North Korea Supports Seoul’s Idea to Hold First Inter-Parliamentary Meeting
Sputnik – 27.09.2018
North Korea supported on Thursday South Korea’s initiative to organize the first bilateral inter-parliamentary meeting before the end of the year.
The Yonhap news agency reported that the meeting was suggested by Speaker of the South Korean National Assembly Moon Hee-sang.
“The role of the Koreas’ parliaments and political parties is very important in implementing the April and September inter-Korean summit agreements. In this regard, we agreed to the offer in principle,” Chairman of the North Korean Supreme People’s Assembly Choe Thae-bok said in a letter to Moon, which was quoted by the agency.
According to the news outlet, the date of the meeting is expected to be set during high-level government negotiations in the near future.
Earlier in September, South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korea leader Kim Jong Un held the third inter-Korean summit, during which the two sides reached a number of agreements on Pyongyang’s military and nuclear facilities and the connection of two of Korea’s roads and railways. Pyongyang and Seoul also signed an accord aimed at the enhancement of mutual trust.
U.S. Perversity on Peace in Korea
By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | September 19, 2018
Just when you think that the U.S. national-security state’s policy toward Korea can’t get more perverse, it does. The latest perversion? Opposing a peace agreement between North Korea and South Korea! Imagine that. And why would U.S. officials oppose such an agreement? Because it would inevitably lead to calls for U.S. troops in Korea to be sent packing home to the United States. After all, when a peace agreement is entered into, what would be the justification for keeping U.S. troops in that faraway land?
Don’t believe me? Well, take if from the New York Times, one of the most mainstream papers in the country:
President Moon Jae-in of South Korea arrived in Pyongyang Tuesday for his third summit with Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s leader, to work toward a common goal: fashioning a political statement this year declaring the end of the Korean War. Such a declaration, although not a legally binding treaty, could carry far-reaching repercussions, helping North Korea escalate its campaign for the withdrawal of American troops from the South, analysts said. For that and other reasons, the United States has strong reservations about such a breakthrough.
Why the strong reservations? Wouldn’t you think that U.S. officials would be ecstatic about the prospect of peace in Korea? Wouldn’t you expect that to be the response of any rational person?
Not for a regime that has come to view Korea as a constant flashpoint to keep people on edge and afraid, thereby assuring ever-increasing budgets for the Pentagon, the CIA, the NSA, and their army of contractors and sub-contractors. And not for a regime that has come to view Korea as a place that permanently bases tens of thousands of U.S. troops. And not for a regime that continues to target the North Korean regime for regime change.
A peace agreement between the two Koreas would threaten all of those things. Suddenly, the national-security state would lose one its principal flashpoints for crisis and fear, one that it has relied on since at least 1950. It would also mean having to bring all those troops home and trying to figure out what to do with them. And it would mean giving up its dream of regime change, at least through military force.
That’s why U.S. officials are so concerned about the ongoing improvement in relations between North and South Korea and the possibility that the two countries could enter into a peace agreement.
South Korean president Moon Jae-in and North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un continue their efforts to improve relations between their two countries. They are currently holding their third summit, with Kim visiting Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital, for the first time ever. Kim was met by huge throngs of people, organized of course by the North Korean regime, cheering for Kim, waving flowers, and chanting “reunification of the fatherland.”
Left out of these negotiations are U.S. officials. But so what? Korea belongs to the Koreans, not to the Pentagon or the CIA. It’s their civil war, a civil war that the Pentagon and the CIA butted into more than 60 years ago, and without the constitutionally required congressional declaration of war. Koreans don’t need the permission of U.S. officials to resolve their war and their differences.
What is concerning U.S. officials is that the two leaders might reach an agreement that doesn’t involve “denuclearization” by North Korea. But the only reason that North Korea has nuclear weapons is to deter the Pentagon and the CIA from attacking and invading North Korea for the purpose of regime change. With no regime-change attack by the United States, North Korea’s nukes become irrelevant.
But there’s the rub: The Pentagon and the CIA refuse to give up their goal of regime change in North Korea. They don’t want U.S. troops to come home. They want to keep them in South Korea forever (just like they want to keep their wars in the Middle East and Afghanistan, their war on terrorism, and their war on drugs going on forever). In that way, there is always the chance that North Korea can be provoked into committing some provocative act that could serve as an excuse for bombing and destroying North Korea’s communist, anti-U.S. regime and replacing it with a pro-U.S. puppet regime.
