Asia News Digest
North Korea Suspends All North-South Projects After Hyundai Suicide
On Aug. 5, North Korea halted all North-South projects for an undetermined "period of mourning" after the death of Hyundai Asan Co. Chairman Chung Mong-hun. (See this week's "Latest From LaRouche" for a LaRouche in 2004 campaign statement.)
Chung was the top Seoul corporate official in charge of relations with North Korean Chairman Kim Jong-il, and was personally much closer to Kim (whom Chung had met many, many times) than anyone in the Seoul government. In fact, none of South Korea's current top officials, including President Roh Moo-hyun, have ever met Kim Jong-il. Chung was also in charge of building large sections of the Trans-Korean Railway, reconnected June 14.
The North's pause for mourning could either be briefsince many leaders in Seoul have vowed to continue cooperationor could become serious, if the South Korean prosecutors continue with their witch-hunt against Hyundai. On Aug. 6, the prosecutors called five of Chung's employees to interrogate them on Chung's dealings with the North. Putting this together with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State John Bolton's outbursts against the "nightmare regime" in Pyongyang July 30 in Seoul (see this week's "InDepth"), this gives a picture of a royal brawl in the U.S. between those who want to go with the Six Power talks to reach a peaceful solution to the North Korea crisis, and those who want to blow up North Korea. The same brawl is reflected inside Seoul politics.
Meanwhile, President Roh Moo-hyun's government is falling apart, as a result of the undercutting of his every move from Washington. "Roh's Ever-Plummeting Approval RatingLeadership Crisis Results in National Dilemma," was the title of the Korea Times editorial July 30, after his approval rating fell to an unprecedented 24% in the polls; and the Times is very pro-Roh.
Neo-Cons Woolsey and Mcinerney Outline Insane Plan for War on North Korea
In an Aug. 4 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, neo-conservative warmongers James Woolsey (Mr. "World War IV") and Thomas McInerney rant that, unless China succeeds in ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program, preferably through a "change in regime," the United States and South Korea must plan for "The Next Korean War" within weeks to months. Woolsey, a former CIA director, is a member of the secretive Defense Policy Board, run by the Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz cabal that produced fraudulent intelligence in order to justify the Iraq war. Recent allegations have appeared in the magazine of the U.S. Naval War College, that intelligence about North Korean weapons of mass destruction, has also been distorted by political idealogues who want to provoke a war.
It is no accident that the op-ed appeared in wake of reports that progress was being made in setting up U.S. multilateral talks on North Korea.
"Force is an option in Korea," the neo-con warmongers claim, and the U.S. and South Korea must "begin to assess realistically what it would take to conduct a successful military operation to change the North Korean regime."
According to the two utopians, the U.S. could defeat North Korea decisively in 30-60 days, by using massive air power to strike the nuclear reprocessing facility at Yongbyon and other key sites, plus deploying two U.S. Army divisions and Marine Expeditionary Forces. Specifically, "the U.S. should begin planning immediately to deploy the Patriot tactical ballistic missile defense system plus Aegis ships to South Korea and Japan," as well as move in aircraft carrier battle groups.
Russia Committed to Economic Support for North Korea
In an op-ed published in the Aug. 6 German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Deputy Russian Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov writes that, whereas "North Korea certainly is no threat to the security of the United States, one single medium-range nuclear-missile detonation would create havoc in the region. Therefore, Russia is committed to contribute to a diplomatic solution to the North Korean problem, in whatever format is acceptable to Pyongyang. The main objective of Russian diplomacy is to establish a nuclear-free zone on the entire Korean peninsula."
But Russia is committed also to essential economic contributions to a future package deal for North Korea, Losyukov writes: "Russia would supply electricity to North Korea, and would also build a pipeline to supply natural gas. Moreover, Russia does have an interest in the completion of the Trans-Korean railway project, as part of the design to establish a direct rail freight transport link between Asia and Europe, via the Trans-Siberian Railway."
China, Russia Launching Joint Sci-Tech Center
A joint science and technology center is being sponsored in Lianoning, China by the Shenyang City (China) Engineering College, Russia's Tomsk Polytechnic College, and the Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, to conduct research on aeronautics and astronautics, bioengineering, energy, new materials, laser technology, and environmental sciences. It is to be completed in 2005, and ultimately should include 10 institutes. The center will also be open to other institutes in China, Russia, and other countries.
