(SMH) -Italy has blocked the sale of two luxury yachts to impoverished North Korea because it suspects they were destined for reclusive leader Kim Jong-Il, the Financial Times reported today.
A contract for the sale of the yachts, worth €12.5 million ($22 million) was terminated this month after a probe by the Italian Government and anti-fraud police, the newspaper said.
The two boats were confiscated by the Ministry of Economic Development amid concerns that allowing the sale would breach international sanctions against Pyongyang, the newspaper said.
"Seeing the type of goods that were involved and the condition that the country [North Korea] is in, we were very suspicious that the yachts were for the leader [Kim], though we have no evidence of this," the ministry said.
A deposit was paid for work on the boats, although it was unclear by whom. The boats have since been returned to Azimut-Benetti, one of Italy's leading luxury yacht makers.
The United Nations imposed sanctions on North Korea for a long-range rocket launch in April. Tensions with the international community rose further after it restarted its weapons program and carried out an underground nuclear test in May.
Kim has been portrayed by visitors and North Korean defectors as a leader who enjoys fine dining, cognac and other luxuries.
The communist state, however, suffers food shortages, and relies on overseas aid to feed millions of its people.
Kim reportedly has life-threatening pancreatic cancer.
AFP
23 July 2009
Sick Kim's suspected two new yachts blocked
North Korea launches bizarre attack on Hillary Clinton
macho macho midgets ...
very gentlemen like deflowering a rose...
if Mrs Clinton hasn't got intelligence
FM spoke person got something else...
A foreign ministry spokesman quoted by the communist state's official news agency accused Clinton of making "a spate of vulgar remarks unbecoming for her position everywhere she went since she was sworn in".
"We cannot but regard Mrs Clinton as a funny lady as she likes to utter such rhetoric, unaware of the elementary etiquette in the international community," the spokesman added in a statement.
"Sometimes she looks like a primary schoolgirl and sometimes a pensioner going shopping."
The North took particular umbrage at recent comments by Mrs Clinton likening Pyongyang's recent missile launches to the behaviour of an unruly attention-seeking teenager.
"Her words suggest that she is by no means intelligent," the statement said, adding that Pyongyang is protecting itself against "the US hostile policy and nuclear threat, not to attract anyone's attention".
Moon Landing - 40 years on
Mrs Clinton could make a contribution to US foreign policy "only when she has understanding of the world". it said.
At a regional security forum in the Thai resort of Phuket, Mrs Clinton urged members to enforce the UN sanctions imposed against the North for its nuclear and missile tests.
Agence France-Presse
Continue read North Korea launches bizarre attack on Hillary Clinton...
North Korea would not return to six party talk
North Korea said Thursday that it would neither return to the six party talk nor stop its nuclear ambition unless other parties ended their bias against Pyongyang.
The communist ruled country would not accept the comprehensive package proposed by the US Sectary of State Hillary Clinton since it has nothing new from the previous administration, said North Korea's Director of International Affairs Department Ri Hung Sik.
North Korea's diplomats were in Thailand this week for a meeting with 26 countries in the Asean Regional Forum, which Clinton was also in.
Pyongyang would not take any suggestions from the Asean meeting back home and would never give up its nuclear development program, he said.
The Nation
22 July 2009
North Korea fears forum criticism over missile tests
By THANIDA TANSUBHAPOL and ACHARA ASHAYAGACHAT
PHUKET (Bangkok Post): North Korea has called on Thailand to protect its delegates from criticism during the Asean Regional Forum.
Pyongyang's ambassador at large Pak Kun-gwang yesterday raised the issue in talks with Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya ahead of tomorrow's security meeting.
Mr Pak requested an urgent meeting with the minister shortly after the five North Korean delegates arrived on the resort island yesterday.
North Korea is worried its recent missile tests would be condemned by countries participating in the forum, said Mr Kasit's secretary Chavanond Intarakomalyasut. (LOL)
As the Asean chair, Thailand will head the Asean-initiated security talks.
Mr Chavanond quoted the minister as saying "we need to make sure the meeting's peace-building objectives are met and that he would not let any ARF members use the forum to attack other members".
"I would also like North Korea to listen to what the United States has to say," he said. "The Barack Obama administration should be given a chance to speak out."
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will attend the forum, as will representatives from the European Union.
It is the first forum at which North Korea will engage with 25 other countries in such talks.
Asean foreign ministers will hold talks today with their dialogue partners from China, Japan and South Korea.
Thailand will push for closer cooperation with the three nations on finance, agriculture and health matters.
It will also urge the acceleration of the Chiang Mai Initiative during the Asean summit in Phuket in October, diplomatic sources said.
