Is AP's Pyongyang bureau finally getting around to reporting some less-than-flattering stuff?

Over at One Free Korea, Joshua is highly critical of the Associated Press's presence in the North Korean capital, largely because of whatever secret agreement may have been penned between the AP and the DPRK about what to report. In short, it sometimes seems as if AP and their correspondent Jean Lee are unwittingly (or wittingly) playing the role of propaganda cogs.

But there are occasionally AP stories from Pyongyang that paint that harsh reality, including this one on how the hate-on North Koreans (are supposed to) have for the United States starts early:

For North Koreans, the systematic indoctrination of anti-Americanism starts as early as kindergarten and is as much a part of the curriculum as learning to count.

Toy pistols, rifles and tanks sit lined up in neat rows on shelves. The school principal pulls out a dummy of an American soldier with a beaked nose and straw-colored hair and explains that the students beat him with batons or pelt him with stones — a favorite schoolyard game, she says.

For a moment, she is sheepish as she takes three journalists from The Associated Press, including an American, past the anti-U.S. posters. But Yun Song Sil is not shy about the message.

"Our children learn from an early age about the American bastards," she says, tossing off a phrase so common here that it is considered an acceptable way to refer to Americans.

North Korean students learn that their country has had two main enemies: the Japanese, who colonized Korea from 1910 to 1945, and the U.S., which fought against North Korea during the 1950-53 Korean War.

They are told that North Korea's defense against outside forces — particularly the U.S., which has more than 28,000 soldiers stationed in South Korea — remains the backbone of the country's foreign policy.

And they are bred to seek revenge, even as their government professes to want peace with the United States.

"They tell their people there can be no reconciliation with the United States," says American scholar Brian Myers, who dissected North Korean propaganda in his 2010 book "The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves and Why It Matters." ''They make it very clear to the masses that this hate will last forever."

I don't know, though, if it was Jean Lee who threw in the interview with Professor Myers (who, no offense, is a bit of a one-trick pony when it comes to North Korea; just what will he do when/if North Korea shifts or scraps its propaganda tactics?).

If North Korea's propaganda machine really is approving AP's copy, maybe Ms Lee was able to get away with this piece because it included the "new direction" they want the world to think the Pyongyang regime is taking:

In recent years, state propaganda has shifted away from the virulent anti-American slogans of the past and has instead emphasized building up the economy. On the streets of Pyongyang, anti-American posters have largely given way to images of soldiers in helmets and workers in factories.

But is this new propaganda message a smoke screen or an indication of at least one faction's hope for change? I'm not sure myself, but I'm also not so certain that the most vehement of Pyongyang's critics can even allow for the latter to be happening even if it really were.

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The keyboard as a blunt instrument: Rise of the Chinese netizen machinery (plus Peresnorka Watch)

You may recall in February I briefly mentioned the case of Wu Ying (pictured above), a woman of humble origins in China who rose to be one of the richest females in all of China. For the crime of defaulting on $160 million in loans as her business collapsed, she was sentenced to death.

Long-time readers of Monster Island know my Catholic-influenced and logically concluded opposition to the death penalty in virtually all cases (except where a person kept alive continues to kill), but it holds doubly and triply so for those who have been sentenced to capital punishment even though their crime did not actually lead to someone's death.

Ms Wu Ying's case definitely falls into that category, just like those of virtually all the other white-collar criminals in China who've been given the death penalty. Apparently the Chinese netizenry agrees, and in that land where the closes thing to democracy is delivered through the Internet, the government was forced to sit up and take notice:

Wu Ying, once ranked as China’s sixth richest businesswoman, was sentenced to death with a two year reprieve on Monday evening; such sentences are almost always commuted to imprisonment after two years.

The Supreme Court had overturned an original death sentence in April, ordering the High Court in Zhejiang, Ms. Wu’s home province, to reconsider its judgment after a huge public outcry. The case has attracted attention as an example of how the Chinese legal system can be influenced by public sentiment.

“Public opinion played a very important role in this case,” wrote @Heyu Crisis on Sina Weibo, the Twitter-like social media platform, which had registered more than 3.7 million tweets about Wu Ying by Tuesday afternoon. “This case proves once again that the people’s will is truth,” declared another user called @Shishi bear.

Good on you, Shishi bear (no relation). So often we hear in Korea about the rabid anti-Korea bashing of the netizenry, but it's good to see people taking an interest in responsible citizenship.

+ - + - +

In the wake of North Korea's detainment of nearly thirty Chinese fishermen and their vessels, this behavior also channels criticism onto the Beijing leadership for their support of the Pyongyang regime:

Many netizens have criticized the Chinese government's handling of the incident, some even calling Beijing "impotent".