Meanwhile, trying their best to ratchet up tensions and forcing North Korea to “denuclearize,” U.S. officials are doing everything they can to fortify their brutal systems of economic sanctions on the North Korea people, even lashing out against everyone they suspect is violating the sanctions, like Russia. They have to keep those North Korea citizens starving to death so that their public officials finally “denuclearize.”
In another perversity, South Koreans are being warned against violating U.S. sanctions by entering into mutually beneficial economic transactions with the North, such as working together to operate a passenger rail line between the two countries.
The best thing South Koreans could ever do for themselves and the American people would be to boot all U.S. troops out of their country, whether South and North arrive at a peace agreement or not. Korea remains no business of the Pentagon and the CIA. But at least the American people are getting to see the real truth about the U.S. national-security state and its perverse and destructive policies.
Korean defense chiefs sign ‘military pact’ after Kim & Moon adopt denuclearization roadmap
RT | September 19, 2018
South Korean President Moon Jae-in and the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have signed a joint statement following their bilateral talks in Pyongyang. The countries’ defense chiefs have meanwhile signed a separate military pact.
As part of the military agreement, the neighbors will halt border drills from November 1, Yonhap reports. South Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo and North Korea’s No Kwang-chol also agreed to stop military flights in the vicinity of the demarcation line. In addition, the agreement envisions setting up a buffer zone in the Yellow Sea and suspending maritime drills.
As a clear sign of mutual trust, the Pyongyang military agreement also calls for the withdrawal of soldiers from the demilitarized zone and disarming the servicemen keeping watch at Panmunjom border village. The nations also agreed that each would close eleven border guard posts by the end of 2018.
The Koreas’ armed forces will establish and operate a “joint military committee” to discuss the implementation of the military agreement on a “permanent basis,” Moon Jae-in noted.
Speaking to the press on the outcome of Moon’s visit to North Korea, Kim noted that the “agreement at Pyongyang summit will advance an era of peace, prosperity.” Kim especially noted that the military agreement will help to denuclearize the peninsula and reach a lasting peace. He also agreed to travel soon to South Korea to meet Moon for the fourth time since the reconciliation effort between the neighbors began with the Olympic Peace diplomacy earlier this year. To emphasize their commitment to peace, the nations have decided to send a united team to the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, and will submit a joint bid for the 2032 Summer Olympics.
Moon meanwhile told reporters that the neighbors finally managed to agree to “specific denuclearization steps.” The South Korean president also noted that the leaders are striving to turn the demilitarized zone into a zone of peace, and that work will soon begin to reconnect cross-border rails and roads before the end of the year.
Moon arrived in North Korea on Tuesday morning for the third face-to-face meeting with his counterpart. Previously, the leaders held talks on April 27 and May 26 in the border village of Panmunjom, in an unprecedented effort to reconcile the two nations following the Korean War (1950-53). Part of Moon’s agenda for the trip was restarting the US-Korean dialogue that hit a brick wall last month, after Secretary of State Mike Pompeo canceled his visit to Pyongyang.
One of the major breakthroughs of the Pyongyang summit was the consent given by the North to allow international inspectors to document a “permanent dismantlement” of its key missile facilities. North Korea also agreed to closing its main nuclear complex in Yongbyon – although only if the United States takes reciprocal conciliatory steps, Moon told reporters. The Korean Peninsula should turn into a “land of peace without nuclear weapons and nuclear threats,” he noted.
“The North expressed its willingness to continue taking additional steps, such as permanent shutdown of the Yongbyon nuclear facility, should the United States take corresponding measures under the spirit of the June 12 North Korea-US joint statement,” the joint statement said.
‘The Era of no war has started:’ Koreas reach new agreements
Press TV – September 19, 2018
The two Koreas have agreed to take further steps toward peace following a one-on-one meeting between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who is on his first ever visit to Pyongyang.
The two leaders issued a joint statement at the end of the second day of their summit in the North Korean capital on Wednesday, agreeing to take a step closer to peace by turning the Korean Peninsula into a “land of peace without nuclear weapons and nuclear threats.”
“The era of no war has started,” Moon said at a joint press conference with Kim after issuing the statement. “Today, the North and South decided to remove all threats from the entire Korean Peninsula.”
He said that Kim “agreed to permanently close the Tongchang-ri missile engine test site and missile launch facility in the presence of experts from relevant nations.”
The South Korean president said the North’s leader had also agreed to shut down its Yongbyon nuclear facility but only if the United States took “corresponding measures.”
It was not clear what measures were expected of the US.
