Quotes of the Day:
“There is but one thing of real value - to cultivate truth and justice, and to live without anger in the midst of lying and unjust men.”
- Marcus Aurelius
"Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring."
- Marilyn Monroe
“To waste, to destroy our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed.”
- Theodore Roosevelt
1. N.K. leader's sister sends medicine to patients with new infectious disease: KCNA
2. U.S. Bombers on Standby for N.Korean Nuke Test
3. Seoul's top nuclear envoy meets senior U.S. officials to discuss N. Korea issue
4. Behind N. Korea's latest shakeup of officials in high-ranking positions
5. JCS chief visits southern Navy, Air Force units to inspect readiness
6. Yoon says U.N. Security Council should resolutely respond to N.K. provocations
7. S. Pyongan Province authorities forcibly mobilize street vendors to weed fields
8. Defense Ministry pushes for normalization of THAAD base in Seongju
9. South Korea's Yoon calls for coordinated U.N. response to North Korea's provocations - media
10. Australia and South Korea: Resetting Middle Power Ambitions
11. US conveyed concerns over N. Korean nuclear weapon test to China
12. As nuclear test looms, North Korea reports intestinal epidemic
13. Here's Why Japan and South Korea Are Attending a NATO Summit
14. What To Do If North Korea Tests a Nuclear Weapon Again
1. N.K. leader's sister sends medicine to patients with new infectious disease: KCNA
The hits just keep on coming for the Korean people living in the north. They cannot catch a break. But the Propaganda and Agitation Department exploits the opportunity provided by the outbreak to try to make party officials look good. Never let a crisis go to waste.
Excerpt:
On Thursday, North Korea announced an outbreak of an "acute enteric" infection in Haeju City of South Hwanghae Province. It did not specify what the disease is but it appears to refer to infectious diseases such as typhoid, dysentery, and cholera, which most frequently result from consumption of contaminated food or water and through the feces of infected patients.
N.K. leader's sister sends medicine to patients with new infectious disease: KCNA | Yonhap News Agency
By Yi Wonju
SEOUL, June 17 (Yonhap) -- Key aides to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, including his sister, have donated medicine to help people stricken with a new infectious disease in the country's southwestern region, according to Pyongyang's state media Friday.
Kim Yo-jong, the leader's younger sister who serves as vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK), and other leading officials asked the "primary Party committees of their departments to send medicines prepared by their families with sincerity to households in Haeju City and Kangryong County of South Hwanghae Province where an acute enteric epidemic occurred," the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.
They include Hyon Song-wol, a vice department director of the Central Committee, known for her role as an orchestra leader and as a delegate in the inter-Korean talks during the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games.
Jo Yong-won, secretary for organizational affairs of the WPK's Central Committee, said he would "make sure that the families of the officials of the departments of the Party Central Committee voluntarily and morally" help patients relieve their discomfort and pain as soon as possible.
Jo added that he will organize the transportation of medicine to over 800 families suffering from the infectious disease in South Hwanghae Province on Friday. The figure suggests at least 2,000 people could be affected by the illness.
On Thursday, North Korea announced an outbreak of an "acute enteric" infection in Haeju City of South Hwanghae Province. It did not specify what the disease is but it appears to refer to infectious diseases such as typhoid, dysentery, and cholera, which most frequently result from consumption of contaminated food or water and through the feces of infected patients.
The batch of medicine donated by leader Kim earlier this week was successfully delivered to patients in southwestern Haeju City, the KCNA said.
The series of donations made by the Kim family and their key aides appear intended to allay public woes amid growing challenges to fight the spread of the coronavirus and the unidentified illness, observers here say.
Concerns have grown over the impact of the virus outbreak in the impoverished country known for its fragile health care system and chronic food shortages.
julesyi@yna.co.kr
(END)
2. U.S. Bombers on Standby for N.Korean Nuke Test
Interesting interpretation from the Chosun Ilbo headline editor. But perhaps Kim Jong Un thinks the B-52s are targeting him specifically.
U.S. Bombers on Standby for N.Korean Nuke Test
June 17, 2022 12:39
U.S. strategic bombers are circling the Korean Peninsula on standby for another North Korean nuclear test.
A B-52H Stratofortress long-range bomber capable of carrying nuclear-tipped missiles was spotted in skies over Japan on Thursday, while an RC-135S Cobra Ball reconnaissance aircraft flew over waters east of Japan to spy on North Korea, and a squadron of B-1B Lancer bombers have been on standby at Guam for more than 10 days.
The deployment is part of the "extended deterrence commitment" to South Korea that U.S. President Joe Biden reaffirmed when he met with President Yoon Suk-yeol in Seoul last month and a warning message to Pyongyang, which seems to be preparing a fresh nuclear test.
/Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force
According to private flight trackers Golf9 and CANUK78, the B-52H bomber flew over Honshu on Thursday morning. It is capable of carrying a total of 32 tons of weapons like 12 AGM-129 cruise missiles and 20 AGM-86A cruise missiles. On May 25, the B-52H also flew over Japan in a show of force after the North launched a long-range ballistic missile.
On Thursday, the RC-135S spy aircraft flew over waters southeast of Hokkaido to keep watch on the North's nuclear and missile activities. Equipped with a precision radar and an electro-optical device that make it possible to track the flight of ballistic missiles from a long distance, the RC-135S is capable of detecting signs of a missile launch in advance.
A satellite image of Guam on Wednesday shows four B-1B bombers deployed at the U.S. base there, Voice of America reported. The B-1Bs were forward-deployed to Guam from Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota on June 3.