Last month, the so-called Asean+3 agreed in Bangkok to strengthen the regional financial mechanism. A regional pooling reserve would be established under the Chiang Mai Initiative with a US$20 billion (700 billion baht) start-up fund by the end of the year.
Director-general of the Asean Affairs Department Vitavas Srivihok said Asean ministers would also discuss measures to fight the A (H1N1) flu outbreak.
Asean secretary-general Surin Pitsuwan has been assigned to liaise with Southeast Asian health ministers on the issue, the official said.
17 July 2009
UN Issues New Sanctions against North Korea
By JOHN HEILPRIN / AP WRITER
The Irrawaddy News
UNITED NATIONS — The UN imposed new sanctions Thursday against five North Korean officials, four companies and a state agency, and banned imports of two weapons-making materials, in a rare unified push by the world's powers to thwart Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions.
The sanctions, which take immediate effect and are to be carried out by all of the UN's 192 member nations, include travel bans and a freeze on the financial assets against the officials, companies and state agency. Nations also were instructed to refrain from supplying North Korea with certain types of graphite and para-aramid fiber—two of the materials used in ballistic missile parts.
"It is of course significant that we have also put individuals on the list, as this is the first time. This shows that the sanctions are going on a higher level at this moment," said Fazli Corman, Turkey's deputy UN ambassador, who chairs the panel.
The newest sanctions were approved against:
—The General Bureau of Atomic Energy in Pyongyang, the chief agency directing the North's nuclear program. That includes the Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center and its plutonium production research reactor, as well as its fuel fabrication and reprocessing facilities.
—Three Pyongyang-based companies—Namchongang Trading Corp., Korea Hyoksin Trading Corp., and Korean Tangun Trading Corp—and one Iranian-based company, Hong Kong Electronics.
—Yun Ho-Jin, director of Namchongang Trading Corp; Ri Je-Son, director of the General Bureau of Atomic Energy; Hwang Sok-Hwa, chief of the bureau's scientific guidance; Ri Hong-Sop, former director of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center; and Han Yu-Ro, director of Korea Ryongaksan General Trading Corp.
—Two types of goods used in ballistic missile parts by North Korea—a graphite designed or specified for use in electrical discharge machining; and a para-aramid fiber, filament and tape, which is a Kevlar-like material.
US Ambassador Susan Rice said the United States was pleased with the list, which required unanimous approval among the 15 nations that make up a sanctions panel of the UN's powerhouse Security Council. China, North Korea's biggest ally and trading partner, went along with most of the US recommendations.
The US has launched what it calls a major effort to ensure that UN Security Council Resolution 1874, which along with a previous resolution in 2006 serves to authorize the latest sanctions, is implemented effectively.
"These new designations—five individuals, five entities and two goods—strengthen the sanctions regime against North Korea and will serve to constrain North Korea from engaging in transactions or activities that could fund its WMD or proliferation activities," Rice said.
The sanctions panel, which said it plans to add still more names and entities, has been focused on three areas: sensitive dual-use goods, ballistic missile-related items and nuclear-related items.
Pak Tok-hun, deputy chief of North Korea's UN mission in New York, told South Korea's Yonhap news agency that the sanctions were "unfair" but said they will not harm his country.
Pak said North Korea "will not accept Security Council resolutions against the North and any sanctions under the resolutions," adding, "Sanctions will not resolve any problems."
A US expert on North Korean sanctions said the latest measures—putting the UN seal of approval on measures the US already has prepared to undertake—are "a modest first step" that might scare off some of North Korea's weapons-buying customers.
"We're now into a game of Whack-A-Mole," said Marcus Noland, an economist at Washington-based Peterson Institute for International Economics, referring to the game in which moles keeping popping up from their holes randomly.
"What's going to happen is that the North Koreans are going to try to reconstitute their entities and form new shell companies, new front companies, to continue these activities," he said. "If there's really going to be comprehensive efforts on this, they're going to have to go after the financial intermediaries, some of which are in China, and after the customers."
North Korea has not indicated how it might react to the sanctions panel's latest decisions.
But on June 13, North Korea's Foreign Ministry threatened to take "countermeasures" including accelerating plutonium reprocessing and starting up uranium enrichment, which would give the regime a second way to make atomic bombs.
North Korea warned that any attempted blockade of its ships would be considered "an act of war" that would draw "a decisive military response." It also has threatened a "thousand-fold" military retaliation against the US and its allies if provoked.
Security Council Resolution 1874, approved on June 12, responded to the North's underground nuclear test blast on May 25.
