Kim Jong Un has announced that NK will kill 3 generations of families of anyone who defects from NK during the 100 day period of mourning for his late father Kim Jong Il.  China, in violation of the UN treaty on refugees, which it signed, has arrested some 21 North Koreans it is about to repatriate to face extremely harsh punishment.  Apparently even some Chinese bloggers are protesting. 

Read the article in The Korean Herald here.

http://www.koreaherald.com/national/Detail.jsp?newsMLId=20120215000970

Today in North Korea the late dictator Kim Jong Il, known as the General, and the Dear One, as been promoted to Generalissimo forever.  Tomorrow his 70th birthday will be marked with huge celebrations across the land, as the day of the birth of The Shining Star.  Kim Jong Il's father Kim Il Sung was declared President for Life after his death.

This is interesting.  Robert Park, a US missionary and human rights activist, plans to  press charges against the DPRK for extensive torture he suffered in flagrant violation of International Laws and Principles during his 43-day imprisonment in North Korea.   Park crossed illegally into North Korea from China on December 25, 2009 to protest against genocide and crimes against humanity taking place within the country. Some may say his action was heroic, others mad.  Nevertheless, torture is illegal.
 
The missionary has since been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), continues to suffer frequent nightmares, flashbacks and has attempted suicide twice as a result of trauma incurred in North Korea.
 
There is a precedent for his action.  Members of the USS Pueblo who were tortured in North Korea (1968) successfully sued the DPRK in US courts in 2009, with a federal judge awarding them $65 million in damages.
 
Park says he is not interested in a financial settlement but in speaking out against the regime's mass atrocities and ongoing genocide, and has vowed to devote any money earned to funding anti-Pyongyang forces within North Korea and in China.

Genocide Watch, a Washington-based international nongovernmental organization that seeks to end genocide, said in a report last month that North Korea has "committed genocide and political mass killings," and is "a serial killer state."

On Genocide Watch Board of Advisors is Samantha Power, senior director for multilateral affairs at the U.S. National Security Council. Park said he wants to meet with Power to discuss convincing national governments to invoke the "responsibility to protect."

(Most of this is quotd from their newsletter. I added a couple of comments.)

Geneocide Watch appears to be modeling itself on Human Rights Watch.  It does not yet have the same international reputation but seems serious and brings together a wide coalition of groups with the goal of stopping and preventing geneocide, applicable to North Korea.

GENOCIDE and POLITICIDE ALERT: NORTH KOREA - http://www.genocidewatch.org/northkorea.html
 
"Genocide Watch has ample proof that genocide has been committed and mass killing is still underway in North Korea." - Genocide Watch (December 19, 2011)
 
For Immediate Release
 
January 27th, 2012 - Worldwide General Strike and Call to Mass Demonstrations for North Korean Liberation and Human Rights

Kim Jong Un has announced there will be no rapprochement with the South and its "puppet" government.  Puppet is code for ruled by imperialists.  Imperialists is code for the US.  The US is code for evil.  Evil is code for anyone who disagrees in any way with the regime.  Except for China.  (Idea for this entry borrowed from a Jon Stewart skit.)  Un said the South is guilty of "unforgivable sins".  Chiefly the sin was not sending condolences.  The UN General Assembly observed a moment of silence for about 40 seconds in a half-filled hall.  The Security Council refused to make any such gesture.  Kim Jong Un appears ready to continue in the manner of his father and grandfather.  Still, he may decide that feeding his people would help him stay in power.  There is talk of a deal with the US that was being negotiated before Il's death.   The US would send food aid in return for some nuclear step-back.

How should state leaders deal with sending condolences?  Does advanced diplomatic protocol have a formula for this situation?   Condolences should be sent, but not for Kim Jong Il's death.  Condolences must be sent to the people of North Korea for having suffered under this bloody tyrant for so long.  We must mourn with them for the millions of lives he crushed so mercilessly. 

Well, friends, Kim Jong Il was watching Kimjongilia in his private train and had a heart attack.  Or he was gulping down a tumbler of Chivas Regal and smoking a Cuban cigar and choked.  Or he was planning a public execution and heard they were short of rope. Or he was redesigning the food distribution system to exclude everyone but the 300 families in his closest circle.  Or God finally smote the bastard.  To which one might ask, What took You so long?  So now, we might expect Kim Jong Un (the name is funny in French, like he was named Numero Uno) will probably explode a nuclear device as a Don't Mess with Me signal.  I would expect more brutality, not less, as the young "Great Successor" attempts to establish his dictatorial cred.  His Oneness's first job will be to make sure the poor people under his rule don't get any ideas.  Deploy the army and shoot to kill.  Then Young One might announce a market reform.  Then devalue the money and send all the people who riot to a Re-Education Camp.

Or maybe he will announce free and fair elections, the opening of borders,  the acceptance of foreign aid and foreign monitors to make sure the food gets to the starving people.  We can hope.  Let's hope.