In a report Wednesday, the U.S. Center for Strategic and International Studies said new construction activity was detected at Tunnel No. 4 at North Korea's Punggye-ri nuclear test site. South Korean military authorities believe the purpose is to repair a nearby road that had been washed away by a heavy rains last year.
- Copyright © Chosunilbo & Chosun.com
3. Seoul's top nuclear envoy meets senior U.S. officials to discuss N. Korea issue
Sustained high level allied engagement.
Seoul's top nuclear envoy meets senior U.S. officials to discuss N. Korea issue | Yonhap News Agency
SEOUL, June 17 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's top nuclear envoy has met senior U.S. State Department officials in Washington, D.C. to discuss North Korea policies amid concerns of it carrying out a nuclear test, according to officials Friday.
Kim Gunn, special representative for Korean Peninsula peace and security affairs, had a series of meetings with the Joe Biden administration officials during his trip there accompanying Foreign Minister Park Jin earlier this week.
In a Twitter message, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman said she met with Kim "to ensure a strong, coordinated, international response" to North Korea's "ongoing destabilizing activities."
Daniel Kritenbrink, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, also tweeted that the Seoul envoy "provided updates" on the Yoon Suk-yeol administration's North Korea policy and they agreed on "the critical importance" of the allies' continued coordination.
ejkim@yna.co.kr
(END)
4. Behind N. Korea's latest shakeup of officials in high-ranking positions
Hmmm.... I have not seen other reports to confirm this assessment. I look forward to the comments of north Korea nuclear and leadership experts.
Behind N. Korea's latest shakeup of officials in high-ranking positions - Daily NK
North Korea has ended efforts to advance its nuclear capacity through “self-reliance," shifting to actively adopt technologies and bring in equipment from overseas
By Seulkee Jang - 2022.06.17 1:27pm
Kim Jong Un at an emergency consultative meeting of the politburo earlier this year. (Rodong Sinmun - News1)
North Korea recently carried out a large-scale shakeup of major high-ranking figures handling relations with South Korea and the United States, stressing “strength against strength” and a “head-on contest.”
Within North Korea’s ruling party, speculation is emerging that Pyongyang will adopt a strategy of focusing on diplomacy with Washington by launching a “head-on contest” with the US, while adopting a hardline policy against Seoul, excluding South Korea from all negotiations and continuing tensions.
Prior to this, North Korea media reported that Kim Jong Un chaired the Fifth Enlarged Plenary Meeting of the Eighth Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea from June 8 to 10. “The General Secretary said that the right to self-defence is an issue of defending sovereignty, clarifying once again the Party’s invariable fighting principle of power for power and head-on contest,” KCNA reported on June 11. “And he set forth the militant tasks to be pushed forward by the armed forces of the Republic and the national defence research sector.”
In particular, the meeting elevated first deputy foreign minister Choe Son Hui to foreign minister. Choe is an expert on the US who led not only bilateral talks with the US in 2018 and 2019, but also several four-party and six-party talks as well.
In North Korea, Choe has long been recognized as the country’s top figure in diplomacy with the US. Until recently, she oversaw strategy and analysis regarding the US at the foreign ministry.
A high-ranking Daily NK source in North Korea said Wednesday that Choe is one of only a handful of cadres who can talk one-on-one to Kim Jong Un. This means Kim has great faith in Choe.
Choe has suffered setbacks, too, having been sentenced to three months of “revolutionization” — i.e., a punishment of forced labor and ideological training — in 2020 due to conflicts with previous Foreign Minister Ri Son Gwon. However, the source said in matters regarding intelligence analysis and strategy vis-a-vis the United States, Kim Jong Un has long received reports directly from Choe, not Ri.
On the other hand, Ri — who had earned dishonor in North Korea as a “puppet boss” due to his insufficient experience in US diplomacy — has been named head of the ruling party’s United Front Department, returning to his original bailiwick, namely, dealing with South Korea.
Some North Koreans say that while the hardline Ri, who played the role of the regime’s tough talker in the past, closed off talks with the US after being named foriegn minister, the appointment of Choi sent a message that Pyongyang could actively seek talks with Washington.
A high-ranking source said the latest shakeup aimed to “realize the foreign policy line to smash the ‘action first, compensation later’ system presented by the US and move to a ‘compensation first, action later’ system.”
Within its ruling party, North Korea has already been reaffirming its foreign policy line that if the US first eases sanctions and presents economic compensation, Pyongyang could suspend nuclear tests and freeze its nuclear program.
Meanwhile, North Korea has reportedly altered some of its policies in the military industry sector, ending efforts to advance its nuclear capacity through “self-reliance” and launching efforts to actively adopt technologies and bring in equipment from overseas.
North Korean authorities believe they have completed all the weapon technologies and designs they could domestically develop, and now they must bring in supplies or technologies from overseas to further develop their firepower, another high-ranking source told Daily NK.
The source said it was in this context that Yu Jin was replaced by Cho Chun Ryong as head of the Munitions Industry Department.
Cho is a scientist who specialized in missiles at Kim Jong Un National Defense University. However, he also reportedly took part in activities to import weapon plans and parts from overseas, too.
Within the ruling party, Yu’s replacement less than a year after being named to the post is seen as punishment for the failed test launch of the Hwasong-17 missile.
People say that Yu “wasted a lot of party funds,” said the source.
“Yu bears a lot of responsibility for the failed test launch, but because he’s a trusted comrade of Kim, he wasn’t kicked out completely and could rise again,” he added.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Please direct any comments or questions about this article to dailynkenglish@uni-media.net.
5. JCS chief visits southern Navy, Air Force units to inspect readiness
Was there a ghost writer visiting from the north to help with these statements:
During his visit to the submarine command, Won called for service members to always maintain their capabilities and postures to "paralyze the heart of hostile forces" with a "single stroke."
