Here is the latest on Kim Jong-un’s trip to China this week:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, left, shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping, right, in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing during an unannounced visit to the Chinese capital from Monday to Tuesday to discuss issues pertaining to the Korean Peninsula and bilateral relations. [YONHAP]North Korean leader Kim Jong-un made an unannounced visit to China from Monday to Tuesday on the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping, North Korea and China’s state news media confirmed Wednesday, an international diplomatic debut for a young leader who’s only weeks away from holding summits with Seoul and Washington.
It was Kim’s first known trip outside North Korea since he took power in December 2011 following his father’s death, and his first meeting with another government leader.
Rumors spread quickly Tuesday that either he or another high-level official from Pyongyang was in Beijing for talks with Xi, though neither the North Korean, Chinese or South Korean government gave any confirmation.
Photos uploaded online showed a vintage dark green North Korean train similar to the armored vehicle used by former North Korean leaders arriving in the Chinese capital.
Confirmation that Kim was in Beijing came only after he crossed back into North Korea on Wednesday morning. North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Kim, 34, departed the North on Sunday and arrived in Beijing on Monday.
Upon his arrival, Kim met with Xi in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, where they “exchanged views on important matters including the development of DPRK-China friendly relations and the issue of handling the situation on the Korean Peninsula,” according to an English report from KCNA, using the acronym for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
On denuclearization, Kim was quoted by China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency as saying it was his “consistent stand to be committed to denuclearization on the peninsula, in accordance with the will” of his father, Kim Jong-il, and grandfather, Kim Il Sung, who founded North Korea. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
Here is what will be the key to denuclearization talks, what will North Korea demand in return for giving up their nukes:
Neither KCNA nor Xinhua specified Kim’s definition of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula, but North Korea watchers have long argued that Pyongyang’s meaning of the term would require Washington’s nuclear umbrella over South Korea and Japan to be removed and American soldiers stationed in the South withdrawn before it could consider giving up its nuclear arsenal.
This goes back to what I have long been saying, both the DPRK and China want to separate the US from the ROK and then eventually Japan. If the North Korean nuclear issue can do this, then this is in China’s interests as they seek region hegemony over Northeast Asia. That is likely why Chinese Premier Xi Jinping wanted to meet with Kim Jong-un to ensure Chinese interests are met during the upcoming negotiations with the ROK and the US and what rewards China would give to North Korea in return for advancing their interests.
In other news today China has returned to having an Emperor:
China’s rubber-stamp lawmakers on Sunday passed a historic constitutional amendment abolishing presidential term limits that will enable President Xi Jinping to rule indefinitely.
The National People’s Congress’ nearly 3,000 hand-picked delegates endorsed the constitutional amendment, voting 2,958 in favor with two opposed, three abstaining and one vote invalidated.
The amendment upends a system enacted by former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping in 1982 to prevent a return to the bloody excesses of a lifelong dictatorship typified by Mao Zedong’s chaotic 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution. The constitution had until now limited presidents to serving only two consecutive terms. [Stars & Stripes]
You can read more at the link, but President Xi has pretty much made himself Asia’s Putin.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in (L) and Chinese President Xi Jinping pose for a photo prior to their talks at a Berlin hotel on July 6, 2017. (Yonhap)
The White House said Friday it is well aware that Korea has been “independent for thousands of years,” after President Donald Trump quoted Chinese President Xi Jinping as claiming, falsely, that Korea used to be part of China.
“We generally do not comment on the details of what is said between the President and other leaders. We know well that Korea has been independent for thousands of years,” Michael Anton, deputy assistant to the president for strategic communications, told Yonhap News Agency. [Yonhap]
I like how the media is bashing President Trump for repeating something that Chinese President Xi said to him during their recent meeting in Florida:
Following his meeting with Chinese president Xi Jinping, Donald Trump made a shocking admission of ignorance to the Wall Street Journal, on the subject of China and North Korea: “After listening [to Xi] for 10 minutes I realized that…it’s not so easy.” Trump has been called out for having his views on such an important geopolitical issue shift dramatically in a matter of minutes. He also may not know who rules North Korea.
Right before that line about listening to Xi, though, Trump said something arguably even more shocking. He claimed that “Korea actually used to be a part of China.” This is a glaring historical inaccuracy that has, somehow, not yet enraged South Korea, which is usually extremely defensive about suggestions that it is lesser than China or has ever been dependent on it.