"After such a shameful incident, why doesn't our government demand an explanation from North Korea?" a Weibo user said.

Some have accused Beijing of trying to play down the matter for fear of offending Pyongyang.

"[The government] criticizes Japan, America, the Philippines and Vietnam every day, but dare not utter a word against North Korea," You Yi, a Shenzhen-based commentator, wrote on his microblog.

[I find this idea — that China is afraid to offend North Korea even though it frequently pokes the eyes of Japan, the US, etc. — to be very interesting, sort of a mirror to South Korea's left (and even the right) taking shots at Tokyo and Washington (de facto allies) while avoiding criticism of Beijing and Pyongyang (an economic partner it's trying to woo and a crazy uncle in the attic, respectively).]

The Chinese media is following suit:

hina’s leadership is hitting a rough patch with ally North Korea under its new leader Kim Jong Un, as Beijing finds itself wrong-footed in episodes including Pyongyang’s rocket launch and the murky detention of Chinese fishing boats.

The testy state of China-North Korea affairs became public this week after Chinese media flashed images of the fishing crews, some of the 28 crew members stripped to their longjohns, returning home after 13 days in North Korean custody accused of illegal fishing. The reports quoted the fishermen as saying they were beaten and starved, and the coverage unleashed furious criticism in China’s blogosphere.

“The North Koreans are like bandits and robbers,” China’s Southern Metropolis Weekly newspaper quoted one fisherman as saying Tuesday. The story, shared thousands of times on China’s Sina Weibo social media website, said the hijackers ripped down the Chinese flag on one boat and used it “like a rag.”

Of course, this isn't the first time we've seen Chinese netizens criticize their government. In late 2010, in the wake of the North Korean attack on Yŏnpyŏng-do, which killed two South Korean civilians and two ROK military personnel, there was open questioning of China's support for the DPRK.

Anger toward North Korea has always been a bit subdued, however, in part because (as I have opined) Chinese are generally ignorant about the evil excesses of the government in North Korea.

But while there is ambivalence back then, the big difference now is that the Chinese netizenry sees their own country as the victim of North Korea's brinkmanship this time around (although I'm not so sure). At One Free Korea, Joshua suggests that their anger toward their own government over a lack of firmness befitting cooked pasta means little, but the fact that they were allowed to express their dismay is itself enlightening:

No, the Chinese government isn’t about to bow to the demands of Weibo commenters, but the other side of this cause-and-effect relationship is interesting. This outrage, as temporary as it’s sure to be, has to be a consequence of a deliberate decision by the Chinese government to make a public issue of this incident. China’s attitude here really isn’t all that different from what you’d expect had the arresting authorities been South Korean — this really seems to be a reflection of China’s insistence on the filial piety of its vassal states. China’s beef isn’t that North Korea is brutal, it’s that North Korea is rebellious.

I completely agree with him that this is largely about Benevolent Big Brother China being upset with its propped-up satellite state. Back in 2008, when protesters lined the route of the Olympic Torch in both Nagano and especially Seoul, Chinese were furious that their fellow Greater Sino-world Co-Prosperity Sphere members would stoop so low as to insult their historic masters. North Korea generally reacting like a junkyard dog has kept it immune from this treatment, but the recent fishermen incident may have been a game-changer.


And we have to wonder in what other ways it is a game-changer. In light of the past behavior of Chinese fish pirates in South Korean waters, I'm of the belief that North Korea may have been acting reasonably in detaining the Chinese (and we'll probably never know), but what was up with North Korean authorities actually going through with the capture and payment plan?

To cut to the chase: Is Kim Jong-un looking for ways to change direction from his father's in an effort to spin North Korea out of China's orbit? From inviting the world to see what could easily be a failed launch, to being upfront with the North Korean people that the celebrated achievement turned out to be a total muck-up, to openly criticizing the way the country has been run (at least on the periphery), we've seen some behavior that is very uncharacteristic of a North Korean leader.

Is the Western-educated Kim Jong-un seeing his country's future with South Korea, the US, and Japan, in some sort of Peresnorka? Is there some serious palace intrigue going on behind the scenes we don't know about, with the fishing boat incident a flare-up in this unseen war? If there really were changes, what would they look like and how would we know?

I don't know the answer, but it is an interesting question. To complicate matters, my readings of the KCNA news reports have chronicled a severe underreporting of Kim Jong-un's activities, which could be a sign of who knows what.

Stay tuned.