Department of Absurdity: There's a tour group that arranges trips to North Korea called Koryo. They sent out a notice that they'll do a special tour for Kim Il Sung's upcoming 100th birthday with this proviso: "At present, the exact nature of the celebrations and corresponding tourist access is shrouded in the usual mystery - no one knows what visitors can see and do, but as always Koryo Tours will be first in line. Birthday travellers should be ready for sudden changes in itinerary and hotels - all part of the excitement of the country's biggest holiday period ever!"

New York City, United States
12:00pm: Grand Army Plaza in Manhattan, silent march to DPRK Mission to the UN
1:00pm: Demonstration at DPRK Mission to the UN
Speech by North Korean Defector Activist Ji Seong Ho (President of NAUH)   
Event Coordinator: cbk2004@gmail.com
For Interviews, contact: iptbak@gmail.com

There are other events scheduled for London, Berlin, and Seoul to name a few.

The Stop Genocide in North Korea movement is calling for international protests on December 9th, 2011, the 63rd anniversary of the UN Genocide Convention which North Korea is violating in every way.  Currently, Seoul, New York City, Berlin, Tokyo, and London have confirmed to organize demonstrations, with various other cities around the world organizing more protests.

In NY they plan to hand a copy of Kimjongilia to a representative of North Korea.

Recently an interviewer posed a question about Kimjongilia, saying its tone was "highly opinionated".  Though I've heard it before, it still surprises that some viewers apply the word opinion to the film.   When one documents the crimes against humanity which have been committed by say, Charles Taylor in Liberia, or the late Colonel Qaddafi in Libya, to name just two, one does not call this a matter of opinion.  The film presents stories of crimes.  The victims of these crimes express their opinions about the regime that committed these crimes, but that does not change the fact of the crime.  I felt no qualms about judging these crimes as unacceptable.  Only those blinded by a strict adhesion to one political theory or another could possibly "opine" differently.  It is the people of North Korea's great misfortune to be stuck in this time-warped Cold War debate, where excuses for the North's behavior are allowed to flourish.  If the film were about Hitler's concentration camps, would anyone be saying it should have shown the good things Hitler did?  Only when the dictator in question is of the communist persuasion do these questions even arise.  Some have said the film is propaganda.  In the strict sense, propaganda means spreading information to further one's cause.  Fine.  Most issue-oriented documentaries seek to persuade the audience of something by revealing injustice, e.g. sexual crimes against women by soldiers.  Is there any doubt the filmmaker would want us to condemn this practice?   Perhaps balance would be shown by interviewing a boy-soldier who might say he was forced into doing it.  In the case of North Korea it is impossible to interview a guard at a concentration camp and ask if he was forced into his behavior.  Even if he was, it would not mitigate the general crime.  So in the strict sense, yes, the film spreads information about a criminal regime.  But we know the current meaning of  propaganda is always pejorative.  This particular criticism seeks to equate Kimjongilia with North Korea's propaganda, which actively spreads disinformation and lies.   To not recognize the difference is to be… opinionated.

This is from a report from the Candaian organization KanCor, from writer Hazel Smith, who was recently in Pyongyang. 

In most societies, the use of government resources for personal use is characterized as corruption. In North Korea the alternative to engaging in the nation-wide semi-licit market activity is starvation. Food and fuel costs are not subsidized by the government and North Korea’s population pay world market prices, albeit without consumer taxes. A litre of petrol costs $1.30 – about the same as is paid by US automobile drivers. In today’s North Korea, everyone who can engage in trade will do so – as there are still chronic food shortages and so there is a real threat of starvation and hunger – but, at the same time, all must pretend to each other that they are not reliant on the market for survival.

To read the whole very interesting article, go to

http://vtncankor.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/don%e2%80%99t-expect-a-pyongyang-spring-sometime-soon-by-hazel-smith/#more-3208

The gist of it is that there have been some real changes, such as traffic lights ( no more beautiful girls dancing on the corners!) but the poverty beneath remains, and the surveillance remains.  Her fear is that though there is now something of a market, there has been no deveopment of market ethics and so forth, which would be necessary for a one day unification.  It's a very interesting article.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/06/north-korea-malnourished-ophans-floods

Very disturbing video, more reports of the threat of famine in NK, after a difficult witner of natural disasters.  South Korea has offered aid,NK seems reluctatnto accept.  Babies are dying.

I received this from a colleague and am helping to spread the word.  Things have not improved in North Korea, but more people are waking up to the crisis:

"This is a call to worldwide protest on December 9th, 2011, coinciding with the 63rd Anniversary of the UN Genocide Convention. Please read the following article published by the Harvard International Review, and let us know if you can assist us with translation into other languages. For those who would like to unite for this protest, please feel free to take the initiative and utilize social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) to begin the mobilization process, and let us know about your demonstration at nkglobalprotest@gmail.com
 
http://hir.harvard.edu/north-korea-and-the-genocide-movement