"Submarines are key strategic weapons for national security. They are like sharp daggers that can give fear to the enemies," Won said.
In a separate visit to the Air Force unit, Won also called for service members to maintain thorough defense postures through effective operations of their surveillance assets.
JCS chief visits southern Navy, Air Force units to inspect readiness | Yonhap News Agency
SEOUL, June 17 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's top military officer on Friday visited Navy and Air Force units in the southern region to check their readiness amid growing concerns over the possibility of a North Korean nuclear test.
Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) Chair Gen. Won In-choul inspected the Navy's Submarine Force Command in Changwon, 398 kilometers south of Seoul, and the Air Mobility & Reconnaissance Command in the southeastern city of Busan.
During his visit to the submarine command, Won called for service members to always maintain their capabilities and postures to "paralyze the heart of hostile forces" with a "single stroke."
"Submarines are key strategic weapons for national security. They are like sharp daggers that can give fear to the enemies," Won said.
In a separate visit to the Air Force unit, Won also called for service members to maintain thorough defense postures through effective operations of their surveillance assets.
He also visited the 51st Airborne Control Flight Group in Busan, which operates the E-737 Peace Eye aircraft.
His visit came as the military was tightening up its defense readiness in the wake of the North's continued missile launches and signs that it is preparing for a nuclear experiment.
colin@yna.co.kr
(END)
6. Yoon says U.N. Security Council should resolutely respond to N.K. provocations
Should but will not as long as China and Russia have a veto. They will protect north Korea. This is not 2017.
(LEAD) Yoon says U.N. Security Council should resolutely respond to N.K. provocations | Yonhap News Agency
(ATTN: ADDS remarks, details from para 3)
SEOUL, June 17 (Yonhap) -- President Yoon Suk-yeol told U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres that the U.N. Security Council should respond in a resolute and united manner to North Korea's provocations.
Yoon made the remarks in a phone call with Guterres, saying North Korean provocations pose a serious threat to peace on the Korean Peninsula and the international community, an official at Yoon's office said.
Last month, the Security Council failed to adopt a new sanctions resolution on North Korea, which launched a series of ballistic missiles, including intercontinental ballistic missiles, due to vetoes from China and Russia.
"Unless the Security Council takes a resolute and united response, a wrong message could be sent that it tolerates North Korea's nuclear and missile development," Yoon told Guterres, according to the official.
Yoon also voiced concerns about the spread of COVID-19 outbreaks in North Korea.
He told Guterres that North Korea remains unresponsive to South Korea's offer to provide vaccines and treatment for the virus.
Yoon asked the U.N. to closely monitor the COVID-19 situation in North Korea and make close consultations with the South Korean government over the matter, the official said.
kdh@yna.co.kr
(END)
7. S. Pyongan Province authorities forcibly mobilize street vendors to weed fields
Take the weeds by force!
Weeds are more important than markets.
Kill two birds with one stone - eradicate weeds and reduce market activity that is a threat to the regime. The regime is taking away the people's safety valve: markets.
S. Pyongan Province authorities forcibly mobilize street vendors to weed fields - Daily NK
A "grasshopper market," or unofficial market, in a village near Pyongyang. (Chinese blogger Lóng Wǔ*Láng Zhī Wěn)
South Pyongan Province authorities are tightening crack downs on street vendors once again, and vendors caught in the crackdowns are being pressed into weeding fields, Daily NK has learned.
A source in South Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Tuesday that police in Pyongsong have recently been intensifying crackdowns on street commerce.
“Seven street vendors who were selling food and vegetables streetside were busted by police early this month and dragged off to pick weeds at a local farm for five days before being freed,” he said.
According to the source, police in Pyongsong have been working hard to bust street vendors after streetside commerce was reinvigorated with the recent easing of lockdowns imposed to deal with the spread of COVID-19.
The source said that street vendors in Pyongsong are suffering because police are confiscating their wares without compensation, and dragging them off to local farms to pick weeds in rice paddies and fields.
One merchant who was busted — a woman in her 30s with a three-year-old child — reportedly collapsed while doing five days of uncompensated labor.
When she was arrested, she pleaded with police to let her go so she could “earn enough to at least feed her child rice porridge,” telling them that the child “could not get up due to malnutrition.” However, the police pretended not to listen, forced her into a car and drove her to a farm, where they put her to work picking weeds from a corn field.
Overworked, she ultimately collapsed in the field and was hospitalized, said the source.
“Police officials have long been cracking down on street vendors to eliminate non-socialist phenomena, but then pivoted to wage a clean up operation against streetside commerce as part of COVID-19 quarantine efforts over the last two years,” the source said. “Recent crackdowns, however, are aimed at providing support to farms suffering labor shortages.”
The source said street vendors are at the “very bottom of the ladder,” people who live on what they earn day-to-day.
“Street vendors have no power to do anything as the authorities simply crack down on their activities without giving them even a gram of rice,” he said.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Please direct any comments or questions about this article to dailynkenglish@uni-media.net.
8. Defense Ministry pushes for normalization of THAAD base in Seongju
President Yoon wants more THAAD. But they must fix the problems at Seongju first.
Defense Ministry pushes for normalization of THAAD base in Seongju
Posted June. 17, 2022 07:46,
Updated June. 17, 2022 07:46
Defense Ministry pushes for normalization of THAAD base in Seongju. June. 17, 2022 07:46. by Sang-Ho Yun ysh1005@donga.com.
The Ministry of National Defense pitched in to form a consultative body for the general environmental impact assessment of a U.S. THAAD missile defense unit in Seongju, North Gyeongsang Province on Thursday. Its move can be interpreted as a signal of the normalization of the unit in five years left in the status of temporary installation during the entire term of the former Moon Jae-in administration.
