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Tag: North Korea

  • China says North Korea pledges denuclearisation during friendly visit

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has pledged to denuclearise and meet U.S. officials, China said on Wednesday after an historic meeting with President Xi Jinping, who promised China would uphold its friendship with its isolated neighbour.

    After two days of speculation, China and North Korea both confirmed that Kim had visited Beijing and met Xi during what China’s Foreign Ministry called an unofficial visit to China from Sunday to Wednesday.

    The China visit was Kim’s first known trip outside North Korea since he assumed power in 2011 and is believed by analysts to serve as preparation for upcoming summits with South Korea and the U.S.

    North Korea’s KCNA news agency made no mention of Kim’s pledge to denuclearise, or his anticipated meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump that is planned for some time in May.

    Beijing has traditionally been the closest ally of secretive North Korea, but ties have been frayed by Pyongyang’s pursuit of nuclear weapons and China’s backing of tough UN sanctions in response.

    China’s Foreign Ministry cited Kim in a lengthy statement as telling Xi that the situation on the Korean peninsula was starting to improve.

    This, he said is because North Korea had taken the initiative to ease tensions and put forward proposals for peace talks.

    “It is our consistent stand to be committed to denuclearisation on the peninsula, in accordance with the will of late President Kim Il Sung and late General Secretary Kim Jong Il,” Kim Jong Un said, according to the statement.

    He said North Korea is willing to talk with the U.S. and hold a summit between the two countries.

    “The issue of denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula can be resolved, if South Korea and the U. S. respond to our efforts with goodwill, create an atmosphere of peace and stability while taking progressive and synchronous measures for the realisation of peace,” Kim said.

    Kim Jong Un’s predecessors, grandfather Kim Il Sung and father Kim Jong Il, both publicly promised not to pursue nuclear weapons but secretly continued to develop the programs, culminating in the North’s first nuclear test in 2006 under Kim Jong Il.

    The North had said in past failed talks aimed at dismantling its nuclear programme that it could consider giving up its arsenal if the U. S. removed its troops from South Korea and withdrew its so-called nuclear umbrella of deterrence from South Korea and Japan.

    Many analysts and former negotiators believe this still constitutes North Korea’s stance on denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula and remain deeply skeptical Kim is willing to give up the nuclear weapons his family has been developing for decades.

    At first wrapped in secrecy, the announcement of Kim Jong Un’s visit soon became the third-most discussed topic on China’s Twitter-like Weibo microblogging site, although many state media outlets blocked their comments sections.

    Widely read Chinese state-run newspaper the Global Times praised the meeting as proving naysayers about Beijing-Pyongyang relations wrong.

    “China and North Korea maintaining their friendly relations provides a positive force for the whole region and promotes strategic stability in northeast Asia,” it said in an editorial.

    Billed as an unofficial trip, Kim’s appearance in Beijing contained almost all the trappings of a state visit, complete with an honor guard and banquet at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People.

    Kim and Xi also met at the Diaoyutai State Guest House, where Kim Il Sung planted a tree in 1959 that still stands.

    China briefed Trump on Kim’s visit and the communication included a personal message from Xi to Trump, the White House said in a statement.

    “The U. S. remains in close contact with our allies South Korea and Japan.

    “We see this development as further evidence that our campaign of maximum pressure is creating the appropriate atmosphere for dialogue with North Korea,” the White House said.

    A top Chinese diplomat, Politburo member Yang Jiechi, will brief officials, including President Moon Jae-in, in Seoul on Thursday about Xi’s meeting with Kim Jong Un, according to the presidential office in Seoul.

    Kim told a banquet hosted by Xi the visit was intended to “maintain our great friendship and continue and develop our bilateral ties at a time of rapid developments on the Korean peninsula”, according to KCNA.

    Xi had accepted an invitation “with pleasure” from him to visit North Korea, KCNA said.

    However, China’s statement made no mention of Xi accepting an invitation, saying only that Xi pledged to keep frequent contacts with Kim through the exchange of visits and sending special envoys and letters to each other.

