 missiles.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200902/200902260008.html
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-13-2009 03:42 PM
N.Korea Slams 'Meddling' U.S.
North Korea has expressed dissatisfaction with the Obama administration, saying Wednesday that the new U.S. government made a series of statements that infringe on its sovereignty. The North is apparently peeved at a recent remark by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on insecurity surrounding the succession to North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.
"The new administration in the U.S. is working hard to infringe on the sovereignty of [North Korea] by force of arms in collusion with the bellicose South Korean puppet forces," the official (North) Korean Central News Agency quoted a North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying in what was billed as an interview Wednesday.
North Korea, "exposed to the potential threat of the U.S. and its allied forces, will take every necessary measure to protect its sovereignty," the unnamed spokesman added.
Since the inauguration of the conservative Lee Myung-bak administration in the South, the North has all but severed ties with its neighbor and in recent weeks it has increasingly stepped up rhetoric against the United States as joint military exercises between the allies approached.
The spokesman said the North will take "all necessary measures" to protect its sovereignty against the threat posed by the South Korea-U.S. drill, which ends on March 20. A South Korean government official said the fact that the remarks came not from an official statement but from an informal interview suggests that North Korea is treading with caution.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200903/200903120010.html
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-16-2009 11:10 AM
NKorea's border closures threaten joint factories
Published - Mar 16 2009 09:33AM EST
By KWANG-TAE KIM - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/03/15/7158382/192xX.jpg)
South Korean workers wait to go to North Korea's border city of Kaesong at the Inter-Korean Transit Office in Paju, South Korea, Monday, March 16, 2009. North Korea said Monday it would reopen the border to let South Koreans trapped in the North for three days to return home, an official said. (AP Photoi/Newsis, Park Jong-min)
South Korean firms began suspending operations Monday at factories in North Korea as Pyongyang blocked trucks hauling raw materials to their joint industrial zone, undermining a key reconciliation project between the sides.
At least 10 firms have halted operations in the wake of two recent border shutdowns by the North, and many more will be forced to suspend production within a week if the restrictions aren't eased, the business association for South Korean factories the northern border town of Kaesong said.
North Korea has provided no official explanation for the closures, but Pyongyang has been engaged in a war of words with South Korea since conservative President Lee Myung-bak took office a year ago vowing to hold the North accountable for its disarmament pledges.
South Korea warned Monday that the North would be held accountable for any economic losses to the joint economic zone once hailed as a shining example of reconciliation between the two wartime rivals.
"North Korea's delay and blockade of passage is very regretful," Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon said in a strong statement. "We make it clear all responsibilities for this incident, including breaks in production and economic losses, lie with North Korea."
Dozens of factories in Kaesong rely on cargo and managerial know-how from the South and cheap labor from the North to produce everything from watches and shoes to kitchenware and electronic goods.
After shutting down the border Friday and stranding more than 700 South Koreans in the north all weekend, North Korea allowed them to return home Monday, Unification Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said.
But authorities refused to open the border the other direction, leaving factories understaffed and short on goods.
The two Koreas technically remain at war because their three-year conflict ended in 1953 with an armistice, not a peace treaty. The Demilitarized Zone dividing the foes is one of the world's most heavily armed.
Relations improved under two liberal presidents in Seoul but have deteriorated since Lee stopped the flow of unconditional aid to the impoverished North. Most of the landmark, joint inter-Korean projects created during an earlier bloom in relations have been suspended since Pyongyang severely restricted border traffic in December.
Tensions have further intensified in recent weeks with the North announcing it will send a satellite into space _ a launch some fear will be a cover for testing its long-range missile technology.
A skeleton staff of South Koreans has been allowed to cross the border to run the last joint project remaining: more than 100 Kaesong factories employing some 38,0000 North Koreans. The firms give North Korean authorities about $70-$75 cash per worker each month, providing the regime with much-needed hard currency, according to the Unification Ministry.
Pyongyang last week cut off the only communications hot line left between the two Koreas and shut down the border for a day to protest joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises taking place across the South. Hundreds were stuck in Kaesong when North Korean officials shut the crossing again Friday.
The North agreed to let some 450 South Koreans return home Monday but refused permission to 650 others in the south seeking to get to jobs in Kaesong, Unification Ministry officials said. With the prospect of severe short-staffing Tuesday, many chose to remain in Kaesong another night, with fewer than 300 returning to the south, the ministry said.
One South Korean working at footwear maker Samduk Stafild said by telephone from Kaesong that his factory is struggling from a lack of raw materials. He asked not to be named, saying he was not authorized to speak to the media.
North Korea is using Kaesong to pressure Seoul into softening its hard-line policy toward Pyongyang, analyst Paik Hak-soon said.
"The North hopes South Korea will switch back to a policy of reconciliation and cooperation" to prevent a complete shutdown of Kaesong, the North Korea expert at the private Sejong Institute said Monday.
President Lee has refused to ply the North with aid until Pyongyang abides by its commitment to dismantle its nuclear program. The North agreed in 2007 to disarm in exchange for aid.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9009/7153023/NKoreas_border_closures_threaten_joint_factories/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-17-2009 07:58 AM
NKorea fully reopens border crossing
Published - Mar 17 2009 07:22AM EST
By JEAN H. LEE - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/03/16/7159251/192xX.jpg)
South Korean vehicles arrive at the Inter-Korean Transit Office in Paju, South Korea, near North Korea's border city of Kaesong, on Monday, March 16, 2009. Three days after shutting down the border, North Korea agreed to partially reopen the crossing Monday to let South Koreans stranded in a northern industrial zone head home, Seoul officials said. (AP Photo/ Lee Jin-man)
North Korea fully reopened its border Tuesday to South Koreans commuting to jobs at factories in a northern economic zone after four days of restrictions, South Korean officials said.
The crossing was closed twice in a week, stranding hundreds of South Koreans who work in Kaesong and keeping new deliveries of raw materials from factories in the industrial complex for days.
After partially opening the border Monday, the North Korean military relayed a letter Tuesday saying it would fully reopen the crossing to Kaesong workers, Unification Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said in Seoul.