The Chinese are also planning a high-tech industrial park catering to Russian technology in Shenyang, in northeast China. This center plans to follow up with a Russian-Chinese science park in Russia, in a bid to introduce Chinese high technology, practical technology, and products to Russia.
Iran Promotes 'Reviving the Ancient Silk Road' to China
In an interview with the Beijing English-language magazine World Great Talents, reported in the Aug. 4 Tehran Times, the Iranian Ambassador to China, Fereydoun Verdi Nejad, referred to the "many-thousands-year history of the Silk Road" which served travellers, a path for exchanges of culture and art, and an economic transit road among all countries on its path for centuries. The boosting of Tehran-Beijing political and economic ties can play an important role in efforts aimed at reconstruction of that ancient road." Now, he said, "Chinese technicians and engineers are currently busy at such infrastructure facilities as road, subway, airport, and power plant construction in Iran." He said that the "vast unused potentials in both countries" can be used to expand relations.
Taliban Killing Off Clerics Who Support Afghanistan's Karzai Government
New York Times correspondent Carlotta Gall reported from Kandahar, Afghanistan on Aug. 3 that the Taliban are now in the process of killing off those Afghan clerics who do not agree to the holy war call issued by the Taliban militia. Three senior clerics have been killed by the Taliban in the last 40 days. The killing comes in the midst of increased Taliban activity in southern Afghanistan. Local officials reported capturing 20 Taliban suspects in the last few days in two operations in Kandahar province, says Gall. The authorities also caught a Taliban member trying to plant a mine meant to kill the Governor of Uruzgan province, north of Kandahar, and home province of Taliban supremo Mullah Mohammad Omar.
The strategy of the Taliban is to silence the Kandahar-based Ulema-e-Shura, or Clerics' Council. The 15-member Ulema-e-Shura had pledged its support to the Karzai government in Kabul. Ulema-e-Shura issued a religious edict seven months ago, denouncing the Taliban's call for jihad against the American-led forces in Afghanistan. Ulema-e-Shura chief Maulvi Muhammad Huq said that, unlike the Soviets, whose intervention here in the 1980s was intended to occupy the country and so justified a jihad, the American-led forces had come to expel terrorists and bring peace, and had United Nations' support.
Iran Supports a Stable Afghan Regime
Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi, during his Aug. 5 meeting with the UN Special Representative to Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, said that "Iran has consistently voiced support for a stable and strong government in Afghanistan that guarantees peace, stability, and welfare of the Afghan people. This is our government's policy." Brahimi, who was visiting Tehran, also lauded Iran's participation in the Afghan reconstruction work in various areas. He described these efforts as "very positive and useful," adding, "We attach special importance to consultations between the United Nations and Iran."
In another meeting with the Deputy Foreign Minister for Asia-Pacific Affairs, Mohsen Aminzadeh, Brahmi expressed appreciation for Iran's role in the work of reconstruction in Afghanistan. Aminzadeh also said Iran is meeting some success in curbing poppy cultivation in Afghanistan.
China Painted As 'Enemy' For Refusing To Devalue Its Currency
In an Aug. 4 article about China's resistance to the devaluation of its currency, the Toronto Globe and Mail points out that in some circles, China is being viewed as a threat for making this decision.
"China is being blamed for millions of job losses in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia. And with the U.S. election season approaching, the outcry will only grow noisier; and the yuan has suddenly emerged as the bete noire of politicians and business leaders around the world." Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge has joined a chorus of many other European and American government officials in calling for a rise in the yuan's value.
"Beijing's public reaction has been unsympathetic," says the Globe. "In the official media, Chinese policy makers and opinion leaders are scoffing at the Western complaints, seeing them as an admission of economic illness. 'If they are sick, why let China take the pills?' asked Xiao Guoliang, an economist at Beijing University. He accused Western leaders of 'retaining a Cold War mentality.' 'China is now becoming the Japan of the 1980s,' said Wenran Jiang, a political scientist at the University of Alberta. 'I think this is very much a new chapter in the "China threat" theory.'"
See ECONOMICS NEWS DIGEST for: Mahathir, Sakakibara Renew Call for Asian Monetary Fund
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