    China had largely sat on the sidelines as Pyongyang improved its relations with Seoul, prompting worry in Beijing that it was no longer a central player in the North Korean issue, reinforced by Trump’s subsequent announcement of his proposed meeting with Kim Jong Un in May.

    Improving ties between North Korea and China would be a positive sign before the planned summits involving the two Koreas and the United States, a senior South Korean official said on Tuesday.

    Kim Jong Il met then-president Jiang Zemin in China in 2000 before a summit between the two Koreas in June that year.

    That visit was seen at the time as reaffirmation of close ties with Beijing. (Reuters/NAN)

  • IOC president to visit North Korea after Winter Games

    IOC president to visit North Korea after Winter Games

    International Olympic Committee ( IOC ) President Thomas Bach will visit North Korea after the PyeongChang Winter Olympics, Reuters reported on Monday.

    The visit is part of an agreement between the IOC and both North Korea and South Korea, according to a source.

    The source said the trip would be “sometime after the Olympic Games’’, which are due to finish on Feb. 25, and did not comment on the agenda for the visit.

    North Korea agreed to participate in PyeongChang after Games’ host South Korea and the IOC encouraged the reclusive, heavily-sanctioned state to participate as a gesture of peace.

    Athletes from North and South Korea, technically still at war, marched together at the Games opening ceremony.

    Both countries have fielded a unified women’s ice hockey team, the first time an inter-Korean team has competed at any Olympic Games.

    South Korean President Moon Jae-in has been using the Games in his efforts to re-engage with the North and to pave the way for talks over the North’s weapons programme.

    The IOC and the two Koreas signed a tripartite agreement on Jan. 20 in Lausanne, Switzerland.

    It set out the details of North Korea’s Olympic participation, including the number of athletes, the sports they would take part in as well as their joint march.

    The agreement was seen as a breakthrough, given the Koreas had not marched together at an Olympics for more than 12 years.

    South Korean President Moon Jae-in hosted two of North Korea’s most senior officials at the Games opening ceremony, including North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister.

    Moon warmly shook hands with her and later held talks with her in Seoul.

    Kim Jong Un has invited Moon for talks in Pyongyang, South Korean officials said, setting the stage for the first meeting of Korean leaders in more than a decade.

    The thaw in relations has centred on the Olympics.

    It has led to a senior American member of the IOC calling for the joint ice hockey team to be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

    The team had included 12 North Korean players.

  • North Korea to participate in Winter Olympics

    North Korea to participate in Winter Olympics

    North Korea is to send a delegation to the 2018 Winter Olympic Games taking place in South Korea in February, officials from the South said.

    The breakthrough announcement came as the countries met for their first high-level talks in more than two years, the BBC reports.

    The delegation will include athletes, officials and supporters.

    A military hotline between the nations, suspended for nearly two years, will be reinstated from Wednesday, the South’s officials said.

    Read Also: North Korea agrees to talks after U.S., South Korea postpone military drills

    However, the North’s response to all of the South’s proposals is not yet known.

    The opening remarks of head of the North Korean delegation, Ri Son-gwon, were fairly neutral.

    He said he hoped the talks would bring a “good gift” for the new year and that the North had a “serious and sincere stance.”

  • North Korea reopens hotline to South

    North Korea has reopened a hotline to South Korea, almost two years after it was disabled on the orders of leader Kim Jong-un,

    South Korea confirmed it had received a call from the North at 15:30 local time (06:30 GMT) on Wednesday.

    The North Korean leader had earlier said he was open to dialogue with Seoul and to sending a team to the Winter Olympics in the South next month, the BBC reports.

    The two nations have not held high-level talks since December 2015.

    North Korea cut off the communications channel shortly afterwards, refusing to answer calls, according to officials in the South.

    A North Korean official announced the hotline’s re-opening in a televised statement.

    He said the two nations would discuss the practical issues around a proposal to send a North Korean delegation to the Winter Games in Pyeongchang in February.

    “We will make close contact with South Korea in a sincere and faithful manner,” Yonhap news agency quoted the official as saying.

    He said the countries would “discuss working-level issues” about sending the delegation.