About 280 South Koreans crossed into Kaesong while 200 others returned home, and some 100 others chose to spend the night in the enclave, the ministry said.
North Korea has provided no explanation for the closures, which have unnerved business owners who rely on South Korean managers and raw materials for factories that employ some 38,000 North Korean workers just across the border.
But Pyongyang has been critical of Seoul's decision to hold 12 days of joint military exercises with the U.S. at a time of heightened tension on the peninsula. As the drills got under way last Monday, the North's military severed the only communications hot line between the Koreas and banned traffic across the border.
Relations between the two Koreas have steadily deteriorated since President Lee Myung-bak took office a year ago with a new, tough policy on Pyongyang. One by one, joint projects developed during the previous era of warming ties have been suspended.
The Kaesong complex _ the most prominent of the landmark inter-Korean projects and a lucrative source of hard currency for the impoverished North _ has been allowed to operate with a skeleton South Korean staff.
But the closures forced at least 10 companies halted operations, and many more warned they would be forced to close within days if the border restrictions were not eased, a Kaesong business association, the Corporate Council for the Gaesong Industrial Complex, said Monday.
North Korea is also locked in a standoff with the international community over its nuclear weapons program and its plans to launch a satellite into space next month. Some fear the launch will be a cover for testing long-range missile technology.
Regional powers have urged Pyongyang to refrain from carrying out any launch, noting that the launch would violate a U.N. Security Council resolution prohibiting the North from ballistic activity.
North Korea also recently began slowing work on disabling its nuclear facilities in an apparent protest of a delay in shipment of energy aid under an international deal, a South Korean Foreign Ministry official said Tuesday.
North Korea had been removing 15 spent fuel rods from its main nuclear complex at Yongbyon each day but recently dropped to 15 each week, said a South Korean Foreign Ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, citing department policy.
Under a 2007 deal, North Korea agreed to disable the complex as a step toward its ultimate dismantlement in return for 1 million tons of fuel oil and other concessions from the U.S., South Korea, China, Russia and Japan.
More than 70 percent of the promised energy aid has been provided, but Pyongyang has complained the pace of energy shipments does not match that of its disabling work.
Meanwhile, near the border, South Korean activists and defectors from the North released 10 balloons filled with leaflets that urged North Koreans to rise up against autocratic leader Kim Jong Il and contained a taboo subject: Kim's many alleged romantic relationships.
Their campaign is a major source of irritation to North Korea, which sees the leaflets as a violation of a 2004 inter-Korean agreement to end decades of propaganda warfare. Seoul says it cannot stop them, citing freedom of speech, but repeatedly has urged the campaigners to refrain from provoking the North.
The two Koreas technically remain at war because their three-year conflict ended in 1953 with an armistice, not a peace treaty. The Demilitarized Zone dividing the foes is one of the world's most heavily armed.
___
Associated Press writers Kwang-tae Kim and Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul and Jin-man Lee in Imjingak contributed to this report.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9009/7153023/NKorea_fully_reopens_border_crossing/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-17-2009 11:20 PM
Seoul rules out closing economic zone in North
Published - Mar 17 2009 10:34PM EST
By KWANG-TAE KIM - Associated Press Writer
Closing a lucrative, symbolic joint economic enclave in North Korea is not an option despite Pyongyang's recent moves to shut down the border, South Korea's top Cabinet minister on North Korea said Wednesday.
The North Korean military severed the only communications hot line between the two Koreas and repeatedly has restricted workers and cargo from passing through the border to protest South Korean-U.S. military drills that began March 9 and will continue across the South through Friday.
North Korean officials fully opened the border Tuesday after four days of restrictions and was allowing workers passage Wednesday, South Korean officials said.
But the arbitrary border shutdowns have raised concerns about the future of the industrial complex in the North Korean border city of Kaesong, a joint venture considered a shining example of inter-Korean cooperation after decades of animosity and a lucrative source of hard currency for the communist regime.
"We are not considering shutting down" the Kaesong complex, Unification Minister Hyun In-taek told reporters.
Hyun warned the North against closing the border again after the military exercises end, saying Seoul would "take necessary steps" if people and cargo were blocked. He declined to elaborate.
Relations between the two Koreas have steadily deteriorated since President Lee Myung-bak took office a year ago with a new, tough policy on Pyongyang. One by one, joint projects developed during the previous era of warming ties have been suspended.
The Kaesong complex, the most prominent of the landmark inter-Korean projects, has been allowed to operate with a skeleton South Korean staff that must seek permission from North Korean authorities before crossing the border for the zone.
South Korean firms that run some 100 factories rely on trucking in raw materials to produce the watches, shoes, kitchenware and electronic parts produced in the industrial complex.
Hyun renewed Seoul's commitment to developing the inter-Korean project and cautioned Pyongyang against closing it, warning that the impoverished North would suffer huge economic losses if the factories cease to operate.
Last year, South Korean firms gave North Korean authorities $26.8 million in wages for some 38,000 North Korean employees, according to the Unification Ministry.
North Korea also is locked in a standoff with the international community over its nuclear weapons program and its plans to launch a satellite into space next month. Some fear the launch will be a cover for testing long-range missile technology.
Regional powers have urged Pyongyang to refrain from carrying out any launch, noting it would violate a U.N. Security Council resolution and could draw further sanctions.
North Korea also said it would no longer accept U.S. food assistance and informed five groups distributing food aid that they must leave the country, U.S. officials said Tuesday.
The North gave no reason for refusing to accept U.S. food aid, State Department spokesman Robert Wood said in Washington, calling the rejection worrisome to aid workers and U.S. officials.
North Korea faces chronic food shortages and has relied on outside aid to help feed its 24 million people since famine reportedly killed as many as 2 million in the 1990s, a result of natural disasters and mismanagement.
___
Associated Press writer Foster Klug contributed to this report from Washington.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9009/7153023/Seoul_rules_out_closing_economic_zone_in_North/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-18-2009 11:14 AM
Millions Hungry, But North Korea Tells U.S. to Stop Sending Food
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
By Patrick Goodenough, International Editor
![[Image: 45219.jpg]](http://media.eyeblast.org/resources/45219.jpg)
Sacks of U.S. wheat are offloaded in the port of Nampo, North Korea in this June 29, 2008 file photo released by the World Food Program. (AP Photo/World Food Program)(CNSNews.com) – North Korea has told the U.S. to stop providing food aid, the State Department confirmed Tuesday, one day after a bleak new United Nations report described conditions in the country as “dire and desperate.”