The ministry announced that for environmental impact assessment, it asked related local governments and environmental institutions for the recommendations of members of the consultative body. “The organization will be consisted of the civil servants of related local governments and environmental offices, private environmental experts, resident representatives as well as the officials from the Ministry of Defense and Environment,” the ministry said. “After being launched, the organization will conduct assessment in a swift manner according to law and procedure of the Seongju unit for its normalization.”
The general environmental impact assessment usually takes more than a year, but the ministry is planning to put the plan forward as much as possible. “Accumulated data from small-scale assessments done so far may help us finish it within this year at the earliest,” said the source in the ministry. When the assessment is completed, the THAAD battery will become available for the construction and extension for the normalization.
The THAAD battery was deployed in Seongju in April 2017 in the wake of North Korea’s heightened nuclear and missile threats and has been on duty in the status of temporary installation. Throughout the former Moon administration, the United States pointed out the poor conditions of the base even mentioning its withdrawal, which developed into discord in the alliance.
9. South Korea's Yoon calls for coordinated U.N. response to North Korea's provocations - media
Coordinating with everyone but China and Russia.
South Korea's Yoon calls for coordinated U.N. response to North Korea's provocations - media
SEOUL, June 17 (Reuters) - South Korea's President Yoon Suk-yeol said the United Nations Security Council should respond in a coordinated manner against North Korea's missile provocations, South Korea's Newsis reported on Friday.
Yoon made the remarks in a telephone conversation with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres during which he also called for close communication for assistance to North Korea in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the report.
North Korea has been battling its first confirmed outbreak of COVID-19 infections, declaring a state of emergency last month.
South Korea and the United States have offered to provide help, including with vaccines, but Pyongyang remains unresponsive while ratcheting up tensions with a series of weapons tests.
Yoon's call for a coordinated U.N. response came after China and Russia vetoed a U.S.-led bid to impose new U.N. sanctions on Pyongyang over the renewed ballistic missile launches.
The double veto publicly split the 15-member Security Council for the first time since it started punishing Pyongyang in 2006. read more
In Washington, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman met Kim Gunn, South Korea's Special Representative for Korean Peninsula Peace and Security Affairs, on Thursday and discussed ways to ensure a "strong, coordinated, international response" to North Korea's "destabilising activities," she said on Twitter.
Reporting by Soo-hyang Choi; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman
10. Australia and South Korea: Resetting Middle Power Ambitions
Excerpts:
Australia and South Korea certainly share many similarities in their foreign policy outlooks and approaches. Their new governments, nevertheless, will have to overcome several challenges in efforts to reset their middle-power ambitions.
Chinese pressure on the Yoon administration will inevitably be a careful consideration as it gradually enmeshes itself in U.S.-led regional initiatives. Provocations from Pyongyang may also draw Seoul’s attention away from the broader Indo-Pacific and back to the Korean Peninsula, while domestic sentiments in South Korea may complicate the government’s efforts to repair ties with Japan.
Likewise, Australia’s policy frameworks and the strong bipartisanship around them will make it harder to suddenly overturn existing trends. With the Quad and AUKUS having absorbed much of Australia’s limited policy bandwidth, for example, Labor’s promise to invest more in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific will require delicate adjustments to an already overstretched public service. Ambitious global diplomacy on climate change will also need sustained high-level commitment but the past decade of domestic political feuds over climate policy does not bode well for Australian leadership on this issue.
Such gaps between ambition and reality will not be easy to navigate, but both middle powers under their new leaderships should effectively leverage the rapidly shifting geopolitical dynamics to make a positive contribution toward regional and global stability. There remains a need for middle powers to consider fresh policy ideas and undertake concerted advocacy if, in the words of former Australian foreign minister and leading advocate of the middle power concept Gareth Evans, “the world around them is to be safer, saner, more just and more prosperous.”
Australia and South Korea: Resetting Middle Power Ambitions
It is worth assessing if and how two of the Indo-Pacific’s most prominent middle powers might once again pursue creative and ambitious statecraft.
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In recent years, scholars have debated the apparent lack of diplomatic leadership by “middle powers” like Australia and South Korea on the international stage. Such pessimism should be reconsidered, however, in light of new administrations in both Canberra and Seoul. It is worth assessing if and how two of the Indo-Pacific’s most prominent middle powers might once again pursue creative and ambitious statecraft.
Early indications hint at opportunities that the governments of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol could capitalize on to rethink their respective countries’ alignment toward the great powers, strengthen their roles in regional arrangements and institutions, and renew their global activism.
Stronger Support for the U.S.?
Like several of their regional counterparts, Australia and South Korea have faced difficulties in trying to navigate their security alliances with the United States and economic interdependence with China. Both countries could leverage the opening afforded by their new leaderships to reset or reinforce their relations with the great powers.
U.S. President Joe Biden’s May trip to Seoul set some high expectations for the kind of role Washington wants South Korea to play going forward. The United States is looking for a more proactive South Korea that will contribute its economic, military, and technological edge to a regional balancing agenda vis-à-vis China. However, although Seoul is expected to rethink its “strategic ambiguity” and align more closely with the U.S. under Yoon, the new administration has so far been cautious about expanding the alliance’s mission to also deal with China.
Meanwhile, Albanese has promised to the stay the course in terms of Australia’s close alliance with the United States. Policy continuity is expected on most issues of Australia-U.S. relations, such as the Enhanced Force Posture Initiatives, deeper technological cooperation, and implementing the AUKUS partnership. The new Labor government has also been at pains to emphasize that it will not offer any concessions but will partake in “much less … chest beating” in its relations with China.