    The Press Secretary for South Korea’s President, Moon Jae-in, said the restoration of this communications channel was “very significant.”

    “It creates an environment where communication will be possible at all times,” he said.

     

  • Trump warns North Korea: ‘Do not try us’

    Trump warns North Korea: ‘Do not try us’

    “Do not try us,’’ U.S. President, Donald Trump, warned North Korea on Wednesday at Seoul’s Korean National Assembly, seeking to convince Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes.

    “The North Korean regime has interpreted America’s past restraint as weakness … This is a very different administration than the U.S. has had in the past,” Trump added.

    “America does not seek conflict or confrontation, but we will not run from it,” said Trump, as he described the U.S. military presence in the region, including the “three largest aircraft carriers in the world” and nuclear submarines “appropriately positioned.”

    “I want peace through strength,” Trump said.

    But in spite the president’s firm rhetoric, he also offered a path forward to North Korea.
    Speaking directly to North Korean leader, Trump said: “The weapons you are acquiring are not making you safer. They are putting your regime in great danger.”

    “North Korea is not the paradise your grandfather envisioned.

    “It is a hell that no person deserves. Yet in spite every crime you have committed against god and man, we will offer a path to a much better future,” Trump added.

    Read Also: North Korea ’s nuclear weapons aimed only at U.S – diplomat

    “It begins with an end to the aggression of your regime,” Trump said, calling on Pyongyang to give up its ballistic missile programme and agree to “complete, verifiable and total de-nuclearisation.”

    In the speech, Trump avoided some of the more antagonistic language he has used in previous North Korea speeches.

    He did not mention “fire and fury” or “little rocket man,” for instance.

    The president also called on China and Russia to “sever all ties” with North Korea, including diplomatic relations, over Pyongyang’s ongoing nuclear and missile pursuits.

    “To those nations, who choose to ignore this threat … the weight of this crisis is on your conscience,” Trump said.
    The speech capped Trump’s whirlwind 24-hour stop in South Korea.

    He was set to leave for Beijing, where he was expected to seek international support to help isolate North Korea.

    Earlier on Wednesday, a surprise visit by Trump to the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea was scrapped due to bad weather.

    The early morning helicopter trip was called off due to heavy fog.

    South Korea’s President Moon Jae In had been planned to join Trump in the DMZ, White House spokeswoman, Sarah Sanders, said, which would have marked the first time presidents from the two countries visited the area together.

    Read: Trump ‘politicising’ NY attack, says Senate Democratic leader Schumer

  • North Korea’s nuclear weapons aimed only at U.S – diplomat

    North Korea’s nuclear weapons aimed only at U.S – diplomat

    A high-ranking North Korean diplomat told a non-proliferation conference in Moscow on Friday that the country’s nuclear weapons were aimed at the U.S. and at no one else.

    “We believe that the U.S., but not any other country, may mount a nuclear attack,” Choe Hui, the Head of the North Korean Foreign Ministry’s Department on North American Affairs said.

    “Our nuclear programme and weapons are aimed at the U.S.,’’ the diplomat said in comments carried by Russian state news agency TASS.

    “Our nuclear response will aim at the U.S., but not any other third country.”
    Russia and China have the closest diplomatic relations with the insular communist state of North Korea.

    The U.S. and its allies South Korea and Japan have been increasingly alarmed in recent months about the potential for a nuclear war with North Korea. (dpa/NAN)

  • North Korea-America face-off and possibility of war

    These seem to be dangerous times. No one should delude himself about it. Despite that the 21st century has humongous possibilities and several promises for us, what is happening among world’s powerful nations should be of concern to those who follows developments in world politics.

    The address delivered by the  United States (U.S.) President, Mr Donald Trump, during the just-concluded United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) is something that should call for concerns. The speech, which sent shockwaves to the diplomatic circle, took many by surprise. Many could not hide their bemusement while the American leader called out the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-Un.

    It is no longer strange that the two leaders don’t see eye-to-eye. In fact, it would be safe to refer to them as sworn enemies, and that is where my fear lies. These are not the kinds of enemies the world wants to have right now. They are not good for each other, neither are they good for the world. The fact that they are world leaders makes it even more frightening. I will tell you why these are bad guys on the world stage and heading some powerful nations.