The U.S. last May pledged 500,000 tons of food over a 12-month period and has delivered 169,000 tons of it to date, in seven shipments up until the end of January.
But Washington has now been told North Korea does not want any more, State Department spokesman Robert Wood said.
Pyongyang’s decision comes at a time of fresh tensions in the region. The six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs are stalled, and its plans to place a satellite in orbit early next month have prompted international concerns that it really intends to test an intercontinental ballistic missile.
North Korea also has charged that joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises currently underway are preparations for an invasion, and has responded by shutting off inter-Korean communications channels.
![[Image: 45220.jpg]](http://media.eyeblast.org/resources/45220.jpg)
South Korean unification minister Hyun In-taek speaks at a meeting with the media in Seoul, South Korea, on Wednesday, March 18, 2009. (AP Photo)South Korea’s unification minister, Hyun In-taek, told reporters in Seoul that the North’s rejection of food aid could be its response to international criticism about the planned rocket launch.
Wood said the North Koreans had not given a reason for a decision, but pointed out that the food aid was unrelated to efforts to resolve the nuclear standoff.
“This humanitarian assistance that we provide to the North has nothing to do with the six-party talks,” he said. “This is about our true humanitarian concern for these people.”
Wood said the most recent U.S. food shipment had arrived in late January and was being distributed by U.S. non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Those NGOs have now been ordered to leave North Korea by the end of March, according to one of the agencies, Mercy Corps.
The U.N. World Food Program (WFP), also involved in distributing U.S. aid, reported last week that North Korea will soon enter its “lean season,” a critical period when food stocks from last year’s harvest run low.
In Geneva on Monday, a U.N. “special rapporteur” for North Korea, Vitit Muntarbhorn, presented a report saying that around 8.7 million North Koreans – more than one-third of the population – were affected by food insecurity and needed help. Of those, however, only 1.8 million people were getting it.
![[Image: 45221.jpg]](http://media.eyeblast.org/resources/45221.jpg)
In this April 2000 World Food Program file photo, North Korean children at a Pyongyang nursery eat a lunch consisting of locally produced seaweed soup, Canadian herrings and bread made from U.S. wheat supplied through the WFP. (AP Photo/World Food Program)Muntarbhorn said the communist regime had long used food rations as a means to impose control over citizens.
He urged it to cooperate constructively with U.N. and other humanitarian agencies to ensure the effective provision of food and other basic necessities. And he said the international community should “take more proactive measures … to impel more protection for the inhabitants.”
The report was presented at a session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, where democracies’ representatives voiced concern about the situation while others, including delegates for Syria, China, Russia and Laos, suggested the investigation into North Korea was “selective” and based on political considerations.
Responding to the report, North Korean representative Sang Il Hun called it a product of U.S. hostility towards Pyongyang and European politicization of human rights.
The North Korean government, he said, had its own “true” and “superior” human rights system in place and would continue to develop it further.
A WFP-UNICEF survey in 2005 found that at least 37 percent of North Korean children were chronically malnourished and one-third of mothers were malnourished and suffered from anemia – key factors contributing to child malnutrition.
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/Content/Article.aspx?rsrcid=45217
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-18-2009 11:40 PM
Reports: NKorea military detains US journalists
Published - Mar 18 2009 11:27PM EST
North Korean guards detained an American journalist near the country's western border with China, a newspaper report said Thursday. However, another report said two U.S. reporters were taken into custody in the far northeast while trying to shoot footage of the communist country.
The Munwha Ilbo newspaper in Seoul said North Korean soldiers detained a female reporter Tuesday in the border region along the Yalu River dividing China and North Korea. The report cited unnamed diplomatic sources in Seoul.
The paper identified her as a reporter named "Ming" working for a U.S. television station.
The South Korean network YTN later reported that two journalists, both Korean Americans, were arrested in Chinese territory near the Tumen River, some 500 miles (700 kilometers) to the northeast. The network did not cite its source.
YTN said North Korean guards ordered the women to stop shooting footage of the country from China, and then crossed into China to arrest them when they continued to film. Both were working for online media, and one was identifed as a Californian with the surname Park.
The U.S. Embassy in Seoul and the South Korean Foreign Ministry said they had no information about the reported incident.
Both the Tumen and Yalu rivers are frequent crossing points for North Koreans seeking to defect to China.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/1104/7184954/Reports_NKorea_military_detains_US_journalists/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-20-2009 02:41 PM
U.S. Journalists Held by North Korea at Sensitive Time
Friday, March 20, 2009
By Patrick Goodenough, International Editor
![[Image: 45395.jpg]](http://media.eyeblast.org/resources/45395.jpg)
In this Oct. 12, 2006 file photo, a North Korean soldier reacts to a photographer on a passing boat on the Yalu river along the North Korean-China border. (AP Photo)
(CNSNews.com) – The reported detention of two American journalists by North Korean security officials comes at a time of heightened tensions in the region, raising concerns that Pyongyang may use them as bargaining chips in its attempts to win concessions from the U.S.
Pyongyang’s rhetoric towards the U.S. and South Korea has grown increasingly antagonistic in recent weeks, angered by joint military exercise between the two allies and by international opposition to its rocket launch plans for early next month.
North Korea says it will put a satellite into orbit; the U.S. suspects it will test an advanced ballistic missile – one which U.S. Forces Korea head Gen. Walter Sharp told a Senate hearing Thursday was “capable of striking Okinawa, Guam and Alaska.”
Both the U.S. and Japan militaries have warned that they will intercept the rocket if threatened. North Korea says any interception will be tantamount to a declaration of war.
In other actions showing its displeasure it has cut inter-Korean communication links, closed the access route to a joint North-South industrial complex several miles north of the demilitarized zone (DMZ) – effectively holding hundreds of South Korean workers hostage there – and told the U.S. to stop providing food aid, despite severe food shortages. Multilateral efforts aimed at resolving a long running dispute over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programs remain stalled.