Moon said Pyongyang had already pledged to work toward the “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” during his first encounter with him in April, in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that separates the two Koreas.
The two Koreas “have continuously shown their trust toward one another and I hope there will be another summit between the two countries as soon as possible,” Moon said.
Kim also agreed to work toward denuclearization during a summit with US President Donald Trump in Singapore back in June.
But North Korea has said denuclearization will have to be phased, with each stage coming in return for reciprocal steps by the US, potentially including the removal of US forces from the region.
Yet, no specific steps have been designated toward that goal, and Pyongyang says that, while it has taken several goodwill measures — including the suspension of missile and nuclear tests — the American side has taken no moves in return.
North Korea has also already dismantled a nuclear site and has returned the remains of some US soldiers killed in the 1950-53 Korean War to America.
In return, Pyongyang is also seeking relief from harsh international sanctions — mostly spearheaded by the US — imposed on the country over its nuclear and missile programs.
The US, however, has not offered any such relief.
Kim to visit Seoul
When President Moon hoped for another summit, he must have had little idea that his wish would be granted very soon. Kim said shortly after their meeting that he would make a visit to the South in “the near future,” in what would be the first-ever visit to the capital, Seoul, by a North Korean leader.
Moon then said that the trip could happen this year unless there were “special circumstances.” He said the trip would be “unprecedented” and would “provide a turning point for the two Koreas.”
‘This divided nation to unite on its own’
Kim described the latest agreements as a “leap forward” toward military peace on the peninsula.
“The world is going to see how this divided nation is going to bring about a new future on his own,” the North Korean leader said, in a remark potentially meaning that diplomacy with the US, which has already stalled, may not be necessary.
The two Koreas also plan to link up their railways, allow reunions for families separated by the Korean War, and to co-host the 2032 Summer Olympics, according to the joint statement.
The Korean War ended with a truce and not a peace treaty. Ever since, the two countries were on a near-constant war footing. But Kim initiated a rapprochement with South Korea in January. And the US started diplomatically engaging North Korea only later.
The two Koreas have since been advancing their relations. But the US failure to reciprocate North Korean moves has plagued diplomatic engagement between Washington and Pyongyang.
Trump ‘excited’ by developments
Following the announcement, Trump took to Twitter to describe the developments as “very exciting.”
Kim Jong Un has agreed to allow Nuclear inspections, subject to final negotiations, and to permanently dismantle a test site and launch pad in the presence of international experts. In the meantime there will be no Rocket or Nuclear testing. Hero remains to continue being… …returned home to the United States. Also, North and South Korea will file a joint bid to host the 2032 Olympics. Very exciting!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 19, 2018
He failed to mention the North Korean demand for reciprocal US measures.
US Must ‘Show Commitment’ to Peace Talks with North Korea – Scholar
Sputnik | September 19, 2018
The Trump administration needs to take a page from North Korea’s playbook and show some type of commitment to peace that amounts to more than just suspended war games, Simone Chun, fellow at the Korea Policy Institute and member of the Korean Peace Network, told Sputnik.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in marked their third meeting on Tuesday. Moon’s three-day visit to Pyongyang is expected to cover talks on the North’s continued denuclearization and the rebooting of dialogue between the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) and the US.
The pair previously met at the border village of Panmunjom on two different occasions in April and later in May of this year.
Chun told Radio Sputnik’s Loud & Clear on Tuesday that the United States needs to put its best foot forward and work to mend its issues with the DPRK.
“It’s very disappointing that as President Moon Jae-in is making another very historic summit… that there’s many disagreements within the Trump administration on what to do with North Korea and US negotiations,” she told hosts Brian Becker and John Kiriakou. “This is, again, Moon Jae-in taking the initiative.”
“We should really be supporting the peace process and really counter the opposition and conflicting messages coming from the Trump administration,” Chun added, before adding that “diplomacy will render better results.”
In June, US President Donald Trump and Kim met for the first time in Singapore with the hopes of finding a peaceful solution to nuclear matters that had been unfolding on the Korean Peninsula. The historic summit concluded with both leaders signing a four-point agreement that would pave the way toward peace in the region.
Although North Korea has moved toward dismantling its nuclear test sites, and the US has steered away from full-fledged war games, Chun told Becker that Washington’s efforts aren’t up to par.
“North Korea has done several irreversible steps toward denuclearization and respecting and implementing the Singapore summit, whereas the United States has so far only done one by suspending the war games,” she said. “I really think the United States should take reciprocal action and show commitment.”