    Nick Kramer, an analyst with deep knowledge of North Korean politics and its current leader, writes that Kim Jong-Un was taught to believe that he was essentially divine. Kramer writes: “In North Korea, his grandfather and father were revered like gods, and he has no less of an opinion about himself. Arrogant and aggressive, he has always gotten away with everything in life.  He has never had to face the consequences of his bad behaviour. He is a bully, who no one has ever hit back. And if any person ever tried to punch him back, his daddy fed them to the wild dogs.”

    While saying that Kim does not think like a normal person, Kramer said the North Korean “Spoilt Brat” as Kim is popularly called in a segment of the western media, does not consider what happens after he strikes.

    Kramer writes: “He doesn’t know what comes next.  This blissful ignorance likely extends to what happens after a nuke launch. There have never been consequences to his temper tantrums before. In his mind – Why should there be any now? This makes him irrational and unpredictable.”

    If what were written by Kramer are true characteristics of a powerful leader that Kim is, there is the frightening assertion by psychiatrists about an equally powerful, though older Donald Trump. The American president, according to the health experts at Yale University, has a “dangerous mental illness.”

    Speaking at the conference at Yale’s School of Medicine recently, one of the mental health professionals, Dr John Gartner, a psychotherapist, who advised psychiatric residents at Johns Hopkins University Medical School until 2015, said: “We have an ethical responsibility to warn the public about Donald Trump’s dangerous mental illness.”

    Gartner, also a founding member of Duty to Warn, an organisation of several dozens of mental health professionals who think Trump is mentally unfit to be president, said the U.S. president’s statement about having the largest crowd at an inauguration was just one of many that served as warnings of a larger problem.

    James Gilligan, a psychiatrist and professor at New York University, told the conference he had worked on some of the “most dangerous people in society”, including murderers and rapists – but that he was convinced by the “dangerousness” of  Trump.

    This is where my fear is. That the two leaders may have had mental issues, which send shivers down my spine because it means they can, in their irrationality, transfer their anger on the rest of the world at the slightest provocation. I bet the North Korean young leader has already put his acts together and ready for what Trump might send his way. Let us hope the two won’t take the world down as they reach for each other’s jugular.

     

    • Mohammed is a graduating Mass Comm. student of Kogi State University, Anyigba
  • North Korea: 2 women plead not guilty to killing leader’s half-brother

    North Korea: 2 women plead not guilty to killing leader’s half-brother

    Two women accused of assassinating the estranged half-brother of North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un with a banned nerve agent pleaded not guilty at the start of a high-profile murder trial in a Malaysian court on Monday.

    Indonesian Siti Aisyah, 25, and Doan Thi Huong, 28, a Vietnamese, are charged with killing Kim Jong Nam by smearing his face with VX, a chemical poison banned by the United Nations, at Kuala Lumpur’s international airport on Feb. 13.

    Police have also named four North Koreans as suspects in the case and an Interpol red notice, an international alert just short of an arrest warrant, has been issued for the North Koreans, who remain at large.

    Prosecutors said the four North Koreans helped the accused women carry out several practice runs in Kuala Lumpur shopping malls.

    “The prank practice carried out by the first and second accused with the supervision of the four who are still at large was preparation to see through their common intention to kill the victim,” the prosecution said in its charge sheet.

    Defense lawyers demanded that the prosecution immediately name the four other suspects, who have also been charged, so they could prepare their case.

    “The charge must be clear,” said Siti Aisyah’s lawyer, Gooi Soon Seng.

    Judge Azmi Ariffin dismissed their request.

    Both women wore bullet-proof vests as they were led into the court on the outskirts of the Malaysian capital. They face the death penalty if convicted.

    The two women nodded their heads when the charges were read out to them by two interpreters in the Shah Alam court on the outskirts of the Malaysian capital. The interpreters said both women pleaded not guilty.

    The prosecution said their actions showed “intent to kill the victim” by smearing his face and eyes with VX nerve agent, which a post-mortem confirmed had killed Kim.