The reported detention of two U.S. journalists and their guide as they filmed along the North Korea-China border has added a new element to an already tense situation as the Obama administration mulls how to deal with the reclusive Stalinist regime.
The two women have been identified in South Korean news reports as Euna Lee and Laura Ling, staffers with the San Francisco-based Current TV, an online video news service set up by Al Gore.
Their exact whereabouts when arrested are unclear. Some reports say they were on Chinese soil, filming across the Tumen River which separates China from north-east North Korea. Others suggest they had strayed into North Korean territory.
State Department spokesman Robert Wood said the U.S. was trying to obtain more details about the case, and would do so through the Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang. In the absence of diplomatic relations, Sweden looks after U.S. consular interests in North Korea.
“When you have, you know, two American citizens who are being held against their will, we want to try to find out all the facts and try to … gain their release,” he told a press briefing.
![[Image: 45396.jpg]](http://media.eyeblast.org/resources/45396.jpg)
In this Oct. 9, 2006 file photo, two North Korean soldiers patrol on the Yalu river along the North Korean-China border. (AP Photo)
It is believed to be the first time North Korea has held foreign journalists. In 1994 North Korean forces downed a U.S. helicopter which the Pentagon said had strayed by error across the DMZ during a routine training mission. One pilot was killed and another held for 13 days. Two years later, an American man was held for three months, accused of espionage, after he had swum across another border river, the Yalu.
The incidents required direct intervention to secure the release of the Americans, in both cases undertaken at President Clinton’s request by New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, then a congressman.
A conservative South Korean daily, Chosun Ilbo, said Friday the latest incident may lead to the first direct negotiations between North Korea and the Obama administration. If so, it could be an opportunity for Pyongyang to abandon the hard line stance it has adopted in recent months.
On the other hand, the paper said, “if it holds them for a long time, resorting to their ridiculous tactic of accusing them of being ‘spies,’ the only result would be an increase in negative sentiment toward the North among the American public.”
Refugees, abductions
The Tumen and Yalu rivers, both of which lie along the 880 mile-long border with China, are common crossing points for North Koreans who flee their impoverished homeland, often hoping eventually to reach South Korea, Japan or other countries.
As China refuses to recognize them as refugees requiring protection under U.N. conventions, human rights advocates say the North Koreans risk forced repatriation and, on their return, face imprisonment in labor camps or even execution.
According to a South Korean missionary organization which works with North Korean refugees, the detained journalists were aiming to interview refugees who were hiding in China.
In 2000, a South Korean pastor who was helping North Korean refugees inside China disappeared in the border area. A South Korean court later established that Kim Dong-Shik, a permanent resident of the U.S., had been abducted by North Korean agents inside China. He is believed to have died while incarcerated inside North Korea.
Kim was a resident of Illinois, and in 2005, then Illinois Sen. Barack Obama joined most of his state’s congressional colleagues in signing a letter to the North Korean mission to the U.N., demanding a full accounting of Kim’s fate before they would support North Korea’s removal from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Last year, when the Bush administration was mulling removing North Korea from the list, Obama – then campaigning for president – came under fire from North Korean human rights advocates when he appeared to back away from that 2005 ultimatum, by dropping news on Kim’s fate as a condition for supporting the delisting move.
When President Bush in October announced his eventual decision to remove North Korea from the list, Obama in a statement called the step “appropriate.”
“Looking ahead,” he said, “North Korea must also resolve all questions about the abduction of Japanese and South Korean citizens, and of the Reverend Kim Dong-Shik. I urge the Bush administration to continue to use our diplomatic and economic leverage to press North Korea to cooperate fully with Tokyo, Seoul and Washington on these matters.”
http://www.cnsnews.com:80/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=45393
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-21-2009 12:50 PM
EDIT: Yet it is OK for illegal aliens to cross US borders and we should welcome them with open arms?
NKorea: 2 US reporters held for crossing border
Published - Mar 21 2009 11:27AM EST
By KWANG-TAE KIM - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/03/19/7186984/192xX.jpg)
These undated photo show two American journalists Laura Ling, rigtht, and Euna Lee. Ling and Lee were detained by North Korean soldiers while on a reporting trip earlier in the week near the country's border with China, South Korean news reports said Thursday, March 19, 2009. (AP Photo/Yonhap)
North Korea confirmed Saturday that it has detained two American journalists and accused them of illegally entering its territory from China.
Authorities are investigating the two women, who were seized Tuesday, the official Korean Central News Agency said in a brief report that gave no other details. The journalists' cameraman and guide reportedly escaped but were later detained by Chinese border guards.
The arrests of the journalists, who were reporting on North Korean refugees, complicate already difficult ties between the North and the United States. North Korea has repeatedly blasted joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises, severing a hot line and shutting its border with South Korea in recent days to protest the drills. It restored the telephone link, the only one between the rivals, on Saturday.
U.S. officials, meanwhile, have criticized North Korean plans to fire a satellite-equipped rocket into space in early April, a launch some fear will be a cover for testing long-range missile technology. North Korea said Saturday that it plans to close two air routes through its territory from April 4 to 8 _ the period it has set for the launch.
The North also is locked in a standoff with regional powers over its nuclear program, and earlier this week ordered five U.S. groups that distribute much-needed food aid to leave the impoverished country by the end of March.
KCNA said the two Americans were detained "while illegally intruding into the territory" of North Korea.
South Korean media and a South Korean missionary identified the two Americans as Laura Ling and Euna Lee, reporters for former Vice President Al Gore's San Francisco-based media outlet Current TV.
Kalee Kreider, a spokeswoman for Gore, declined to comment Saturday about the journalists' detention or efforts to win their release.
State Department officials said Washington is in contact with North Korea about the detentions and that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was working on the case.
The U.S. has informed the North that it is willing to hold a high-level meeting to push for a quick release of the reporters, South Korea's Munhwa Ilbo newspaper reported Saturday, citing an unnamed South Korean government official.
State Department spokesman Robert A. Wood had no immediate comment Saturday on that report.
