It looks like people are slowly catching on to what I said when Kim Jong-un’s nuclear test suspension remarks were hailed as some kind of major breakthrough when it isn’t:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, second from left at the podium, presides over a plenary meeting of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea in Pyongyang on Friday. Kim declared the North will stop all nuclear and missile tests and close down its underground nuclear test site at the meeting. [RODONG SINMUN]North Korea’s announcement Friday that it will stop all nuclear and missile tests was welcomed by the South and the United States, but some critics say the statement didn’t actually indicate any interest in denuclearization from the recalcitrant state.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was quoted in a lengthy report released by the North’s state-run Korean Central News Agency Saturday as saying that no such tests were necessary anymore, “given that the work for mounting nuclear warheads on ballistic rockets was finished as the whole processes of developing nuclear weapons were carried out in a scientific way and in regular sequence.”
Kim said North Korea, starting immediately, will never use nuclear weapons nor transfer nuclear weapons or nuclear technology under any circumstances unless the country faces a nuclear provocation or threat.
The North will also “facilitate close contact and active dialogue” with neighboring countries and international society in order to guarantee the peace and security of the Korean Peninsula and the world by creating an “international environment favorable for socialist economic construction,” Kim said. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but there has been nothing done so far by the Kim regime different from what they have done before. Everything they are doing is from their standard playbook and the Korean left and international media is largely playing along with it. I’ll start getting hopeful when international inspectors are allowed to go in and monitor their nuclear facilities and artillery and troops are withdrawn from the DMZ. Until concrete actions like this are taken this is just more of the same.
Kim Jong-un announcement of suspending nuclear tests is making big news internationally:
North Korea says its quest for nuclear weapons is “complete” and it “no longer needs” to test its weapons capability, a significant development ahead of diplomatic engagement with both South Korea and the United States.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said Saturday that “under the proven condition of complete nuclear weapons, we no longer need any nuclear tests, mid-range and intercontinental ballistic rocket tests, and that the nuclear test site in northern area has also completed its mission,” as quoted by the state-run KCNA news agency.
The announcement appears to signify a remarkable change in policy for Kim, following a relentless pursuit of nuclear and ballistic weapons as a means to ensure his regime’s survival — although some analysts remain skeptical, pointing out that Kim hasn’t tested a missile since last November. [CNN]
You can read much more at the link, but remember we have been down this road before with Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il. Both of them suspended nuclear programs for international aid and look where we are at today. Also notice the rhetoric Kim Jong-un is using, he is saying the testing is “complete” and no longer needed; not that he is doing this out of the goodness of his heart for North-South cooperation.
Like I have always said these North Korean defector accounts should be taken with some skepticism since they are impossible to confirm. However, there undoubtedly negative effects happening around the Punggye-ri nuclear test site:
North Korea’s nuclear test site in Kilju, North Hamgyong Province is turning into a wasteland after six underground nuclear tests, according to witness accounts.
North Koreans who defected from the region said 80 percent of trees that are planted die, underground wells have run dry and babies are being born with defects.
The Research Association of Vision of North Korea, which includes North Korean defectors, interviewed 21 defectors who used to live in Kilju in the last couple of years.
“I heard from a relative in Kilju that deformed babies were born in hospitals there,” one defector said. Another said people in Kilju drink water that comes down from Mt. Mantap in Punggye-ri, where the nuclear test site is located, and they are worried about contamination from radiation.
Another said, “I spoke on the phone with family members I left behind there and they told me that all of the underground wells dried up after the sixth nuclear test.”
Suh Kyun-ryul, a professor of nuclear engineering at Seoul National University, said, “Due to the collapsed ground layer, fissures must have formed underneath, leading to contamination of the underground layer and water supply. [Chosun Ilbo]