It would therefore be easy to assume that Australia and South Korea will simply continue to follow the general contours of their respective strategies toward the great powers. However, potential strategic surprises could very quickly trigger new alignment postures by Albanese and Yoon. For Australia, if a re-elected Donald Trump presidency abandoned the AUKUS partnership, it would force a profound re-evaluation of Australia’s current strategic policy choices. For South Korea, a new dispute with China could compel Yoon’s hand to take a hard line in light of his criticism of the previous administration’s handling of the 2016-17 THAAD crisis.
Enhanced Role in Regional Arrangements and Institutions?
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The rise of groupings like the Quad and AUKUS, as well as Chinese-led economic initiatives and various ASEAN-plus arrangements, have made for a more crowded regional institutional landscape. As middle powers that are individually unable to influence decision making but could collectively have a significant impact, both Canberra and Seoul will no doubt pursue greater engagement in the various platforms that would amplify their voices and roles in the region.
In contrast to the previous South Korean government’s ambivalence towards exclusive U.S.-led arrangements, Yoon has doubled down on the importance of cooperating with like-minded partners and plans to release its own Indo-Pacific Strategy. Seoul may not be set to formally join the Quad, but the door remains open to its participation in some of its working groups. The Yoon administration’s keenness to mend bilateral relations with Tokyo also suggests that there could be more instances of groupings involving the two countries in support of a free and open Indo-Pacific.
The Albanese government has been quick to reaffirm its support for the Quad, with the prime minister visiting Tokyo for the Quad summit only days after the federal election and before he had even finalized his ministry. Australia is scheduled to host the next Quad Summit in 2023, accompanied by the emergence of an “ambitious and diverse” Quad agenda that boasts a range of initiatives. Beyond the Quad, Australia will arguably continue to prize its participation in the various trilateral groupings, such as with India and France as well as with Japan and the U.S., in realizing its preferred regional order.
Alongside their interest in smaller groupings, Australia and South Korea are also expected to recalibrate their engagement with ASEAN. On the heels of the ASEAN-Australia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership established in 2021, Labor has announced several initiatives focused on Southeast Asia, including an extra A$470 million in aid and development assistance and the appointment of an ASEAN Special Envoy. Meanwhile, the new South Korean government has indicated a potential modification of its predecessor’s New Southern Policy to include “a strengthened strategy aspect,” perhaps beefing up its niche in defense industry cooperation with selected Southeast Asian partners.
Australia and South Korea can still influence the shape of the region’s minilateral and multilateral groupings. Australia has been at pains to emphasize the Quad’s positive contributions to regional public goods rather than just being a platform for containing China, and South Korea’s engagement on specific Quad initiatives will reinforce the grouping’s openness. Australia and South Korea’s deepening defense cooperation with Southeast Asia, particularly in capacity building, similarly highlights the important value that middle powers can bring as equal partners with Southeast Asia beyond a China-U.S. binary.
Renewal of Global Activism?
Australia and South Korea will also have a chance to renew their global diplomatic activism in light of challenges such as climate change, pandemic recovery, and emerging technologies. From the United Nations to major international treaties, persistent effort and coalition building have been widely associated with the behavioral expectations of what it means to be a middle power. The invitations for Australia and South Korea to participate in the 2021 G-7 Summit and 2022 NATO Summit certainly reflect the expectations regarding middle-power contributions to global agendas.
Against this backdrop, Yoon has called South Korea a “global pivotal state” in an updated interpretation of former President Lee Myung-bak’s “global Korea” concept. This suggests that South Korea will engage in a concerted attempt to raise its international profile, which could also involve Seoul’s bid for a non-permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council for 2024–25, as well as hosting a future meeting of Biden’s Summit for Democracy.
While Australia has steadily narrowed its global vision and ambitions to its immediate region, the new government’s focus on climate change will be an opportunity to renew a global level of engagement. After all, current Foreign Minister Penny Wong and others were actively involved in the Copenhagen climate talks over a decade ago under the previous Kevin Rudd government. Moreover, Australia’s enormous potential in areas like hydrogen, solar, and wind can be aligned with South Korea’s strong expertise in nuclear energy to speed up the world’s energy transition to a zero-emissions future.
Looking Ahead
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Australia and South Korea certainly share many similarities in their foreign policy outlooks and approaches. Their new governments, nevertheless, will have to overcome several challenges in efforts to reset their middle-power ambitions.
Chinese pressure on the Yoon administration will inevitably be a careful consideration as it gradually enmeshes itself in U.S.-led regional initiatives. Provocations from Pyongyang may also draw Seoul’s attention away from the broader Indo-Pacific and back to the Korean Peninsula, while domestic sentiments in South Korea may complicate the government’s efforts to repair ties with Japan.
Likewise, Australia’s policy frameworks and the strong bipartisanship around them will make it harder to suddenly overturn existing trends. With the Quad and AUKUS having absorbed much of Australia’s limited policy bandwidth, for example, Labor’s promise to invest more in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific will require delicate adjustments to an already overstretched public service. Ambitious global diplomacy on climate change will also need sustained high-level commitment but the past decade of domestic political feuds over climate policy does not bode well for Australian leadership on this issue.
Such gaps between ambition and reality will not be easy to navigate, but both middle powers under their new leaderships should effectively leverage the rapidly shifting geopolitical dynamics to make a positive contribution toward regional and global stability. There remains a need for middle powers to consider fresh policy ideas and undertake concerted advocacy if, in the words of former Australian foreign minister and leading advocate of the middle power concept Gareth Evans, “the world around them is to be safer, saner, more just and more prosperous.”