The two journalists, along with their male cameraman and a guide, were headed to the Chinese city of Yanji, across the border from North Korea's far northeastern corner, where they planned to interview women forced by human traffickers to strip for online customers, according to the Rev. Chun Ki-won of the Seoul-based Durihana Mission, a Christian group that helps defectors.
They also planned to meet with children of defectors, said Chun, who helped the journalists organize the trip. Many children who grow up on the run in China live in legal limbo, unable even to attend school, according to a 2008 Human Rights Watch report.
The journalists and cameraman Mitch Koss were following their guide across the frozen Tumen River early Tuesday morning when North Korean soldiers armed with rifles approached them from a half-hidden guard post, the South Korean Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported Saturday. It cited activists working with North Korean refugees in China and other unidentified sources.
Koss and the guide pushed the North Korean soldiers away and ran back toward China, but Ling and Lee were caught, the newspaper said, citing an unidentified source.
Koss and the guide were later seized by Chinese border guards and sent to the Chinese Public Security Bureau, the newspaper said. Their whereabouts remain unclear.
The North Korean-Chinese border is long, porous and not well demarcated and thus a common route for escape from the North.
A growing number of North Koreans have sneaked into China to avoid political repression, chronic food shortages and to seek asylum, mostly in South Korea, according to North Korean defectors in South Korea and activists.
Past detentions by North Korea have required international intervention. In 1996, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, then a congressman, went to North Korea to help secure the release of an American detained for three months on spying charges. In 1994, he helped arrange the freedom of a U.S. soldier whose helicopter had strayed into North Korea.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9002/7186670/NKorea_2_US_reporters_held_for_crossing_border/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-21-2009 12:56 PM
N.Korea Must Free U.S. Reporters Now
Two U.S. journalists, working for the news website Current TV, were arrested into custody by North Korean soldiers on Tuesday while working on a story about North Korean refugees along the Tumen or Duman River, which runs along the border between North Korea and China. The two have been out of contact for three days.
One of them is a Korean-American and the other a Chinese-American, and it is unclear in what circumstances they were taken by North Korean soldiers. Seoul and Washington believe North Korean authorities have detained the two.
Current TV is a website created by former U.S. vice president Al Gore in 2005 and has covered the world’s trouble spots and other dangerous areas.
Since 1990, there have been a few incidents where U.S. citizens were detained for a prolonged period of time after accidentally crossing over the North Korean border. In December 1994, chief warrant officer Bobby Hall, whose Army helicopter was shot down after accidentally straying into North Korea, was released by North Korean authorities after 13 days in captivity. In August 1996, Evan Hunziker, whose mother was South Korean and father American, was detained by North Korean authorities for almost three months after he swam across the Yalu River into the communist country.
In both cases, then House representative and incumbent New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson won the release of the Americans following long negotiations with North Korean officials. In July 1999, a Korean-American woman in her 50s was caught crossing over into North Korea from China. She was released about a month later after negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang.
If negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang follow as in previous cases, it would be the first official U.S.-North Korean talks since the launch of the Obama administration. From that perspective, the latest incident could be an opportunity for North Korea to abandon its hardline stance, which has been growing more radical in recent months. North Korea is preparing to launch a rocket despite warnings from the United States and the international community. It declined a visit by U.S. special envoy Stephen Bosworth and has rejected American food aid.
If North Korea keeps behaving this way, even the Obama administration, which made clear it wants to talk to the North, will have no choice but to take a harder line as well. If North Korea pushes ahead with the missile launch, it will gain nothing but UN sanctions, and the situation on the Korean Peninsula will get more unstable.
North Korea must release the two U.S. journalists immediately. If it holds them for a long time, resorting to their ridiculous tactic of accusing them of being “spies,” the only result would be an increase in negative sentiment toward the North among the American public. It is an internationally deplorable act to hold journalists captive. The right thing for Pyongyang to do would be to release them immediately and show the world a new side.
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200903/200903200026.html
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - Marcus - 03-25-2009 12:52 PM
Kim Jung-Il is nuts, however I really have no problem with North Korea taking those two journalists. They were warned time and time again to stay away from the border and they refused. They may not have been spies but I could see where the N.Korean government...from their point of view...would think they were. Bottom line is journalists have been proven time and time again to be snoops and some of the most blatant liars and back-stabbers out there. They will do anything to gain sources and get a scoop. Who knows if they didn't have a government employee who promised to become one of their "sources" if they did some spying.
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-25-2009 03:46 PM
US: North Korea loading rocket on launch pad
Published - Mar 25 2009 02:50PM EST
By PAMELA HESS - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/03/25/7250449/192xX.jpg)
This undated black-and-white handout image provided by DigitalGlobe shows a aerial view of a North Korean rocket launch site. North Korea is loading a Taepodong rocket on its east coast launch pad in anticipation of the launch of a communications satellite early next month, U.S. officials say.
(AP Photo/DigitalGlobe)
North Korea is loading a Taepodong rocket on its east coast launch pad in anticipation of the launch of a communications satellite early next month, U.S. officials say. U.S. counterproliferation and intelligence officials have confirmed Japanese news reports of the expected launch between April 4 and 8.
North Korea announced its intention to launch the satellite in February. Regional powers worry the claim is a cover for the launch of a long-range missile capable of reaching Alaska. National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said earlier this month that all indications suggest North Korea will in fact launch a satellite.
North Korea faked a satellite launch in 1998 to cloak a missile development test. In 2006, it launched a Taepodong-2 that blew up less than a minute into flight.
Both the satellite launch rocket and long-range missile use similar technology, and arms control experts fear even a satellite launch would be a test toward eventually launching a long-range missile.
South Korea, the U.S. and Japan have urged North Korea to refrain from launching a satellite or missile, calling it a violation of a U.N. Security Council resolution barring the country from ballistic activity.
North Korea insists it bears the right to develop its space program and on Tuesday warned the U.S., Japan and its allies not to interfere with the launch.
Officials at the South Korea's National Intelligence Service and the Defense Ministry were not available for comment early Thursday in Seoul.
South Korea's chief nuclear envoy, Wi Sung-lac, said Wednesday after returning from talks with his Beijing counterparts, that a launch would trigger a response.