And while a bilateral peace agreement between Pyongyang and Seoul would sound like great news to many, it’s likely not going to happen due to South Korea’s ties to the US.
“There’s a good chance [that Moon and Kim could sign a peace agreement], however, I know that President Moon Jae-in is still very [interested] in working with the United States. I don’t think that they’ll sign a peace treaty,” Chun said.
Kim and Moon are expected to reveal the results of their latest meeting in the days to come. Moon’s visit to Pyongyang also marks the first visit to the North by a president of South Korea in 11 years; the last meeting took place in October 2007, when former South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun was in office.
Despite US Opposition, Joint Liaison Office Opens On Shared Korean Border
By Tyler Durden – Zero Hedge – 09/15/2018
On Friday an unprecedented development occurred that could put the Korean peninsula on a permanent trajectory of stability should talks between the North and South continue their positive direction, and which signals an intensification of diplomacy between the two.
South Korea has opened a new liaison office in the North Korean city of Gaeseong (or alternately Kaesong), which is to allow for 24-hour communication between the two sides for first time since war. The office is located inside an industrial park — and Gaeseong is just inside the North’s side of the border.
It’s being described as allowing “around-the-clock” communication between rival officials on either side the military demarcation line, and could avoid the potential for future misunderstandings or provocations, and further comes amidst a parallel diplomatic push by the United States and its allies for complete North Korean denuclearization.
When the proposal was being finalized this summer, however, the US was opposed to the plan, with the State Department last month saying progress between the two Koreas must occur “in lockstep” with talks on the north’s denuclearization.
According to Bloomberg:
The Aug. 20 announcement of the office’s establishment had raised concerns in the U.S. about whether it would violate sanctions meant to penalize Pyongyang over its nuclear arsenal. But on Thursday, the United Nations Command said it had approved South Korean vehicles and personnel to cross the border into North Korea and begin constructing a communications center at the Gaeseong complex.
Meanwhile the United Nations welcomed the development, with UNC commander Vincent Brooks saying in a statement that communication between two sides is “a way to prevent incidents or crises.”
About 50 South Korean officials crossed into the North to attend the opening ceremony, where South Korean Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon told ceremony attendees, “A new chapter in history is starting here today,” and added, “It is a symbol of peace made jointly by South and North Korea.”
The two sides agreed to open the office during the prior historic April summit between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, with the two again set to meet in Pyongyang next week. And meanwhile the White House is reportedly working toward plans for another meeting between President Trump and the North Korean leader.
But even though outlets like the New York Times reported the joint liaison’s office as a positive step in relations, much of the reporting this week has failed to recall that Washington firmly opposed it.
The Pentagon and the CIA Are in Charge
By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | September 7, 2018
Yesterday, President Trump, yielding to the overwhelming power of the Pentagon, CIA, and NSA, announced that he has decided to keep U.S. troops in Syria indefinitely, thereby abandoning his intention announced last March to instead bring U.S. troops in Syria home. Of course, keeping the troops in Syria has been the position that the U.S. national security establishment has been demanding of Trump since the beginning of his presidency, especially since that increases the risk of confrontation with Russia, the decades-old enemy and rival of the U.S. national-security establishment.
What business does the U.S. government have in Syria? None. Just as it has no business in countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Vietnam, Korea, Nicaragua, Grenada, Panama, and countless others. But that is what life is like under a governmental structure in which the military-intelligence establishment is in control. It calls the shots. Everyone else — the president, the Congress, the judiciary, and the American people — are expected to yield to its overwhelming power within the federal governmental structure and within American society.
It’s worth recalling that the American people in the late 1700s were ardently opposed to large, permanent military establishments. That’s why the Constitution instead called into existence a type of government known as a limited-government republic, one whose powers are few and limited.
That all came to a screeching halt after World War II, when Americans began living under a totally different type of governmental structure, one that is known as a national-security state. It is characterized by a massive, permanent, ever-growing military establishment, CIA, NSA, and a national police force known as the FBI, all of whose powers together are vast and unlimited, including the power of the government to assassinate its own people.
Why didn’t our American ancestors favor a national-security state instead of a limited-government republic? Because they knew that the military-intelligence component of the government would inevitably end up controlling and running the government and that the other parts of the government would inevitably yield to its overwhelming power. More important, they knew that that a government founded on a massive military-intelligence foundation would inevitably end up destroying their freedom, privacy, and well-being.
