OH YES THEY DID: North Korean Defector Group Sends Anti-Pyongyang Leaflets to North
Posted: May 12, 2018 Filed under: Asia, Foreign Policy, Global, Space & Aviation | Tags: China, Donald Trump, Kim Jong-un, Korean Peninsula, Moon Jae-in, North Korea, President of South Korea, South Korea, Xi Jinping 1 CommentPAJU, South Korea, May 12 (Yonhap) — A group of North Korea defectors scattered leaflets critical of the North Korean regime across the border to the North on Saturday despite the government’s recommendation not to.
Six members of the Fighters for a Free North Korea flew five big plastic balloons at around 12:30 a.m. from the border city of Paju, Gyeonggi Province. The balloons sent
the border to the North Korean side were carrying 150,000 leaflets criticizing North Korea, as well as other gifts like United States dollar bills and USBs, Park Sang-hak, the head of the defectors’ group said.
Banners were also tied to the balloons, reading “Do not be fooled by Kim Jong-un‘s fake dialogue offer, disguised peace offensive.”
“Defectors’ leaflets to North Korea, which are intended to tell the facts and truth to some 20 million North Korean people, will never by stopped by any form of blockade or physical means,” Park noted.
The defectors group tried to fly the anti-North leaflets a week earlier but failed to do so when they were stopped by police and local residents.
The government has repeatedly advised the Fighters for a Free North Korea, as well as other groups that send leaflets to North Korea, against such activity.
“Spreading of anti-North leaflets runs against the spirit of the inter-Korean agreements under the Panmunjom Declaration agreed upon between the leaders of the two countries,” the Unification Ministry has told the groups, urging them to stop the activities. Read the rest of this entry »
North Korea’s Ultimatum to America
Posted: September 6, 2017 Filed under: Asia, Diplomacy, Foreign Policy, Mediasphere, Self Defense, Terrorism, War Room | Tags: Donald Trump, France, James Mattis, Korea, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, Pyongyang, South Korea, United Nations Security Council, United States 1 Comment
Caroline B. Glick writes: The nuclear confrontation between the US and North Korea entered a critical phase Sunday with North Korea’s conduct of an underground test of a thermonuclear bomb.
If the previous round of this confrontation earlier this summer revolved around Pyongyang’s threat to attack the US territory of Guam, Sunday’s test, together with North Korea’s recent tests of intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the continental US, was a direct threat to US cities.
In other words, the current confrontation isn’t about US superpower status in Asia, and the credibility of US deterrence or the capabilities of US military forces in the Pacific. The confrontation is now about the US’s ability to protect the lives of its citizens.
The distinction tells us a number of important things. All of them are alarming.
First, because this is about the lives of Americans, rather than allied populations like Japan and South Korea, the US cannot be diffident in its response to North Korea’s provocation. While attenuated during the Obama administration, the US’s position has always been that US military forces alone are responsible for guaranteeing the collective security of the American people.
Pyongyang is now directly threatening that security with hydrogen bombs. So if the Trump administration punts North Korea’s direct threat to attack US population centers with nuclear weapons to the UN Security Council, it will communicate profound weakness to its allies and adversaries alike.
Obviously, this limits the options that the Trump administration has. But it also clarifies the challenge it faces.
The second implication of North Korea’s test of their plutonium-based bomb is that the US’s security guarantees, which form the basis of its global power and its alliance system are on the verge of becoming completely discredited. Read the rest of this entry »
[VIDEO] U.S. Keeps Its Military Threat Alive While Pressing North Korea
Posted: April 26, 2017 Filed under: Asia, Foreign Policy, Global, Guns and Gadgets, Mediasphere, War Room, White House | Tags: Bashar al-Assad, Donald Trump, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, Pyongyang, United Nations Security Council, United States, United States Pacific Command, USS Carl Vinson, White House Leave a comment
Senators briefed at WH by military, intelligence officials.
WASHINGTON—The Trump administration said it is launching an urgent push, combining diplomatic pressure and the threat of military action in a bid to halt North Korea’s advancing nuclear-weapons program.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, one of those who briefed senators at a classified briefing hosted by the White House on Wednesday, also plans to host a special meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Friday, where he will propose international officials redouble efforts to enforce economic sanctions and isolate North Korea.