"If North Korea launches rocket, certain countermeasures are unavoidable," he said. He refused to elaborate, saying the measures, including any sanctions, would be discussed among U.N. Security Council member nations.
It probably won't be clear if the latest launch is a satellite or a missile test until footage can be analyzed after the event; the trajectory of a missile is markedly different from that of a satellite.
Analysts have been watching for signs of a satellite or missile on the launch pad in Musudan-ni, the northeast coastal launch site. Satellite imagery from March 16 showed progress toward mounting a rocket, with a crane hovering over the launch pad, said Christian LeMiere, an editor at Jane's Intelligence Review in London.
He said that once mounted, scientists would need at least a week to fuel and carry out tests before any launch. Images from earlier this month did not indicate the rocket or missile had been mounted, he said Wednesday.
___
Associated Press Writer Jean H. Lee in Seoul contributed to this report.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/1104/7249184/US_North_Korea_loading_rocket_on_launch_pad/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 03-26-2009 10:36 AM
NKorea positions rocket for April liftoff
Published - Mar 26 2009 09:26AM EST
By JEAN H. LEE - Associated Press Writer
The U.S. and South Korea warned of serious consequences Thursday if North Korea forges ahead and fires a rocket that American officials say is now positioned on a launchpad in the northeast for fueling.
Pyongyang says the rocket will carry a satellite, but regional powers suspect the North will use the launch to test the delivery technology for a long-range missile capable of striking Alaska. They have said the launch _ banned by the U.N. Security Council in 2006 _ would trigger sanctions.
Analysts say that after positioning the rocket, scientists need a number of days to conduct tests and to fuel the projectile, keeping Pyongyang on track for liftoff during the announced April 4-8 launch dates.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned such a "provocative act" could jeopardize the stalled talks on supplying North Korea with aid and other concessions in exchange for dismantling its nuclear program.
"We intend to raise this violation of the Security Council resolution, if it goes forward, in the U.N.," Clinton said Wednesday in Mexico City. "This provocative action in violation of the U.N. mandate will not go unnoticed, and there will be consequences."
North Korea responded Thursday by threatening "strong steps" if the Security Council criticizes the launch, and suggested it would reverse nuclear disablement carried out so far. Any challenge to its bid to send the satellite into space would mean an immediate end to nuclear disarmament talks, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
North Korea had declared last month that it was making "brisk headway" in preparations to send its Kwangmyongsong-2 communications satellite into space, and notified aviation and maritime authorities the launch would happen April 4-8, just before North Korea's new parliament holds its inaugural session on April 9. It will also come just before late North Korea founder Kim Il Sung's April 15 birthday.
Commercial satellite imagery from DigitalGlobe has revealed steady progress toward a launch, with a flurry of activity at the Musudan-ni site in late February and an open hatch and crane hovering above the launchpad two weeks ago, Jane's Intelligence Review editor Christian Le Miere said.
U.S. spy satellites spotted the rocket two days ago, South Korean reports said _ the first indication that the countdown toward a launch has begun. Counterterrorism and intelligence officials in Washington confirmed that a rocket was in position.
North Korea is now "technically" capable of launching it in three to four days, South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper said, citing an unnamed diplomatic official.
However, South Korean and U.S. intelligence authorities have not yet determined whether the rocket is intended to carry a satellite or a missile because the top is concealed, the Yonhap news agency said, citing an unnamed South Korean government official.
French Foreign Ministry spokesman Frederic Desagneaux told reporters Thursday that, because the technology for launching satellites and ballistic missiles is the same, "a space launch by North Korea would contribute to the development of its ballistic capacities."
Seoul, meanwhile, urged the North to cancel the launch, warning that the move would threaten regional stability and draw international sanctions.
"If North Korea pushes ahead with the launch by ignoring repeated warning by our government and the international community, that would be a serious challenge and provocation on security on the Korean peninsula and regional stability in Northeast Asia," Defense Ministry spokesman Won Tae-jae told reporters.
Seoul will take the matter to the Security Council whether it's a satellite or a missile, Foreign Ministry spokesman Moon Tae-young said.
North Korea's bid to send a satellite comes at a time of mounting tensions on the Korean peninsula, with Pyongyang lashing out over South Korean President Lee Myung-bak's tough policy toward the North.
Seoul's decision to hold routine military drills with U.S. troops drew a threat from Pyongyang against South Korean airliners flying over North Korean airspace. North Korea also cut off the only military communications hot line connecting the two Koreas during the 12-day exercises, and repeatedly shut down its border crossing.
Pyongyang is also at odds with Washington over nuclear disarmament, and is holding two American journalists they accuse of crossing into the country illegally from China last week.
Analysts say Pyongyang, angling to get President Barack Obama's attention, may use the journalists _ Lisa Ling and Euna Lee of former Vice President Al Gore's online media outlet Current TV _ to push for direct talks with Washington, a prime goal of leader Kim Jong Il.
"North Korea appears to be judging that the issue of the two U.S. journalists could serve as a very good occasion in opening up negotiations with the U.S. on its missile and nuclear programs in the future," said analyst Paik Hak-soon of the private Sejong Institute.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang urged restraint, saying he hoped all parties would "do things to contribute to peace and stability on the peninsula."
U.S. National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said earlier this month that indications suggest North Korea will launch a satellite.
However, Tokyo, spooked by a rocket launch a decade ago and North Korea's attempt to shoot a long-range missile in 2006, is preparing to shoot down any debris or fragments that might fall on Japan if the launch fails.
Along Japan's northern coast, officials are setting up hot lines and emergency headquarters and conducting safety drills, officials said. U.S. military officials at Misawa Air Base across the Sea of Japan from North Korea say they are closely monitoring activities.
Japan also reportedly plans to deploy an Aegis radar-equipped destroyer carrying a missile interceptor, and South Korea also will dispatch a destroyer to monitor the launch, Yonhap said. Four U.S. and Japanese Aegis ships already are in place, Yonhap said.