    The women told their lawyers they did not know they were participating in a deadly attack and believed they were carrying out a prank for a reality TV show.

    The two women sat quietly during the opening day of the trial. Siti was dressed in a black floral suit, while Huong wore a white long-sleeved t-shirt and jeans. The courtroom was packed with embassy officials and media.

    Juliana Idris, who works at the airport, told the court a man later identified as Kim Jong Nam approached her and asked her to take him to a police station. Kim later went to the airport clinic but died there within 20 minutes.

    She said the man, who spoke English, told her he had been “attacked by a woman from behind … another one closed his eyes”.

    “His hands were shaking a bit, I don’t know why,” she said.

    Police Lance Corporal Mohd Zulkarnain Sanudin, who was on duty at the Kuala Lumpur International airport on the day of the killing, said Idris had brought Kim Jong Nam to him.

    He said Kim told him a substance had been wiped on his face. Kim’s eyes were red and he could see some liquid on his face, Zulkarnain said.

    He also said the he had wrongly recorded Kim Jong Nam’s nationality as South Korean.

    “The police report I made showed the nationality as South Korean, while on the passport, it was written DPR Korea, whereby I did not know what DPR meant. I was only sure that Korea was South Korea,” he told the court.

    DPRK is the acronym for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic Republic of North Korea.

  • China shuts down North Korean companies

    China shuts down North Korean companies

    China has told North Korean companies operating in its territory to close down as it implements United Nations sanctions against the reclusive state.

    The companies will be shut by early January, the BBC reports.

    Joint Chinese and North Korean ventures will also be forced to close.

    China, Pyongyang’s only major ally, has already banned textile trade and limited oil exports.

    The move is part of an international response to North Korea’s sixth and most powerful nuclear test.

    The UN Security Council, of which China is a member, voted unanimously for fresh sanctions on September 11.

    China’s commerce ministry said it had set a deadline of 120 days from the passing of the resolution for any North Korean companies within its borders to close.

    North Korea is politically and economically isolated, and the vast majority of its trade is with China.

    Beijing has traditionally been protective of its neighbour, but has sharply criticised its nuclear tests and escalating rhetoric.

    Earlier this year, it clamped down on its purchase of coal from Pyongyang and on seafood and iron trade across the border.

  • North Korea accuses Trump of declaring war

    North Korea accuses Trump of declaring war

    In a reaction to a tweet over the weekend by the President Donald Trump of the United States, North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho accused Trump of declaring war on his country by saying North Korea “won’t be around much longer”.

    According to an official translation of his remarks to reporters in New York, Ri said: “Last weekend Trump claimed that our leadership wouldn’t be around much longer and declared a war on our country.”

    “Since the United States declared war on our country, we will have every right to make all self-defensive counter-measures, including the right to shoot down the United States strategic bombers at any time even when they are not yet inside the aerospace border of our country,” Ri said.

    White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Monday that the US has not declared war on North Korea, adding, “Frankly, the suggestion of that is absurd.”

    Related: Trump, North Korean leader in hot exchange

    Sanders said it is “never appropriate” to shoot down another nation’s aircraft in international waters and the administration plans to continue to protect the area.

    Earlier on Monday, State Department spokesperson Katina Adams told CNN the US seeks a “peaceful denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”

    But the US military “will take all options to make sure that we safeguard our allies and our partners and our homeland so if North Korea does not stop their provocative actions we’ll make sure we provide options to the President to deal with North Korea,” according to Col. Rob Manning, a Pentagon spokesman.

    Also: Iran defies Trump, tests missile

    Asked about Ri’s charge that Trump’s comments were a declaration of war, Manning, said: “Our job as the Department of Defense is as you know is to make sure that the President is provided military options, we’ll continue to do that, and we have a deep arsenal of military options to provide the President so then he can decide how he wants to deal with North Korea and the regime.”

    “We are postured and we are ready to fight tonight,” he added.

    The US Navy will also continue to maintain its presence near the Korean peninsula despite the latest round of harsh rhetoric and threats of a military strike from Pyongyang.