North Korea

[JohnnyRico]

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[JohnnyRico]

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[JohnnyRico]

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[palden]

Promoting Christianity in a Buddhist temple is indeed hostile. Typical ANG Mo mentality. Kenna detail then act like victim. Try the opposite, and he will be crucified.

SYDNEY: An Australian missionary detained in North Korea left pamphlets promoting Christianity in a Buddhist temple, with his guide informing security officials, his travel companion told media Thursday.

Hong Kong-based John Short, 75, was taken from his Pyongyang hotel on Monday by North Korean police, two days after arriving from Beijing as part of a small tour group, according to his wife Karen.

He is being held for allegedly distributing Korean-language Christian pamphlets and attempting to proselytise, which is illegal in a country that views foreign missionaries as seditious elements intent on fomenting unrest.

Short has reportedly admitted to North Korean authorities that his trip to the isolated country was not only for tourism.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation said he was on a two-man trip with Chinese Christian Wang Chong, who has returned to Beijing and said their problems stemmed from a visit to a Buddhist temple.

He said Short left pamphlet materials promoting Christianity at the site.

"They took us to a mountain to visit a temple and a Buddhist statue was broken or smashed by someone. The door of this temple was damaged too," Wang told the broadcaster.

"They were not happy for us to see this damage. We took some photos. They asked us to delete them and we deleted them.

"(Short) didn't feel comfortable in his heart and he left a pamphlet there relating to the gospel."

Their local North Korean tour guide reported this, and security officials found more Korean-language material in his luggage at his hotel, Wang said.

The ABC said the Chinese tour company that booked the trip, BTG, was in touch with its North Korean counterparts, and employee Han Weiping claimed Short had admitted he was there for more than just tourism.

"When we called the DPRK travel agency they said he had admitted that he didn't go to North Korea only for tourism," Han told the ABC, adding that the trip was supposed to be for four days.

"The pamphlet event happened on the second day," she said.

"And on the third day it was planned for them to visit some sites, but the Australian man said he didn't want to go out and instead wanted to stay in the hotel.

"So the North Koreans could've become even more suspicious that he wasn't there as a tourist."

Canberra is working on the case via the Swedish embassy in Pyongyang, which represents its interests in the absence of diplomatic relations between Australia and North Korea.

Pyongyang had sought to re-open its embassy in Canberra last year but was rebuffed in March after conducting a nuclear test.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott on Thursday used Short's detention to warn travellers they must obey the laws of the countries they visit.

"Not all countries have the same legal system or the same laws as Australia," he said, with Short potentially facing a long jail term.

North Korea is also holding US citizen Kenneth Bae, described by a North Korean court as a militant Christian evangelist.

He was arrested in November 2012 and sentenced to 15 years' hard labour on charges of seeking to topple the government.

Short has lived in Asia for five decades and runs a publishing house in Hong Kong that distributes calendars, Bibles and tracts in Chinese and other languages, his wife said.

Although religious freedom is enshrined in the North Korean constitution, it does not exist in practice and religious activity is restricted to officially-recognised groups linked to the government.

Short's detention comes just days after a hard-hitting United Nations report, headed by an Australian former judge, outlined a litany of crimes against humanity in North Korea, including mass murder, enslavement and starvation.

North Korea refused to cooperate with the commission, claiming its evidence was "fabricated" by "hostile" forces.

- AFP/xq

 

[YouMakeMyDreams]

Re: N.Korea builds 'shrine' to leader's likely successor

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[YouMakeMyDreams]

South eyes Pyongyang after its missile launches

Mar 01,2014

South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense called North Korea’s launch of four short-range missiles “an intentional provocation” against the ongoing joint military drills between Seoul and Washington.

“We judge it was an intentional provocation [by North Korea] to fire off missiles while South Korea and the United States are conducting the Key Resolve exercises,” Kim Min-seok, the ministry’s spokesman, said at a daily briefing yesterday.

“Given the fact that a North Korean military patrol ship violated the Northern Limit Line [NLL] two days before the missile launch, we assume the firing was a planned provocation.”