UPDATE:
The Chosun Ilbo has an article on "welcome signs" that China's attitude toward North Korea is changing. It offers this advice for Beijing:

If China continues to deal with the North Korean defector issue simply from the perspective of a border treaty it signed with Pyongyang in 1998 and continues to ignore the human rights of defectors, it would seriously undermine Beijing's goal of becoming a global leader. The time has come for China to consider not only relations with long-time ally North Korea, but also to think about the standards that are expected from a leading global power.

Yeah. I'm sure the Chinese will agree. Now where's the "eye rolling" emoticon? (Seriously, one of the big problems South Koreans have in dealing with China is that they are used to their biggest ally, the US, actually responding to bad press and bad impressions, at least some of the time. China, seeing itself as Benevolent Big Brother and the natural leader of a Sinocentric East Asia behind which countries like the Koreas, Japan, Vietnam, etc., will fall in line, simply doesn't give a rat's arse.)

Did Kim Jong-un (inside circle, center back) learn about the virtues of democratic rule and freedom during his years in Switzerland, or did classmates in the back left and front center teach him that choking and other forms of violence are the way to solve conflict?

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Disturbing video snuck out of North Korea

Frequent One Free Korea commenter and occasional Monster Island visitor Theresa sent me a link to this The Shanghaiist post which contained the following video (put together by the guerrilla journalists at Rimjin-gang) snuck out of North Korea:



Seeing the emaciated and dazed twenty-three-year-old woman is just heart-wrenching. But the pugnacious youngish ajumma in the next scene gives hope that there are more like her who are willing to stand up to authority (and that there are authorities like the guy in the picture who don't automatically fight back when challenged).

I direct you to One Free Korea, where Joshua also put up a post on this video, with some very good commentary. A sample:

These are the expendable people of North Korea, the ones who don’t have a place in the propaganda parades, the ones who don’t get to eat the food aid that the regime either refuses or steals from them. I’d be surprised if that woman were still alive today.

One day, these people are going to hold their oppressors accountable. The more I see, the more convinced I become that we should teach them how, and then arm them. North Korea needs a revolution, and no peaceful revolution can possibly succeed in such a place. When governments become destroyers of humanity, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish them. I see no other way.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if that were sooner rather than later?

Chinese netizen reactions to North Korean brinksmanship

I don't usually put much stock in netizen reactions as news (this oldie but goodie The Marmot's Hole post sums up why), but I thought this collection of Chinese netizen comments by the Wall Street Journal provided some useful insight:

The Kims are making trouble for the Chinese people here. Chinese people don’t want to control North Korea, but Fatty Kim is getting out of control. No one sympathizes with them, and this will only isolate them further. They need to build up their economy. — reader commenting in Baidu’s Post Bar discussion forum

From a broader perspective, this seemingly random attack was in fact an inevitable consequence of tensions that have been developing between the Koreas ever since the Cheonan incident. Additionally, ever since its second nuclear weapons test, North Korea has wanted to be invited to the table as a nuclear power…Forcing the U.S., China and other countries to acquiesce in this is the strategic objective it wants to realize. — Zhang Liangui, Korea expert, Central Party School

By every indication, North Korea despises the Six-Party Talks… The Six-Party Talks and the strategic objectives of North Korea are completely contradictory. North Korea firmly believes that possessing nuclear weapons isn’t just a matter of maintaining stability on the peninsula—it’s also a way for them to get more of what they want. — Shen Dingli, professor of international relations, Fudan University

China has no right to criticize North Korea. North Korea has a right to pursue freedom. If they can’t earn freedom, if they scream and nobody pays attention, then cannons will get attention. Cannons are effective. — reader commenting on Sina.com’s Mil Forum

As far as peninsular issues are concerned, South Korea relies completely on the United States military, seldom consulting China. As a result, despite China and South Korea having a common interest—despite China and both Koreas having a common interest—in stability, what you get instead is yesterday’s attack. — Global Times editorial

Firing on a residential area is the most intolerable act. The EU, the U.S., Japan and even Russia have condemned it, but all we can do is express neutrality. The most pressure in this situation actually falls on our shoulders. North Korea understands this, keeps stirring things up, because they know we’ll help them—stir things up all over the place then make us cover their tail. — reader commenting in Baidu’s Post Bar

The link is courtesy of One Free Korea, included in a post listing other worthwhile links.

Anju links, Barbara Demick, Juan Williams, and a little stream of consciousness at 7 a.m.

After a nearly 48-hour blackout thanks to my weekly real-world hump of work every Thursday, I was all set to do a bunch of posts on stuff happening in North Korea this week, and then I thought, ah, I'll just point everybody to this post full of links at One Free Korea.

Although I have not yet read her book Nothing to Envy, I'm happy to hear that Barbara Demick is now a finalist for the National Book Award (that's one of the OFK links from above).