11. US conveyed concerns over N. Korean nuclear weapon test to China
I bet the Chinese response was to tell us to lift sanctions and maybe Kim will not conduct a test. Of course if we do that then Kim will confirm that his political warfare strategy and blackmail diplomacy works and he will just "keep on keeping on."
Or China may have said another way: if you are so afraid of a nuclear test why don't you lift sanctions and give Kim everything he demands. Perhaps we should reflect on that. Are we so afraid of a north korean nuclear test? Or is it just another opportunity for us to respond to demonstrate that Kim's political warfare strategy and blackmail diplomacy will not be successful and will not achieve the effects Kim desires?
US conveyed concerns over N. Korean nuclear weapon test to China
U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan holds a news briefing about the situation in Afghanistan at the White House in Washington, U.S., Aug. 17, 2021. Reuters-Yonhap
The United States has discussed with China the growing concerns over a possible North Korean nuclear weapon test, U.S. national security advisor Jake Sullivan said Thursday.
He also reiterated U.S. concerns over what will be North Korea's seventh nuclear test.
"On North Korea, we have expressed our concern that North Korea is preparing to conduct another nuclear test. We have said that publicly. We have communicated that to China," Sullivan said in an online discussion session hosted by the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), a Washington-based think tank.
The remarks come after Sullivan met with Yang Jiechi, head of the Chinese Community Party's Foreign Affairs Bureau, in Europe.
"The proof will be in the pudding. Let's see how things play out, but both of these subjects featured in our discussions on Monday in Europe, the discussion I had with my counterpart, Yang," he said when asked if there existed any consensus between the U.S. and China on the war in Ukraine and North Korean provocations.
Kurt Campbell, deputy assistant to the president and National Security Council coordinator for the Indo-Pacific, later said the U.S. and China had "detailed" and "frank" discussions.
"We had a detailed and very frank set of discussions about Ukraine, about North Korea, about Southeast Asia, about the Indo-Pacific strategy, keeping those lines of communication open, trying to remove areas of potential miscalculation, trying to make sure that there are communication links in the case of inadvertence or miscalculation," he said of the Sullivan-Yang meeting in a later session hosted by CNAS.
"That is the primary pursuit as we try to build what is undeniably a competitive relationship, but hopefully a peaceful relationship in which the best aspects of competition on both sides can be brought out," he added.
China, together with Russia, blocked a U.S.-proposed U.N. Security Council resolution last month that sought to impose fresh and tougher Security Council sanctions on North Korea for staging more than a dozen ballistic missile tests this year in violation of existing Security Council resolutions.
Pyongyang has so far launched more than 31 ballistic missiles in 18 missile tests this year, according to U.S. officials.
Officials in Seoul and Washington have noted the North may also conduct its seventh nuclear weapon test in the near future, with South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin reaffirming earlier this week that Pyongyang appears to have finished all preparations and the only thing left before an actual test may be a political decision.
North Korea conducted its sixth nuclear test in September 2017. (Yonhap)
12. As nuclear test looms, North Korea reports intestinal epidemic
Distract the people with a nuclear test?
As nuclear test looms, North Korea reports intestinal epidemic
TOKYO — As South Korean and U.S. officials repeated their warnings this week about a potential North Korean nuclear test, Pyongyang announced it is fighting a new intestinal epidemic that comes as the country grapples with drought, covid and ongoing food and cash shortages from its border lockdown.
During his visit to Washington this week, South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin echoed U.S. assessments that North Korea apparently has completed preparations for its seventh nuclear test, which would sharply raise the stakes in the diplomatic standoff between Washington and Pyongyang. Park said he believes North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is waiting for the time to make his “political decision.”
New satellite images released this week by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies showed that refurbishment work at the Punggye-ri nuclear testing facility, which has been taking place over the past four months, appeared to be complete.
Pyongyang has held an unprecedented volley of missile tests as it rapidly expands and diversifies its weapons program. It tested an estimated 31 ballistic missiles this year — surpassing its annual record in just six months and despite U.N. Security Council resolutions prohibiting such tests.
All the while, North Korea remains in a strict covid border closure, even for its largest trading partner, neighboring China. Park, speaking at a news conference with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken this week, warned North Korea against further isolating itself.
“I think that North Korea is at a crossroads now. It can go ahead with its nuclear test and isolate itself, or it can make a right decision and return to the diplomacy and the dialogue. I hope North Korea can make the latter choice instead of continuing on a dangerous course of action,” Park said.
The Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, which is affiliated with the South Korean Defense Ministry, estimated North Korea has spent as much as 2 percent of its gross domestic product this year — between $400 million and $650 million — on its missile tests.
Meanwhile, North Korea’s Central News Agency reported Thursday on an outbreak of the “acute enteric epidemic,” without naming the disease or giving a caseload. The term enteric refers to the gastrointestinal tract, and observers said the disease could be an intestinal illness like typhoid and cholera.
The announcement, though concerning, does not necessarily indicate a worsening public health crisis, according to Ahn Kyung-su, from the Seoul-based research center dprkhealth.org.
Waterborne diseases like cholera and typhoid were rampant in North Korea before the announcement of the country’s first coronavirus infection. Ahn said the outbreak of intestinal disease is not an uncommon situation given the country’s poor health and sanitary conditions.
“The recent state media reports about the outbreak could be a politically motivated one to demonstrate leader Kim Jong Un’s efforts for his people,” Ahn said.
North Korean state media reported that Kim is distributing medical aid as part of “his noble outlook on devoted service for the people’s well-being.”
Still, the outbreak probably complicates matters for the regime, which is already fighting a coronavirus outbreak amid growing economic woes and a chronic shortage of vaccines and medicines.