North Korea test-fired four short-range ballistic missiles toward the East Sea from a launch site in Kitdaeryong, a mountainous region in Kangwon Province, starting at 5:42 p.m. on Thursday, the South Korean military told reporters that day.

The range of each missile was estimated to be at least 200 kilometers (124 miles), Seoul said. They are believed to be Scud-series ballistic missiles. If those speculations are true, it would be the first time since 2009 that North Korea has launched such a weapon.

“Because most of North Korea’s Scud missiles can be placed on a mobile launch pad, they can prepare for a launch within a short time period,” Kim said. “Given the fact that the entire Korean Peninsula is under the range of those missiles, we are concluding that North Korea had a purpose for this provocation.”

The South Korean military is focusing on the timing of the launch, as it comes just days after a North Korean patrol ship abruptly entered into South Korean waters, crossing a disputed maritime border.

“We are paying attention to the fact that North Korea is militarily active, particularly as tensions eased following reunions for families [separated during the 1950-53 Korean War],” a South Korean military official told the JoongAng Ilbo. “Instead of reducing its military exercises in defiance against the South Korea-U.S. military drills, the regime could show its protest another way.”

On Monday, the first day of annual military drills between Seoul and Washington, the South Korean military discovered that a North Korean military vessel had strayed across the Northern Limit Line, the de facto maritime border in the Yellow Sea, three times from Monday evening until early Tuesday morning. After the South Korean military broadcast warnings, the ship slowly returned to the North in a zigzag path.

On Thursday, North Korea abruptly held a press conference in Pyongyang, where a South Korean Baptist missionary appeared and claimed to have been abducted and arrested more than four months ago on suspicion of trying to establish underground Christian churches in the North. He asked for mercy, imploring the regime to release him.

South Korea’s Ministry of Unification, in charge of all inter-Korean cooperation, said the missile launch should not cast a shadow on the conciliatory mood on the Korean Peninsula.

“We hope North Korea’s missile launch won’t affect inter-Korean relations, including further family reunions,” Kim Eui-do, the spokesman of the ministry said yesterday at a briefing.

After family reunions ended, South Korea proposed medical assistance for North Korea, which is currently struggling to contain an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, a highly infectious virus that can kill livestock.

Pyongyang has not yet responded to the offer.

BY KIM HEE-JIN [[email protected]]

 

[YouMakeMyDreams]

South Korean missionary arrested in North makes ‘confession’

PUBLISHED : Thursday, 27 February, 2014, 4:38pm
UPDATED : Friday, 28 February, 2014, 5:11pm

Agence France-Presse in Seoul

Kim Jeong-wook reads a statement detailing a number of anti-government activities at a news conference in Pyongyang on Thursday. Photo: AP

A South Korean missionary arrested in North Korea in October said on Thursday he had sought to establish underground churches while operating under the orders of South Korea’s intelligence agency.

At a news conference staged in Pyongyang, Kim Jeong-wook, wearing a dark suit and in apparent good health, read a statement that detailed a number of anti-government activities.

No questions were taken at the event, footage of which was broadcast on South Korean television.

Foreigners arrested in North Korea are often required to make a public “confession” which can then expedite their eventual release.

“I thought that the (North’s) current regime should be brought down and acted ... under directions from the (South’s) National Intelligence Service,” Kim said.

“I met with North Koreans and introduced them to the NIS,” he added.

When Kim was first arrested, the North simply announced that it had captured a South Korean “spy” and ignored repeated requests from Seoul to properly identify the detainee.

It later emerged that he was Kim Jeong-wook, 50, a Baptist evangelist who for seven years had been providing shelter and food to North Koreans living in China’s northeastern border city of Dandong.

Kim Jeong-wook (centre in the background) speaks under the portraits of late leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il during a news conference in Pyongyang, North Korea, on Thursday. Photo: AP

Fellow activists said he had crossed the Yalu border river in October to establish the whereabouts of some North Korean refugees who had been arrested in Dandong by Chinese authorities and repatriated.

In his statement, which he read, seated alone at a small table, Kim said he had told North Koreans he met that statues to the country’s ruling Kim dynasty should be smashed, and churches built in their place.

“I also vilified and insulted the North’s leadership with extremely colourful language,” he said.