Trump also made it clear in the interview that when he says Korea “used to be a part of China,” he is talking about the entire Korean peninsula, not just the North. Here’s the full quote:
[Xi] then went into the history of China and Korea. Not North Korea, Korea. And you know, you’re talking about thousands of years …and many wars. And Korea actually used to be a part of China.
“No respectable historian would make such a claim,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at the University of Southern California and author of A History of Korea, when I asked him via email to assess Trump’s statement. [Quartz.com]
You can read the rest at the link, but here is the Korean reaction to the quote:
South Korea on Wednesday dismissed the controversial remark reportedly made by U.S. President Donald Trump that Korea was “part of China” as untrue and not worthy of response.
“Whether that is true or not, Korea hasn’t been a part of China for thousands of years and it is an historical fact that the international community acknowledges and no one can deny it,” a foreign ministry official said on the condition of anonymity.
“It is worthless to respond to this kind of story,” he added.
Controversy is growing here after U.S. online media reported that Trump made that remark in an interview with the Wall Street Journal while sharing what was discussed with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in their recent summit held earlier this month.
In the story titled “Trump weirdly says Korea was part of China, which is totally wrong and could enrage South Korea,” Quartz reported that Trump quoted Xi as making the remark during the summit.
It is not clear if and in what context Xi said so, nor is it certain whether it is an accurate quote or an error that possibly occurred in the process of interpretation. The remark was not mentioned in the WSJ interview. [Yonhap]
So it is a remark with no context and was not in the actual WSJ interview and we are all supposed to get enraged by this? Even if the remark is true, people instead of getting upset with Trump should get upset with Xi. Considering China’s ongoing Northeast Asia Project is it any wonder Xi would claim to Trump that Korea was once part of China? The Northeast Asia Project has been going on for years where the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) have been claiming that the ancient Koguryo kingdom in Korea was founded by a Chinese minority tribe. They have even registered Koguryo sites with UNESCO with no mention of the kingdom being Korean.
This is all likely being done to set political conditions for the possible Chinese domination of North Korea if the Kim regime was ever to collapse.
I guess we will see in the future of this statement includes North Korea or not:
U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday after summit talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping that “tremendous progress” was made in U.S. relations with China and that “lots of very potentially bad problems will be going away.”
“We have made tremendous progress in our relationship with China” Trump said after talks with Xi at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, according to pool reports. “I think truly progress has been made,” he said, calling the relationship with China “outstanding.”
“Lots of very potentially bad problems will be going away,” Trump said.
It was unclear if the “bad problems” include North Korea. (…….)
The strikes against Syria, which came in the middle of the state dinner Trump hosted for Xi at his Mar-a-Lago estate, could also send a message to China that the U.S. may take unilateral action unless Beijing helps rein in Pyongyang. [Yonhap]
It would probably be interesting to be a fly on the wall to over hear what President Trump and Chinese Premier Xi Jinping will discuss this weekend:
President Donald Trump listens to a question during a town hall with business leaders in the White House in Washington on Tuesday. [AP/YONHAP]Claiming North Korea is a “matter of urgent interest” for President Trump and his administration, the official added that Trump “has been pretty clear in messaging how important it is for China to coordinate with the United States, and for China to begin exerting its considerable economic leverage to bring about a peaceful resolution to that problem.”
Such issues will come up in their discussions, the official said. “Even though we hear sometimes that China’s political influence may have diminished with North Korea, clearly its economic leverage has not,” pointing out that nearly 90 percent of Pyongyang’s external trade is with its closest ally Beijing.
The Trump administration has been suggesting a paradigm shift from previous U.S. governments on policy toward the North Korea issue, putting the Pyongyang nuclear issue as a top priority for the first time.
Trump’s administration also isn’t shy about the pressure it intends to put on China over North Korea.
In a town hall meeting with business CEOs on Tuesday, Trump said on his upcoming summit with Xi, “I’m sure we’re going to have a fantastic meeting and we’re going to talk about a lot of things, including, of course, North Korea,” which he described as “really a humanity problem.”
“China has great influence over North Korea,” Trump declared in an interview with the Financial Times on Sunday.
“China will either decide to help us with North Korea, or they won’t. And if they do that will be very good for China, and if they don’t it won’t be good for anyone.”
He also said that he will solve the North Korea issue if China won’t do it – and without China’s help. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