North Korea’s Missile Advancements
The State Department said Mr. Tillerson is considering harsh measures such as asking other countries to shut down North Korea’s embassies and other diplomatic facilities. Read the rest of this entry »
[VIDEO] Pranking Military Guide! North Korea Day 3
Posted: November 25, 2016 Filed under: Asia, Censorship, Entertainment, Global, Mediasphere, War Room | Tags: Advice and consent, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, Pranking Military Guide, Pyongyang, United Kingdom, United States, video Leave a commentOur 3rd day in North Korea the most isolated nation on earth! I’m trying to focus on positive things in the country and combat the purely negative image we see in the Media.
China Paper says U.S., South Korea will ‘Pay the Price’ for Planned Missile System
Posted: October 2, 2016 Filed under: Asia, China, Self Defense, Space & Aviation, War Room | Tags: Barack Obama, Korea, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, Pyongyang, SEOUL, Shinzō Abe, South Korea, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, United Nations Security Council, United States, Xi Jinping, Xinhua News Agency 1 Comment
BEIJING (Reuters) – The United States and South Korea are destined to “pay the price” for their decision to deploy an advanced missile defense system which will inevitably prompt a “counter attack”, China’s top newspaper said on Saturday.
“If the United States and South Korea harm the strategic security interests of countries in the region including China, then they are destined to pay the price for this and receive a proper counter attack.”
Tension on the Korean peninsula has been high this year, beginning with North Korea’s fourth nuclear test in January, which was followed by a satellite launch, a string of tests of various missiles, and its fifth and largest nuclear test last month.
In July, South Korea agreed with the United States to deploy the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system to protect against any North Korean threats.
South Korea aims to deploy the system on a golf course, a defense ministry official said on Friday.
But the plan has angered China, which worries that THAAD’s powerful radar would compromise its security and do nothing to lower temperatures on the Korean peninsula.
In a commentary, the ruling Communist Party’s official People’s Daily said China’s opposition to THAAD would never change as it was a serious threat to the regional strategic security balance.
“Like any other country, China can neither be vague nor indifferent on security matters that affect its core interests,” the newspaper said in the commentary, published under the pen name “Zhong Sheng”, meaning “Voice of China”, often used to give views on foreign policy. Read the rest of this entry »
North Korea Conducts Fifth Nuclear Test as Regime Celebrates National Holiday
Posted: September 8, 2016 Filed under: Asia, Global, War Room | Tags: Kim Il-sung, Kim Il-sung Socialist Youth League, Kim Jong-il, Kim Jong-un, Korean Central News Agency, Korean Peninsula, List of leaders of North Korea, North Korea, Pyongyang, South Korea 1 Comment
The governments in both South Korea and Japan convened emergency meetings to discuss the test.
TOKYO — Anna Fifield reports: North Korea conducted its fifth atomic test Friday morning, South Korean officials said, as Kim Jong Un’s regime continues to defy international condemnation of its nuclear and missile programs and waves of sanctions.
The test, which analysts said appeared to be of a large nuclear device, came at exactly 9 a.m. local time on Friday, the 68th anniversary of the formation of the communist regime by Kim Il Sung, the current leader’s grandfather, and a national holiday.
“We believe this is a nuclear test,” South Korea’s defense ministry said Friday morning after the United States Geological Survey reported a 5.3-magnitude earthquake near Punggye-ri. “Possible explosion, located near the location where North Korea has detonated nuclear explosions in the past,” the USGS said on its website.
[Read the full text here, at The Washington Post]
Analysts said that the earthquake was artificial. “USGS is calling it an explosion because it has all the hallmarks: The waveform is sudden, unlike an earthquake, the depth is shallow, the location is the North Korean test site, and it happened on the half-hour,” said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia nonproliferation program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, Calif.
“This is clearly a nuclear test,” Lewis said, estimating the size at between 10 and 20 kilotons — a size that, if confirmed, would make this the biggest of North Korea’s five tests.