On a side note (and this has nothing at all to do with Barbara Demick per se, but it was triggered by the National Book Foundation choosing a book like hers as a finalist), one thing that I've noted lately is that North Korea serves as a convenient whipping boy for the mainstream media that wants to dispel accusations that they are too "liberal." Though there are some news media outlets that have their reporters hop a plane to Pyongyang and then talk about how things in the capital aren't as bad as we've heard, most journalists fall over themselves finding new ways to discuss how strange, scary, oppressive, eerie, or Orwellian the place is. That is, they're clearly bashing a communist government, which gives them or their media outlet cover to say they are not knee-jerk pro-leftist or anti-capitalist or whatever.

Just an observation. We could get in a whole discussion about whether or not the lame-stream MSM (mainstream media, as some conservatives like to call it so they can identify each other in an online crowd) really is liberal, but it's not hard to find a pattern where the media as a whole (or as individuals) show off that they can be tough on a supposedly liberal subject (e.g., Bill Clinton during the impeachment, Obama as out of touch, the NYT in the run-up to the Gulf War, etc.) to prove they're not really liberal mouthpieces.

This kind of thing (i.e., bashing an okay-to-bash group in order to prove you're not a rabid leftist), of course, may have backfired for NPR's Juan Williams, who may have subconsciously employed this tactic on the Bill O'Reilly Show when he honestly said he thinks what many Americans themselves think:

When I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous.

Juan Williams, a prominent journalist on a network widely reviled by conservatives as the worst of liberal propaganda machines because it's taxpayer-supported, went on a show on the mouthpiece of American conservatives and basically recounted that, "Hey, I'm just like you guys."

And then he was fired. Because NPR isn't scared of being labeled liberal. They're scared of looking insensitive to minorities, especially a religious minority whom much of the country has tacitly given a green light to bashing.

As we like to say here at Monster Island, this is all kinds of stupid. I have not yet watched Juan Williams on the Bill O'Reilly Show (and I'd like to point out that Bill O'Reilly is my favorite among the Faux News talking heads, though lately I'm more likely to see him on The Daily Show than on his own program), but he should realize there would be a backlash for saying, essentially, that looking at any Muslim makes me fear they are a terrorist.

But NPR, instead of taking such rash action, could have used this star journalist of theirs and forged a national teaching moment out of it. Yeah, even this progressive (?) reporter on this supposedly leftist network himself gets sucked into this toxic prejudice about people who are different from him. One could imagine a whole dialogue where the fears of the non-Muslim population are aired and analyzed for what it is, while also addressing, say, what sometimes seem to be the lack of outrage by the Muslim community in America about terrorist activities perpetrated in the name of their faith and by members of their community (even if it is a small handful out of millions and millions of people).

So the opportunity for a great national dialogue was lost. Some have noted that the sacking of Juan Williams has echoes of this summer's firing of Shirley Sherrod. If so, if NPR reviews the tape and realizes that in the bigger picture of Mr Williams's appearance on Bill O'Reilly's program what he said was more tempered, even, and honest, maybe they can hire the guy back and then then begin that dialogue. (I especially don't like the idea of people being fired for honestly revealing their prejudices, though I can understand NPR's point of view that, well, maybe someone who harbors such thoughts — and publicly airs them — isn't really the kind of reporter that belongs in their stable.)

Let the healing begin.

Plan B

Over at One Free Korea, Joshua seems quite pleased with the Obama administration's announcement of targeted sanctions against North Korea. Indeed, they seem to be following his must-read "Plan B" almost to the letter (no pun intended):

The order, pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, authorizes the blocking of assets of “any person” providing what Treasury calls “material support” for North Korea’s WMD proliferation, money laundering, counterfeiting, trade in luxury goods, bulk cash smuggling, and pretty much everything North Korea does that violates UNSCR 1718 or 1874, or the U.S. Criminal Code.

In addition to the new order, Treasury also imposed new sanctions against several North Korean entities under the existing Executive Order 13382. Below the fold, I’ve pasted the text of the Executive Order, President Obama’s letter forwarding the EO to the Speaker of the House, two Treasury press releases, and some remarks by OFK favorite Stuart Levey, all of which I’ve archived here to aid your research and mine.

My initial reaction is that the new EO gets it just right. It’s narrowly targeted at North Korea’s illicit activities, but it’s also broad enough to cover the main ones — arms and drug trafficking, money laundering, currency and pharmaceutical counterfeiting, and the squandering of its resources on luxury goods while North Korean children starve in the streets. This is a tough-yet-refined version of the Plan B I’ve been advocating since its earliest draft in 2006.