A book I highly recommend is National Security and Double Government by Michael J. Glennon, professor of law at Tufts University. Glennon gets it, and he sets it forth perfectly in his book. The national-security establishment — or what many today are calling the deep state — is in charge of the federal government. As long as the other three branches understand that it’s calling the shots, it permits the other three branches to maintain the appearance of being in control. But as Glennon shows so well, it’s all just a façade. It’s the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA who are ultimately calling the shots, like with respect to Syria.
In fact, the South Korean people are also discovering this phenomenon in their country. In their attempt to arrive at a peaceful and satisfactory resolution of the civil war that has besieged Korea since 1950, South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in and North Korea’s president Kim Jong-un have been negotiating. In the process, they have agreed to work together to run a train between the two countries. The tracks were laid long ago and train stations along the way were built long ago. Now, it’s just a logistical problem of getting the train running between the two nations.
But it’s not going to happen. Why not? For the same reason that Trump isn’t going to pull U.S. troops out of Syria. Because the Pentagon said no to South Korea, just as it said no to Trump. Here is how yesterday’s New York Times reported the matter: “Last month, American military commanders in Seoul stopped South Korea’s plan to send a train across the inter-Korean border and run it on a North Korean railway, to test the rails’ condition.”
What? Who’s in charge of the country — the South Korean government or the U.S. military? The answer is obvious: The U.S. military is in charge, just as it is here in the United States. Like President Trump, South Korean President Kim yielded to the orders and commands of his superiors in the U.S. national-security establishment. That’s why that train between South and North Korea isn’t running.
Look at the extent to which the U.S. national-security establishment has extended its tentacles throughout the federal bureaucracy. A general, not a civilian, is Secretary of Defense. A CIA Director is made Secretary of State. A general is White House chief of staff. An FBI director is appointed Special Counsel to target Trump with removal for befriending Russia. CIA assets in Congress, the mainstream press, and who knows where else. A large number of military and CIA veterans running for Congress. A vast number of cities and states fearfully dependent on military bases and projects.
President Eisenhower warned the American people of the danger of converting the federal government to a national-security state, which he called the military-industrial complex. He said that this new, radically different governmental structure posed a grave threat to the freedoms and democratic processes of the American people. But he did nothing about it except issue a warning.
The only president to ever take on the national-security establishment has been John F. Kennedy. He took them on directly, firmly, and unequivocally. Kennedy threw the gauntlet down on their militarist, imperialist, anti-communist, anti-Russia vision for the future of America. The result was an all-out war between Kennedy and the Pentagon and the CIA, a war that did not end up well for either Kennedy or the American people. (See FFF’s book JFK’s War with the National Security Establishment: Why Kennedy Was Assassinated by Douglas Horne and also my current video-podcast series on the JFK assassination.)
While there are some who thought that Trump was going to walk in the footsteps of President Kennedy and stand up to the national-security establishment, including bringing the troops home from the forever wars in which the Pentagon and the CIA have embroiled our nation, alas, it is not to be, as reflected by Trump’s buckling under to the national-security establishment with respect to Syria and even moving in an anti-Russia direction with his imposition of economic sanctions on Russia.
Responding to the Pentagon’s decision to prevent South Korea from running its train into North Korea, North Korea’s main state-run newspaper summed it up best. Pointing out that the United States was obstructing better relations between North and South Korea, the paper correctly described it a “dim and twisted” attitude. The paper continued: “The U.S. must realize that the more the inter-Korean relations improve, the better it will be for the U.S.” The problem, however, is that it would not be better for the U.S. national-security establishment, which necessarily depends on perpetual crises to sustain its ever-growing, taxpayer-funded largess, including those crises that it itself incites.
North Korea Could Formally End War With South Without US Troop Pull Out – Report
Sputnik – 06.09.2018
A South Korean delegation returning from Pyongyang brought important news from the socialist country: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is willing to sign an end-of-war declaration without the withdrawal of US troops from the South. Meanwhile, the North is preparing to celebrate its 70th birthday amid speculation about how militant the fete will be.
A special envoy delegation sent by South Korean President Moon Jae In visited the North Korean capital of Pyongyang Wednesday, delivering a personal letter from Moon to Kim. A Thursday statement in the Workers Party of Korea’s newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, described the photoshoot, dinner and discussions as taking place “in a compatriotic and warm atmosphere.”