South Korea’s Unification Ministry said Thursday that it is willing to help North Korea battle the new outbreak. But Pyongyang has not responded to offers of coronavirus aid from South Korea and the United States and is unlikely to change course with countries the regime considers national security threats.
North Korea has asked for freight train service with China to be restored amid its shortage of food and medical supplies, Japan’s Asahi Shimbun reported this week, citing Chinese sources. It was the latest sign of North Korea’s growing dependence on Beijing, which has drawn Pyongyang closer amid rising U.S.-China competition.
U.S. and North Korean denuclearization negotiations fell apart in 2019. The United States has said it is ready to resume talks without preconditions, and North Korea has said it wants sanctions relief. The United States has not indicated it would be open to lifting any sanctions and has pushed for more in response to Pyongyang’s recent tests.
Last week, China’s envoy to the United Nations, Zhang Jun, said Beijing does not want to see another North Korean nuclear test and called on the United States to lift sanctions and end joint military exercises: “The United States is the number one superpower in the world. If the United States wants to engage in dialogue with anyone in the world, it’s not a difficult thing.”
Kim reported from Seoul.
13. Here's Why Japan and South Korea Are Attending a NATO Summit
Hmmm... a perspective I had not thought of (not that I agree with it.
Excerpts:
The perception in Beijing is that Tokyo and Seoul’s participation in Madrid is directed at China. “NATO is headed by the United States,” says Zhou Bo, a retired PLA senior colonel and senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Strategy at Tsinghua University. “Therefore, if the United States concludes that China is a more serious threat than Russia, then of course it will just make use of NATO.”
China has previously enjoyed friendly relations with NATO, frequently partnering with the bloc on joint exercises like anti-piracy missions in the Gulf of Aden. In addition, NATO delegations have attended the influential Xiangshan Forum in Beijing and engaged in many official exchanges.
Yet NATO’s attitude to China is turning more hostile. Zhou, who during his PLA career was for a period in charge of relations with NATO, says that the bloc used to describe China as an “opportunity,” but under U.S. direction has tellingly shifted to using the term “challenge.”
“The irony is the U.S. actually poses a problem for NATO member states, because most of them are European countries still friendly with China,” says Zhou. “These are just countries wearing too many hats in different capacities.”
Here's Why Japan and South Korea Are Attending a NATO Summit
TIME · by Charlie Campbell
As the military conflict in Ukraine bogs down on a slice of the embattled nation’s eastern and southern periphery, the geopolitical shift sparked by Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion keeps gaining new ground. This week, it emerged that the leaders of Japan and South Korea will attend a NATO summit, as observers, for the first time. It’s another sign of Western-style democracies teaming up to meet the bellicose challenge of Moscow and the growing global assertiveness of Beijing.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced on Wednesday that he would attend the June 28-30 gathering of the 30-strong military alliance in Madrid. The attendance of South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol was confirmed earlier by his presidential office. Both leaders have legitimate reasons to consider their nations threatened by Russian aggression. Japan has a sea border and is locked in territorial disputes with Russia. The Kremlin’s historic backing of North Korea is meanwhile a perennial security concern for Seoul.
Commenting on his historic visit, Kishida told reporters that he intended to highlight common security concerns in Europe and Asia. “As the only Asian country in the G7, Japan’s diplomatic capabilities are being tested,” he said.
The news is a geopolitical blow to Russian President Vladmir Putin. Already, formerly neutral European nations Finland and Sweden have applied to join the bloc, while Denmark recently voted to align with the E.U. on defense matters. The presence of Kishida and Yoon in Madrid is also an unwelcome development for Beijing, which has refused to condemn Moscow for the war, arguing, as many Western thinkers have, that Russia was provoked by NATO’s eastward expansion.
Mieko Nakabayashi, a professor at Tokyo’s Waseda University and a former Japanese lawmaker, says that Kishida’s attendance at the meeting is a “turning point” for Japan, which still officially has a pacifist constitution. “Japanese people realize the world is changing and Japan is pretty vulnerable,” she says. “The Ukraine war was so incomprehensible for many Japanese people that it served as a wake-up call. The decline of American hegemony has convinced Japanese people that just being with the U.S. is not safe enough.”
As a result, Asia’s delicate security architecture may now be in the process of change. At the Shangri-la Dialogue security summit in Singapore on June 11, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III insisted “we do not seek a new Cold War, an Asian NATO, or a region split into hostile blocs.”
Critics say that’s exactly what NATO risks by expanding its remit beyond a European security mission.
Japanese airborne troops take part in a military review in suburban Tokyo on Oct. 14, 2018.
YOSHIKAZU TSUNO/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images
Asia Gets Serious About Defense
Over the last few weeks, Kishida has hosted a summit of the Quad security dialogue—alongside the U.S., Australia and India—and given the keynote speech at the Shangri-La Dialogue, warning “I myself have a strong sense of urgency that Ukraine today may be East Asia tomorrow.”
Had this outreach been made by Japan’s hawkish former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Nakabayashi says there probably would have been more domestic pushback. However, Kishida is perceived as being more dovish than Abe and his rhetoric on defense has more credibility. Already, Japan has promised to boost defense spending to 2% of GDP in line with NATO targets, with Abe saying the nation would be a “laughing stock” if it didn’t.
To be clear, South Korea has had extremely robust relations with Moscow, driven chiefly by economics and the confluence of South Korea’s New Northern Policy and Russia’s Turn to the East. Seoul didn’t impose its own sanctions against Moscow in response to the 2014 annexation of Crimea. But a tilt towards NATO risks upsetting that mutually beneficial detente. South Korea’s spy agency has already joined NATO’s cyber defense unit.