The governments in both South Korea and Japan convened emergency meetings to discuss the test. Read the rest of this entry »
China is Buying up American Companies Fast, and it’s Freaking People Out
Posted: February 22, 2016 Filed under: Asia, China, Economics | Tags: Beijing, Chinese New Year, Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, Hainan Airlines, IBM, Information technology, Ingram Micro, Irvine, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, Park Geun-hye, President of the People's Republic of China, Tianjin, Xi Jinping Leave a comment
Given the recent volume of deals, it would appear that the Chinese government is supportive of the foreign-buying spree.
Portia Crowe reports: Here’s a story you’ll be hearing about a lot this year.
Chinese companies have been buying up foreign businesses, including American ones, at a record rate, and it’s freaking
lawmakers out.
There is General Electric’s sale of its appliance business to Qingdao-based Haier, Zoomlion’s bid for the heavy-lifting-equipment maker Terex Corp., and ChemChina’s record-breaking deal for the Swiss seeds and pesticides group Syngenta, valued at $48 billion.
Most recently, a unit of the Chinese conglomerate HNA Group said it would buy the technology distributor Ingram Micro for $6 billion.
And the most contentious deal so far might be the Chinese-led investor group Chongqing Casin Enterprise’s bid for the Chicago Stock Exchange.
A deal spree
To date, there have been 102 Chinese outbound mergers-and-acquisitions deals announced this year, amounting to $81.6 billion in value, according to Dealogic. That’s up from 72 deals worth $11 billion in the same period last year.
And they’re not expected to let up anytime soon. Slow economic growth in China and cheap prices abroad due to the stock market’s recent sell-off suggest the opposite.
[Read the full story here, at Business Insider]
“With the slowdown of the economy, Chinese corporates are increasingly looking to inorganic avenues to supplement their growth,” Vikas Seth, head of emerging markets in the investment-banking and capital-markets department at Credit Suisse, told Business Insider earlier this month.
Kim Kyung-Hoon/ReutersPresident Obama and President Xi Jinping.
China’s economic growth in 2015 was its slowest in 25 years.
The law firm O’Melveny & Myers recently surveyed their mainly China-based clients and found that the economic growth potential in the US was the main factor making it an attractive investment destination.
Nearly half of respondents agreed that the US was the most attractive market for investment, but 47% felt that US laws and regulations were a major barrier. They’d be right about that.
A major barrier
Forty-five members of Congress this week signed a letter to the Treasury Department’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the US, or CFIUS, urging it to conduct a “full and rigorous investigation” of the Chicago Stock Exchange acquisition.
“This proposed acquisition would be the first time a Chinese-owned, possibly state-influenced, firm maintained direct access into the $22 trillion US equity marketplace,” the letter reads. Read the rest of this entry »
GLOBAL PANIC OF JULY 2014 REACHES NORTH KOREA: Hwang Pyong-So Threatens Nuclear Strike on White House, Pentagon
Posted: July 28, 2014 Filed under: Asia, War Room, White House | Tags: Global Panic of July 2014, Hwang, Korean Peninsula, Korean People's Army, North Korea, Pentagon, Pyongyang, United States, White House 3 Comments
This picture released by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un (centre) inspecting a “rocket-firing drill” on July 26, 2014 (AFP Photo)
Seoul (AFP) – A top-ranking North Korean military official has threatened a nuclear strike on the White House and Pentagon after accusing Washington of raising military tensions on the Korean peninsula.
“If the US imperialists threaten our sovereignty and survival… our troops will fire our nuclear-armed rockets at the White House and the Pentagon — the sources of all evil.”
— Hwang Pyong-So, director of the military’s General Political Bureau
The threat came from Hwang Pyong-So, director of the military’s General Political Bureau, during a speech to a large military rally in Pyongyang Sunday on the anniversary of the armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War.
Hwang, who holds the rank of vice marshal in the Korean People’s Army, said a recent series of South Korea-US military drills, one of which included the deployment of a nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier, had ramped up tensions. Read the rest of this entry »
pundit from another planet 