The news conference came a week after North Korea arrested an Australian missionary, John Short, 75, after he left a Christian pamphlet in a Buddhist temple.

Although religious freedom is enshrined in the North Korean constitution, it does not exist in practice and religious activity is severely restricted to officially-recognised groups linked to the government.

North Korea is also holding US citizen Kenneth Bae, described by a North Korean court as a militant Christian evangelist.

Bae was arrested in November 2012 and sentenced to 15 years’ hard labour on charges of seeking to topple the government.

A number of US missionaries have been arrested in the past, with some allowed to return home after interventions by high-profile US figures.

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[YouMakeMyDreams]

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[YouMakeMyDreams]

Is Kim Jong-un purging another high-level official? South Korea 'looking into' rumours

Unidentified sources say North Korea's number two man, Choe Ryong-hae, is in jail

PUBLISHED : Monday, 03 March, 2014, 12:28pm
UPDATED : Monday, 03 March, 2014, 5:01pm

Audrey Yoo [email protected]

North Korea's ideology officials attend a conference in Pyongyang on Feb. 24, 2014. Photo: EPA

The South Korean government has announced that it is “looking into” rumours about the disappearance and purge of North Korea’s number two leader, Choe Ryong-hae.

Seoul’s Ministry of Unification has not yet confirmed any details, according spokesperson Kim Eui-do at a press briefing on Monday morning.

In a report last Friday, the Seoul-based Free North Korea (FNK) Radio cited unidentified sources who said Choe Ryong-hae, who is Pyongyang’s military politburo chief and ideological watchdog, was being questioned behind bars.

The reasons behind his rumoured arrest were unknown, but they speculated that Choe had “violated the leadership system” of top leader Kim Jong-un, FNK Radio reported.

Choe was believed to have emerged as one of Pyongyang’s senior leaders after the high-profile execution of Kim’s uncle, Jang Song-thaek, in December.

He might have fallen out of Kim’s favour because he tried to take hold of various state-run businesses after Jang’s execution, or because he was seen as a threat to Kim, reported the South Korean daily Chosun Ilbo.

Rumours of Choe’s purge surfaced after he appeared to be absent from Pyongyang’s major events in late February.

 

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[Guile]

This thread brings back wonderful memories.

 

[YouMakeMyDreams]

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[LightYears]

Re: Kim Jong-il: the life and times of the leader of North Korea

deleted....

 

[YouMakeMyDreams]

S. Korean leader urges new talks on separated families

AFP
March 4, 2014, 7:00 pm

Seoul (AFP) - South Korean President Park Geun-Hye Tuesday called for new talks with North Korea on allowing families separated by the Korean War to exchange letters and hold reunions via video conferencing.

Park said that more than 6,000 people should meet with relatives from the other side every year if all separated families are to see their loved ones at least once before they die, according the president's office.

"Many families do not have time to wait any more," she said, urging her cabinet to push for talks with North Korea on letter exchanges and video reunions for separated families.

Park last week said the two Koreas should hold family reunions on a regular basis, but Pyongyang has not responded to the offer, which came after the two Koreas wrapped up their first reunion in more than three years.

The six-day reunion last month at the North's Mount Kumgang resort brought together about 750 people from both sides, an event that raised hopes of a sustainable improvement in volatile cross-border ties.

Because the Korean conflict ended with a ceasefire rather than a peace treaty, the two countries remain technically at war, and there is almost no direct contact permitted between their civilian populations.

Millions of Koreans were separated by the 1950-53 war, and the vast majority have since died without having any communication at all with surviving relatives.

The reunion programme began in earnest after a historic North-South summit in 2000, but the waiting list has always been far larger than the numbers that could be accommodated.

Last year alone 3,800 South Korean applicants for reunions died.

Observers say Pyongyang will be looking for bigger ticket financial rewards for what it sees as its humanitarian largesse in allowing the reunion to go ahead.

Pyongyang has been pushing Seoul for some time to resume South Korean tours to Mount Kumgang -- trips that provided much-needed hard currency in the past.

South Korea suspended the tours after a tourist was shot dead in 2008 by North Korean guards after she strayed from the designated path.