“If South Korea is going to burn those bridges with Moscow, I’m concerned that the situation could escalate in the Korean peninsula with Russia playing a more robust role to support Pyongyang,” says Lyle Goldstein, director for Asia engagement at the Washington D.C.-based Defense Priorities think tank and a visiting professor at Brown University. “No doubt, Pyongyang is one of the big winners in the whole Ukraine war.”
The perception in Beijing is that Tokyo and Seoul’s participation in Madrid is directed at China. “NATO is headed by the United States,” says Zhou Bo, a retired PLA senior colonel and senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Strategy at Tsinghua University. “Therefore, if the United States concludes that China is a more serious threat than Russia, then of course it will just make use of NATO.”
China has previously enjoyed friendly relations with NATO, frequently partnering with the bloc on joint exercises like anti-piracy missions in the Gulf of Aden. In addition, NATO delegations have attended the influential Xiangshan Forum in Beijing and engaged in many official exchanges.
Yet NATO’s attitude to China is turning more hostile. Zhou, who during his PLA career was for a period in charge of relations with NATO, says that the bloc used to describe China as an “opportunity,” but under U.S. direction has tellingly shifted to using the term “challenge.”
“The irony is the U.S. actually poses a problem for NATO member states, because most of them are European countries still friendly with China,” says Zhou. “These are just countries wearing too many hats in different capacities.”
While Goldstein says there are positives to Japan and South Korea taking their own defense more seriously, he cautions that coalescing a bloc of Asian allies with China on the outside risks recreating the same alienating circumstances for China that Russia felt preceding the Ukraine war.
“One of the problems with European security is that it increasingly became purely about trying to deter Russia, which became convinced that it was on the outside and had nothing to lose in using force,” says Goldstein.
“The nightmare scenario in East Asia is that China decides they have nothing to gain from actively participating in this [security] architecture so they basically have to destroy the architecture.”
More Must-Read Stories From TIME
TIME · by Charlie Campbell
14. What To Do If North Korea Tests a Nuclear Weapon Again
An opportunity for us to demonstrate that Kim's strategy is failing and he will never achieve his objectives through nuclear tests (and increased tensions, threats, and provocations).
What To Do If North Korea Tests a Nuclear Weapon Again
North Korea is building a full-spectrum nuclear and missile program. Its missiles can reach from local targets in northeast Asia all the way out to North America and Europe. It wishes to develop small, low-yield nuclear weapons which could be used on the battlefield. It is looking to build submarine-launched ballistic missiles; solid-fueled rockets which can be fueled and launched more rapidly; and multiple-warhead missiles so that even one missile breaking through missile defense can strike many targets.
A seventh nuclear test fits into this larger, long-running effort by North Korea to build out into a full-scale nuclear weapons state. Pyongyang is not satisfied with deterring the US with just a few ICBMs. It wants the full package, in part because it is conventionally very far behind the US, South Korea, and Japan. Nuclear weapons are a great way to equalize its very uneven security dilemma.
The Response of the US, South Korea, and Japan
The US and its regional allies, South Korea and Japan, have struggled with a response to all of this.
Instead, the outside world has focused on limiting North Korean arsenal growth via sanctions. Since 2006, the United Nations has sanctioned North Korea nine times. Each of those Security Council resolutions were unanimous; China and Russia to worry about just how large Pyongyang’s arsenal might become. Since 2016, the sanctions have widened to blockade whole sectors of the Northern economy. At this point, almost any substantial trade with North Korea of complex components is sanctioned.
While the sanctions have not forced North Korea to give up its weapons, they probably have slowed its march toward missiles and warheads. The North has likely undershot projections of where it otherwise might be without sanctions.
Finally, the US, Japan, and South Korea have looked to defense. North Korea would deliver a nuclear weapon on a missile, so all three countries increasingly focus on missile defense. Unfortunately, missile defense does not work very well, but there is little alternative.
What to Look for in a Next Test
Should the North test again soon, the key questions will be sheer size of the blast, and whether Pyongyang can step up from its current, primitive fission warheads to more powerful fusion weapons (a hydrogen bomb). The ability of North Korea to detonate a functional nuclear device is now accepted. Further tests will likely focus on quantitative development – building bigger and bigger weapons.
The yield – the amount of energy released – is the big question. The North, presumably, wants to build the genuinely enormous weapons that US and Soviet Union developed during the Cold War. Fusion weapons can release energy by the megaton. Such weapons are city-breaking devices and could be used to hold millions of people hostage in large cities like Tokyo or Seoul.
So What do We Do?
The US has promised a ‘swift, forceful’ response to another test. But it is not clear what options the US and its partners have which have not already been tried. Further sanctions might help at the margins, but North Korea is already pretty heavily sanctioned, and US relations with Russia and China have plunged. They would almost certainly veto any new UN sanctions.
All other options have escalation risks, but it is possible that patience with North Korea is running out. There are more aggressive options.
South Korea’s new president has flirted with missile strikes on North Korean launch sites. That is hugely risky. Less risky might a blockade of North Korean shipping, but there are obvious escalation risks here too in stopping and boarding ships. The allies might try shooting down a North Korean missile test. This idea has floated around for a decade, but there is anxiety that missile defense might not work and miss the target.
Because North Korea will not stop, ever more risky options are being tabled. This will not end well.
Dr. Robert E. Kelly (@Robert_E_Kelly; website) is a professor of international relations in the Department of Political Science at Pusan National University. Dr. Kelly is now a 1945 Contributing Editor as well.
15.
De Oppresso Liber,
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation
Senior Advisor, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy
Editor, Small Wars Journal
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
Phone: 202-573-8647