The Rodong Sinmun article says Kim was “pleased over the fact that technical contacts in various fields were made between the north and the south, the reunions of separated families and relatives were realized and north-south military talks and the work of setting up a joint liaison office progressed well after the historic Panmunjom meeting,” and that “we should value all these successes which the north and the south made hand in hand and keep advancing without deviation the north-south ties that have definitely entered the new orbit of peace, the orbit of reconciliation and cooperation.”
According to the statement, the two Korean delegations mostly discussed the agenda and schedule of the upcoming inter-Korean summit, to take place in Pyongyang September 18 to 20, and Kim said, “The north and the south should further their efforts to realize the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.” Those efforts have seemingly stalled in recent weeks as the US cancelled it most recent planned visit by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the US equivalent of a foreign minister, claiming not to have seen sufficient progress by North Korea toward denuclearization.
More details about the meeting came to light once the delegation returned to South Korea, when members of the envoy delivered further messages from Kim.
Chung Eui-yong, Moon’s national security adviser, told reporters Thursday that Kim said he would be willing to sign the end-of-war declaration that Seoul and Pyongyang have been pursuing since the spring without concomitantly demanding the withdrawal of the 28,500 US troops stationed in South Korea or an end to the alliance between the US and South Korea.
While a lasting peace treaty to the 1950 to 1953 war would require much more extensive negotiations between the four powers involved — North Korea, China, South Korea and the US — a statement declaring the end of the war, issued by the two Koreas, would be an important step toward realizing that goal, which Moon and Kim have indicated to be their primary concern ever since their first meeting at the truce city of Panmunjom in April.
Rodong Sinmun articulated the belief Thursday that “[t]he US should no longer stick to a position of attaining denuclearization before signing a peace treaty.”
“Chairman Kim Jong Un has made it clear several times that he is firmly committed to denuclearization and expressed frustration over skepticism in the international community over his commitment,” Chung said. “He said he has pre-emptively taken steps necessary for denuclearization and wants to see these goodwill measures being met with goodwill measures.”
Chung also told reporters that “Chairman Kim stressed that he has never spoken negatively about President Trump to his staff or anyone,” a statement that won praise from US President Donald Trump in a tweet Thursday.
In turn, the US State Department announced Thursday that Stephen Biegun, the US’ new special envoy to North Korea, who was supposed to go on Pompeo’s cancelled visit, would be touring South Korea, China and Japan next week.
“The special representative will meet with his counterparts and continue diplomatic efforts to achieve the final, fully verified denuclearization of North Korea as agreed to by Chairman Kim in Singapore,” it said, without further elaborating in Biegun’s itinerary, the South China Morning Post reported Thursday.
The South Korean diplomat further affirmed the two Korean governments’ commitment to opening a liaison office in the North Korean industrial city of Kaesong before the inter-Korean summit. Another goal of the Panmunjom summit, the South Korean Ministry of Unification announced last month the approval of $3.1 million in funding to set up the inter-Korean joint liaison office, to come from the Inter-Korean Cooperation Fund, NK News reported at the time.
“We will operate the liaison office with the aim that it can contribute to round-the-clock dialogue and cooperation and the stable management of the situation of inter-Korean relations,” the unification ministry said in the statement.
“The Ministry of Unification will strive to contribute to the development of the South-North relations by implementing the Panmunjom Declaration sector-by-sector without setbacks.”
Meanwhile, North Korea is preparing to celebrate its 70th anniversary on Sunday, and there’s no shortage of speculation and anticipation about how the festivities will play out.
Satellite photos on the website 38 North show that North Korean troops have been practicing for weeks at a mockup of Pyongyang’s Kim Il Sung Square, named after the founder of the country (and Kim Jong Un’s grandfather), a revolutionary communist leader who led the Korean insurgency against Japanese colonial rule during World War II. His Workers Party of Korea declared the foundation of the people’s democratic republic on September 9, 1948, and the country has made a habit of celebrating its birthday with an extravagant parade, the centerpiece of which is typically their latest military weaponry.
However, observers wonder if this year’s event won’t be different, to reflect the change in tone by Kim in recent months. The last major military parade, in February, showcased North Korea’s Hwasong-14 and Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missiles, the very weapons at the center of the denuclearization push on the peninsula, which North Korea says are necessary to guarantee its security and independence amid the presence of US troops in the South and the lack of a permanent peace treaty.
In a major contrast to past parades, dozens of international media organizations have been granted visas to attend this year’s events, Defense News noted Thursday.