___
Associated Press writers Matthew Lee in Mexico City, Pamela Hess in Washington, Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo, and Kwang-tae Kim and Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul contributed to this report.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/1104/7255212/NKorea_positions_rocket_for_April_liftoff/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 04-11-2009 12:18 AM
NKorea's Kim brings close relative to center stage
Published - Apr 10 2009 10:21PM EST
By JAE-SOON CHANG - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/04/08/7399542/192xX.jpg)
In this April 5, 2009 image released by Korean Central News Agency on April 9, 2009, via Korea News Service in Tokyo, shown is the launch of a missile from Musudan-ri, North Korea. Tens of thousands of North Koreans rallied Wednesday, April 8, 2009, in Pyongyang to support Kim Jong Il as he embarks on his third term as leader and to celebrate the rocket launch that was criticized elsewhere as a violation of U.N. sanctions. (AP Photo/Korean Central News Agency via Korea News Service)
North Korean strongman Kim Jong Il is officially back on center stage following a reported stroke, but has promoted a trusted in-law to the spotlight in the clearest sign yet he is making preparations for an eventual successor, analysts said Friday.
Though looking thinner and grayer, and limping slightly, Kim's appearance at the closely watched first session of the North's new parliament Thursday was more than enough to lay to rest any lingering doubts about his health, and prove he is in charge.
Kim appointed his brother-in-law Jang Song Thaek to the all-powerful National Defense Commission, providing analysts with clues about what the future may hold for North Korea after Kim either dies or becomes incapacitated.
The appointment shows Kim is trying to prepare for his eventual departure and pave the way to hand power to one of his sons, analysts said Friday, just as he himself inherited the mantle from his late father, North Korea's founder Kim Il Sung.
"In a system like North Korea, there is nobody else to trust but one's own flesh and blood," said Koh Yu-hwan, a professor at Seoul's Dongguk University. "Jang is expected to play a decisive role in strengthening Kim's rule and as a guardian of Kim's successor."
Jang, 63, is married to Kim's younger sister. He has been considered the person most likely to lead a collective leadership that would probably emerge if Kim leaves the scene, as no single person is yet believed poised to take over.
Kim has three known sons with two different mothers, and Jang is believed to back Kim's youngest son, 26-year-old Jong Un, as successor.
A technocrat trained in the former Soviet Union, Jang was a rising star in North Korean politics until he was summarily demoted in early 2004 in what analysts believe was a warning from Kim against gathering too much influence. But Kim rehabilitated Jang in 2006 and he has since held posts in the ruling Workers' Party.
In another possible succession-related move, the Supreme People's Assembly approved a motion to amend North Korea's constitution. No details were available, but in the 1990s, a similar amendment paved the way for Kim to assume leadership from his father.
Choi Jin-wook, a North Korea expert at the government-funded Korea Institute for National Unification, said Jang's appointment and the constitutional revision must be "aimed at laying the groundwork for a successor as well as stabilizing his regime."
The Supreme People's Assembly re-elected Kim to his post as chairman of the National Defense Commission, the North's most powerful post.
The session marked the first state event the 67-year-old Kim has attended in months. Concerns about his health emerged after he missed a September ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the North's founding. South Korean and U.S. officials later said a stroke had felled him in August.
The personality cult surrounding Kim appeared as strong as ever. In Pyongyang on Friday, tens of thousands of North Koreans rallied to celebrate Kim's re-election and pledged their loyalty. A red-and-white banner at the center of the city's main Kim Il Sung Square read, "Let's safeguard the revolutionary leadership headed by comrade Kim Jong Il with our lives," APTN footage showed.
Kim's return to the spotlight was buoyed by what North Korea claims was the launch of a satellite into outer space. U.S. and South Korean military officials say nothing made it into orbit and accuse Pyongyang of using the launch to test its long-range missile technology.
The launch has caused an international outcry, with the U.S., Japan and South Korea pushing for U.N. Security Council censure of Pyongyang. They say the launch violates previous U.N. resolutions prohibiting North Korea from using ballistic missile technology. North Korea counters the launch was allowed under a U.N. space treaty.
So far, the council has been unable to come up with a united response as China and Russia, both veto-wielding permanent members, have resisted a strong response. Japan and the U.S. have also disagreed on how to proceed; though both would prefer a full-blown resolution, Washington is concerned it would take too long.
The Kyodo news agency, citing diplomatic sources, reported late Friday night from New York that the Japanese were prepared to back off that demand.
The five permanent members and Japan were expected to meet on Saturday to continue their discussions.
Council diplomats said a presidential statement is a likelier option if they can write one that is strong enough. They spoke on condition of anonymity to speak about negotiations that happen behind closed doors.
Security Council resolutions are considered the strongest response the council can take. A presidential statement is considered a lesser response, though the United States and others believe it carries equal clout.
Separately, Japan moved Friday to extend and strengthen its own economic sanctions against North Korea for another year.
___
Associated Press writers Kwang-tae Kim in Seoul, Mari Yamaguchi and Jay Alabastar in Tokyo, Audra Ang in Beijing, and John Heilprin and Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/9002/7400895/NKoreas_Kim_brings_close_relative_to_center_stage/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 04-11-2009 10:18 AM
SKorea, China, Japan want strong message for North
Published - Apr 11 2009 09:36AM EST
By KWANG-TAE KIM - Associated Press Writer
![[Image: 192xX.jpg]](http://www.rr.com/media/jpeg/2009/04/06/7367764/192xX.jpg)
South Korean protesters burn pictures of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, flags and mock missiles during a rally against North Korea's missiles near the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, April 6, 2009. The U.S. and its allies sought to punish North Korea's defiant launch of a rocket that apparently fizzled into the Pacific, holding an emergency U.N. meeting to respond to an act that some believe was a long-range missile test. (AP Photo/ Lee Jin-man)
The leaders of South Korea, China and Japan agreed Saturday to send North Korea a "powerful message" over its rocket launch, an official said, but their newfound unity could result in a weaker response than the one Tokyo originally sought.
The leaders shared the view that the global community should "promptly send a powerful message to North Korea in a unified voice," South Korean presidential spokeswoman Kim Eun-hye said in a statement.
It was issued after South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso met on the sidelines of a chaotic regional summit in Thailand.
Their meeting came as the U.N. Security Council appeared to be making progress in breaking a deadlock over how to respond to North Korea's April 5 rocket launch.