And since I have become convinced that this is the right thing to do at this time, I'm pleased as well. I hope these are implemented effective and given a chance to work. (And note that the "Plan B" link toward the bottom of the last paragraph means that Obama is trying the very things Joshua Stanton wrote in April 2009 that Obama would never try.)

It fits in nicely with my own theory on what to do about North Korea (when I'm not bemoaning that nothing can be done about North Korea), which can be summed up thus:

For me the model is kill with kindness, don’t be a doormat, and be ready to smack ‘em down if they get out of line. How’s that for a North Korean policy?

I call that the hybrid Sunshine-plus-Kick-'em-Where-the-Sun-Don't-Shine Approach.

The Telegraph plagiarizes Joshua's work at One Free Korea

Go here to see the case laid out. It's pretty clear-cut. Egregious and inexcusable.

Joshua's a lawyer, and a couple other lawyers chime in (including Brendon Carr), and they discuss whether Google Maps images that have been interpreted (i.e., painstakingly pored over and analyzed to locate key North Korea structures and facilities previously unknown to the public) and enhanced (e.g., arrows added to show where key items are located) are Joshua's or remain the property of Google.

But clearly the descriptions of the locations and the facilities that are provided by Joshua cannot even remotely be considered the property of Google. They are solely the work of Joshua and they are not on the maps.

Make no mistake, this is serious business. This is the kind of thing that gets undergrads kicked out of college, thank you very much. In the professional world, this is out-and-out theft: The Telegraph passed this off as their own research, and on that basis they sell subscriptions and advertising. They profited from Joshua's efforts. Shame on them.

The Telegraph owes Joshua a public apology, an explanation, and perhaps some cash.

UPDATE (next morning):
According to Joshua, The Telegraph is now crediting One Free Korea for its photos and descriptions. I think they should also issue an apology and explanation, but if Joshua is satisfied, then I'll let it go.

Evidence points to an external explosion sinking the Chonan

Something very big and very urgent has landed on my virtual desk this morning, so I don't have time to get into the most recent evidence of an external attack on the Chonan,  which points toward the dreaded possibility that it was sunk by a North Korean mine, torpedo, or submersible.

Instead, I will point you toward Joshua's excellent roundup of the latest information. A snippet:

One possibility raised is of a mine left over from the Korean War, but none has been found since 1984, and it just doesn’t seem likely that one would destroy a warship in an area patrolled this frequently only now, when North Korea happens to be raising tensions. It seems more likely that whoever placed the mine — if it was a mine — probably did so recently.

That is from his latest update, but the whole post is worth reading.

Is it starting to unravel in the DPRK?

There is just so much going on in terms of public anger and unrest in North Korea over the Great Currency Obliteration of 2009 that it is simply too hard for me to keep up on this site. All I can do is recommend that people read One Free Korea, the Daily NK, and the links on their sites for the latest stories.

But when something particularly important catches my eye, I do try to highlight it. This story, for example, from The Daily NK is talking about ongoing "fighting in the streets," highlighting reports of citizens ambushing security forces tasked with cracking down on the markets that the average Cho, who has now lost his/her savings, needs in order to survive.

In particular, this paragraph caught my attention:

The source concluded, “Traders and residents have lost their property due to the redenomination and are pretty much being treated as criminals as a result of the NSA and PSA’s ‘50-Day Battle.’ Therefore, people are taking revenge on agents, since they feel so desperate that, regardless of their actions, they will die. As a result, social unrest is becoming more serious.” [emphasis mine]

That sounds eerily like I predicted in the Obliteration post linked in the first paragraph. It sounds an awful lot like the tipping point I described:

To me, the tipping point for revolution in North Korea is when a critical mass of people in the DPRK realize that they are more likely to die if they do nothing than if they try to do something. That critical mass is hard to reach, though, because the fear of the authorities imprisoning or wiping out your entire family based on your actions as an individual complicates the calculus of that tipping point of death: You have to figure out at what point your entire set of loved ones are more likely to die if you do nothing than if you do something, and that gets into far murkier math. ...

But the currency revaluation may have revalued the death tipping point calculus as well, and I wonder if this one event may be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back, a catalyst that changes the game for so many people in such detrimental ways — and at the beginning of winter to boot — that the tipping point of death becomes more clearly in sight. [emphasis in original]

I've said it so many times since the end of last year that I'm starting to sound like a broken record: I think we're witnessing the beginning of the end. Things have happened in North Korea that even an oppressive state apparatus cannot quash or suppress. In fact, the more they try, the likelier it would be that they fail, for in the current situation it brings them closer to the tipping point.