It’s known that the parade, which always features mass performances by the people of the city, will include a torch parade as well as the revival of the country’s iconic mass games after a six-year hiatus. The celebrations also feature civilian contingents celebrating achievements in agriculture, industry, science and art, and may feature these more prominently than in the past, given Kim’s newly declared focus on building these parts of North Korean society.
The Story of the Defected Restaurant Workers: Time to Stop Lying?
By Konstantin Asmolov – New Eastern Outlook – 03.09.2018
Among several high-profile stories which the author is closely monitoring is the so-called “case of the defected restaurant workers”. Readers may recall that on April 7, 2016, a manager and twelve waitresses of the North Korean restaurant Ryugyong in Ningbo (a city in China’s north-eastern province of Zhejiang) fled to South Korea for official reasons of “choosing freedom”. The story seemed strange enough from the outset. Suspicions soon arose that their escape was planned by the National Intelligence Service. Pyongyang has demanded the return of its citizens which even resulted in this issue being raised at high-level inter-Korean talks.
In May 2018, South Korean cable TV channel JTBC reported that restaurant manager Heo Gang-il scared the waitresses into joining him and fled to South Korea on the instructions of the National Intelligence Service. The manager admitted that he initially planned to escape alone, but following South Korean Intelligence Service threats, inclined other employees to escape with him. In exchange for such cooperation, he was promised South Korean citizenship and a restaurant in South-East Asia which he and other escapees would manage.
On May 30, at the UN office in Geneva, the representative of North Korea called on human rights bodies to investigate the circumstances of the escape. But the biggest blow to South Korea was delivered on July 10 at a press conference in Seoul given by UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in North Korea Tomás Ojea Quintana. The latter met with several former employees of the restaurant and announced that not all of them fled from China to South Korea of their own free will. Therefore, individual preferences regarding their future place of residence must be taken into account. Moreover, if the abduction is confirmed as such, it must be considered a crime.
The statement made by UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in North Korea caused great resonance. On July 11, the Ministry of Unification of South Korea immediately stated that the North Korean citizens fled to the South voluntarily. At the same time, the Ministry representative refused to disclose details for fear of jeopardizing the safety of refugee families in North Korea.
North Korea’s reaction was immediate. In a comment published on July 20 on the North Korean propaganda website Uriminzokkiri, it was stated that if the case of the restaurant employees is not resolved, it may not only create problems for conducting reunions between divided South and North Korean families, but will also jeopardize inter-Korean relations. The current situation, it reported, will be considered an indicator of South Korea’s sincerity in improving its relations with the North. A similar theme may be heard in materials published by the North Korean official newspaper Rodong Sinmun. However, Pyongyang finally decided not to interfere and go through with the reunion of families as scheduled.
Nevertheless, the Ministry of Unification confirmed that the employees of the North Korean restaurant in China were not under any pressure and their decision to flee to the South of the Korean Peninsula was voluntary. As was stated by its representative on July 30, the position of the South Korean government on the issue remains unchanged. The Ministry of Unification is currently cooperating with the National Human Rights Commission which had begun an audit on the matter.
However, things were again ruined by restaurant manager Heo Gang-il who on August 4, 2018 gave an interview to the New York Times. This time, his story was enriched with a greater number of details. It turns out that the driving force behind his escape was a Chinese-Korean customer who threatened to inform the North Korean authorities of Heo’s regular meetings with the South Korean Intelligence Service. When Heo asked South Korean Intelligence to transport him to South Korea, he was contacted by an agent on April 3 who instructed him to flee with all 19 waitresses within 48 hours. When Heo refused, the agent threatened to inform North Korean authorities of his attempted escape, but on the other hand promised to pay him millions of dollars if he went through with the plan.
Finally, Heo bought 20 plane tickets to Kuala Lumpur, and on April 5 told the waitresses that they are going to move to a different work location. Shortly before the group left the restaurant to go to the airport, five waitresses noticed something was wrong and escaped. The Chinese restaurant owner also got involved: he chased after the group in his car and rammed a taxi transporting two of the waitresses. The others continued their escape without them.
When the waitresses finally found out that they were going to the South Korean Embassy in Malaysia, they broke down in tears. Nevertheless, Heo convinced them to continue their journey to South Korea, saying that things had gone too far as they were, and if they returned to North Korea, everyone would be executed. Just before boarding the plane to Kuala Lumpur, Heo called a South Korean Intelligence Officer and heard cries of enthusiasm and applause at the other end of the line. Heo was proclaimed a hero and promised that the escape would not be covered by the media, “so as not to endanger the families of those who fled”. But the very next day, the news regarding those who “chose freedom” were trumpeted everywhere. Neither did he get the promised millions of dollars. Heo is currently forced to work in minimarkets and as a delivery service truck driver.