The communist nation launched what it said was a satellite, though the U.S., Japan and South Korea said it was actually testing long-range missile technology, which the North is banned from doing under a 2006 Security Council resolution. North Korea says satellite launches are allowed under a U.N. space treaty.
Wen and Aso were at odds during their meeting over whether the council should adopt a resolution or a presidential statement, Kim said. China, a key ally of North Korea, had pressed for a lighter reprimand. But Tokyo, which had been pushing for a full resolution, hinted that it would instead accept a presidential statement _ drafted by China in consultation with Washington _ that was circulated Thursday.
"When push comes to shove, Japan will not insist on a particular format" if three requirements are met, Aso spokesman Osamu Sakashita said. He said the message must be "strong, unanimous and at an early date."
Security Council resolutions are considered the strongest response the council can take. A presidential statement is considered a lesser response, though the U.S. and others believe it carries equal clout.
Wen said China "will make efforts" to ensure that the three countries respond with a unified voice soon through the U.N., the spokeswoman said.
Their unity cleared the hurdle in the Security Council as its five permanent members _ Britain, China, France, Russia and the U.S. _ and Japan prepare to continue their discussions Saturday in New York.
The three leaders agreed that the specific format and wording of the message should be worked out at the Security Council, Kim said.
Their 30-minute meeting took place following the abrupt cancellation of a broader gathering of regional leaders after Thai anti-government protesters stormed the venue of the East Asia Summit in the beach resort of Pattaya, 90 miles (140 kilometers) southeast of Bangkok.
Japan's mass-circulation Yomiuri newspaper reported Saturday from New York that the statement would also contain other points, including a demand that North Korea abstain from more launches, a call for the drawing up of further economic sanctions against it and the early resumption of six-party talks aimed at the North's denuclearization.
North Korea has warned that any move to censure it at the U.N. could prompt its withdrawal from the nuclear disarmament talks, which involve China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the U.S.
The council could adopt the statement through a vote next week if an agreement on its wording is produced Saturday, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported, also citing diplomatic sources.
___
Associated Press writers Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo, Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations and Malcolm Foster in Pattaya contributed to this report.
http://www.rr.com/home/home/article/1104/7278738/SKorea_China_Japan_want_strong_message_for_North/100/
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - converrl - 04-11-2009 03:16 PM
Talk nicely, do nothing, and it'll take care of itself...
Just like the Somali pirates..
And Iran...
And Pakistan...
And our electric grid...
And our airspace...
And...?????
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 04-11-2009 05:46 PM
(04-11-2009 03:16 PM)converrl Wrote: Talk nicely, do nothing, and it'll take care of itself...
Just like the Somali pirates..
And Iran...
And Pakistan...
And our electric grid...
And our airspace...
And...?????
UC's $1.5B debt?
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - converrl - 04-11-2009 05:49 PM
(04-11-2009 05:46 PM)ctipton Wrote:(04-11-2009 03:16 PM)converrl Wrote: Talk nicely, do nothing, and it'll take care of itself...
Just like the Somali pirates..
And Iran...
And Pakistan...
And our electric grid...
And our airspace...
And...?????
UC's $1.5B debt?
Wrong horse!
RE: N. Korea threatens 'war' if satellite is shot down - ctipton - 04-17-2009 06:54 PM
Feeling Guilty for Eating Rice
"A world in which we can eat rice and meat soup, which our Great Leader longed for so much, is becoming a reality due to the efforts of our Dear Leader." Those were the words of a North Korean Workers Party propaganda officer during a party lecture on Jan. 2 in Hyesan, Yanggang Province, North Korea. "Rice and meat soup" was Kim Il-sung's slogan for a prosperous socialist society during the 1950s Chollima (Flying Horse) Movement, a state-sponsored movement that mirrored China's Great Leap Forward to promote rapid economic development.
North Korea's economy is in such bad shape now that a party official has to use a 50-year-old slogan to measure progress today. Among North Korean defectors surveyed by the National Human Rights Commission, 58 percent said they had personally witnessed people starving to death in the North. According to a 2007 study by the Korea Peace Institute, the average monthly salary of a North Korean who has lived in South Korea for more than seven years increased steadily from W500,000 in 2001 to W950,000 in 2004 and W1.4 million in 2007 (US$1=W1,337), but that was still only 66 percent of the average monthly salary for South Koreans of W2.11 million. Among North Korean defectors in South Korea, 27.4 percent earned less than half the middle-class salary in the South and lived in poverty, way more than the 18.4 percent for South Koreans.
Yet North Koreans are happier. In a 2007 survey, North Koreans were asked to grade the level of satisfaction they felt with their lives in the categories of physical condition, mental state and social and physical environment. Out of a perfect score of 5, they gave their lives in South Korea a grade of 3.43, more than the 3.27 points South Koreans gave on average. One North Korean defector who came to Seoul in 2003 wrote in his diary, "I thought China, which had no shortage of food, was paradise, but South Korea was heaven." He lived in Hyesan, which is close to China, and would have been aware of the situation outside his country. But he was stunned by the living standards he encountered in South Korea. North Korean defectors say it is at mealtimes that they think most about the family they left behind in the North. Cho Chang-ho, who escaped from North Korea and came to South Korea in 1994, went to a restaurant in Seoul shortly after arriving here. When he was served corn on the cob, he told the server to "take it away immediately." He felt a surge of guilt over the two sons he left behind. In 1977, when he was no longer able to work in the mines due to pneumoconiosis, his sons started growing corn in the mountain behind their home. They ate corn for breakfast, lunch and dinner for more than a decade.
A few days ago, a front page article in the Washington Post focused on the bewilderment North Korean defectors feel while living in South Korea. The report said the greatest wish among North Korean defectors was to have a hot meal including rice with the family they left behind. It said North Korean children cry thinking about their family back home when they are treated to birthday parties.
North Korean defectors are overwhelmed by guilt whenever they eat something delicious. It breaks one's heart to watch North Korea stake everything on developing nuclear weapons and missiles while it continues to ignore its starving people.
By Chosun Ilbo columnist Choi Byung-muk
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2009/04/16/2009041661028.html