Of course, the attention the story provoked is closely related to the political situation. The “restaurant worker scandal” is intended to cover up the previous “comment scandal”. As regards the “military conspiracy case”, “there were reasonable suspicions” that the escape was organized by representatives of military, rather than “civilian” intelligence. Of course, the self-incrimination of the manager in his interview to U.S. media will be a hard fact to battle for South Korean authorities as they continue declaring that “everyone had fled voluntarily”.
Konstantin Asmolov, PhD in History, Leading Research Fellow at the Center for Korean Studies of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
‘Deceptive’: NYT Botches Story on Suspended Korean War Games
Sputnik – 01.09.2018
The New York Times’ Thursday article “Pause in Military Drills, Ordered by Trump, Leaves South Koreans Uneasy” is giving its readers “deceptive” information, historian and investigative journalist Gareth Porter told Sputnik.
The Times’ article piggybacks on US President Donald Trump’s announcement this week on suspended joint military drills between Washington and Seoul, suggesting that an overwhelming amount of South Koreans are now upset with President Moon Jae In for supporting 45 on the matter.
Porter told Radio Sputnik’s Loud & Clear on Friday that the publication’s article shows that it “has a bug up somewhere about this issue,” since polls in South Korea actually show that upwards of 80 percent of the people support Moon’s decision to mend the country’s relations with North Korea.
“The Times is being very deceptive in this, creating the sense or allusion that South Koreans are upset with Moon about this when, in fact, it’s a small percent of the population,” Porter told hosts Brian Becker and John Kiriakou. “[It’s] trying to sabotage the Trump support for a North-South accord and, even more importantly, support for an agreement of some sort with North Korea.”
The statement released by the White House on Wednesday notes that Trump no longer believes that costly war games are necessary in the current climate, a stance POTUS has repeatedly taken in the past.
“The president believes that his relationship with [North Korean leader] Kim Jong Un is a very good and warm one, and there is no reason at this time to be spending large amounts of money on joint US-South Korea war games,” the press release announced, adding that Trump, if he wishes to do so, can easily reboot the exercises.
According to Porter, the Korean War, which halted in an armistice in 1953 but has still not been concluded with a formal peace treaty, “doesn’t have an end because of the vested interests that are tied up in the status quo.”
“It becomes clear with every passing month that there are tremendous interests involving the US national security state as well as the political and media elite, all of whom want to keep things precisely the way they are because they all have interests that are bound up in keeping this present situation of US military hegemony in northeast Asia,” the historian stressed.
Porter, the author of “Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare,” went on to tell Becker that had any other “nominal centrist Republican or centrist Democrat been elected, we certainly wouldn’t be looking at making peace with North Korea.”
“I’m afraid it’s true,” he said, noting that it was shocking to admit.
US military blocks proposed railway linking North & South Korea
RT | September 1, 2018
US military officials have put the brakes on a proposed rail project that would connect the Korean Peninsula, underscoring growing differences between Washington and Seoul on engagement with the hermit kingdom.
The governments of the two estranged nations were set to begin preliminary plans for the rail link last week, but their application to send a train from Seoul across the length of North Korea was denied by the US-led United Nations Command. The multinational military body, which traces its roots back to the Korean War, controls movement across the demilitarized zone which separates North and South Korea.
The decision is the latest illustration of Washington’s hardline approach to dealing with Pyongyang. The US has demanded full denuclearization as a prerequisite to any economic cooperation with North Korea, while Seoul has taken a less extreme stance, favoring constructive engagement with its northern neighbor. South Korean President Moon Jae-in had expressed hope that the rail link would be completed by the end of the year.
Moon has invested considerable political capital into improving inter-Korean relations and has signaled his desire for large-scale investment in North Korea once sanctions are lifted.
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A dark page from the CIA’s history: What was Project Artichoke, launched 74 years ago?
By Erkin Oncan | Strategic Culture Foundation | August 22, 2025
One of the most useful instruments hidden behind the U.S. empire’s rhetoric of “freedom and democracy” was the Central Intelligence Agency, founded on September 18, 1947, as the successor of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS).
Since its creation, the CIA has carried out countless inhumane operations: assassinations, coups, drug trafficking, support for terrorism, conspiracies. The list of its crimes is endless. But among the darkest and most inhumane chapters of its record lie the notorious “mind control” experiments. … continue
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