13 July 2009
Seoul suspects North Korea behind cyber attacks
(SMH) -Seoul's spy agency has yet to be sure that North Koreans were behind recent cyber attacks on South Korea and the United States but it still sees Pyongyang as a prime suspect, officials said.
The National Intelligence Service (NIS) said in a statement on Sunday it was still looking into "various pieces of evidence" indicating that North Koreans might have orchestrated the attacks against South Korean and US government websites, as well as private websites.
"The NIS ... has yet to reach a final conclusion that the acts have been committed by North Korea," the statement said.
It denied a report by Chosun Ilbo newspaper on Saturday that the NIS had found an internet protocol (IP) address used by a North Korean hacker surnamed Yun, who could be behind the cyber attacks.
It said the Chosun Ilbo report went "too far" and urged local media outlets to be prudent in reporting on the case.
Hackers have planted viruses in thousands of personal computers in South Korea, one of the world's most wired societies, as well as overseas.
These mounted "distributed denial of service" (DDoS) attacks designed to seek simultaneous access to selected sites and swamp them with traffic.
The Korea Communications Commission in Seoul said on Sunday more than 690 personal computers in total had been damaged in the wake of the cyber raid.
The attacks that had crippled some South Korean government websites have now come under control after virus-infected "botnet" hosting servers were isolated and "vaccine" programs were widely distributed to PC users.
The North has staged a nuclear test and numerous missile launches in recent weeks, raising regional tensions.
But a cyber attack, if confirmed, would be a new tactic.
AFP
Kim's cancer 'life-threatening'
A frame grab taken from footage released by KRT on July 8, 2009 this year shows Kim Jong-il during the 15th anniversary of the death of his father and country's founder Kim Il-sung in Pyongyang. Photo: Reuters TV (SMH)
(News.com.au) - Kim Jong-il 'has pancreatic cancer'
* Health report based on foreign spy agencies
* Kim had looked unwell at memorial last week
* Cancer is life-threatening, sources say
NORTH Korean leader Kim Jong-il has pancreatic cancer and the illness is life-threatening, South Korean broadcaster YTN said.
YTN's claim was based on information gathered by Chinese and South Korean intelligence sources.
Mr Kim's health is one of the most closely guarded secrets in the reclusive communist state.
At 67, he was widely thought to have suffered a stroke last year, but there has never been official confirmation.
Mr Kim looked gaunt during a public appearance last Wednesday at a memorial for his father and state founder Kim Il-sung.
Mr Kim's health raises questions about succession in Asia's only communist dynasty and who will control its nuclear weapons programmes.
The North conducted its second nuclear test on May 25, which was met by UN sanctions aimed at cutting off the impoverished state's lucrative arms trade and one of its few sources of hard cash.
South Korean officials have said the North's recent military grandstanding, that also included missiles launches and threats to attack the South, was linked to efforts to pave the way for Mr Kim's youngest son to take over.
Mr Kim took power in 1994 when his father died at the age of 82.
He assumed the title of general secretary of the Workers' Party and chairman of the National Defence Commission, but has never taken the title of president.
From correspondents in Seoul, South Korea
Reuters
06 July 2009
NKorean Launches Maybe Included New Scud
By HYUNG-JIN KIM / AP WRITER
The Irrawaddy News
SEOUL — A barrage of ballistic missiles that North Korea test-fired over the weekend may have included a new type of Scud missile with an extended range and improved accuracy that poses a threat to Japan, a South Korean newspaper reported Monday.
Pyongyang launched seven missiles into waters off its east coast Saturday in a show of force that defied UN resolutions and drew international condemnation.
On Monday, South Korea's mass-circulation Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported the launches were believed to have included three Scud-ER missiles with a range of up to 620 miles (1,000 kilometers).
The paper said the Scud-ER has a longer range and better accuracy compared with previous Scud series so is "particularly a threat to Japan."
Tokyo is about 720 miles (1,160 kilometers) from the base on North Korea's east coast from where the missiles were fired. Some other parts of Japan are closer, well within the range of a Scud-ER.
Scuds are single stage, liquid-fueled missiles, originally developed in the former Soviet Union, and generally known for poor accuracy. Ballistic missile programs in Pakistan and Iran were built on Scud technology.
The Chosun Ilbo, citing a government source it did not name, said the other four missiles were two Scud-C missiles with a range of 310 miles (500 kilometers) and two medium-range Rodong missiles that can travel up to 810 miles (1,300 kilometers).
Five of the seven missiles flew about 260 miles (420 kilometers) from an eastern coastal launch site and landed in one area, meaning their accuracy has improved, the paper said.
South Korea's Defense Ministry spokesman Won Tae-jae said Monday that the North demonstrated improved missile accuracy in the latest tests because they all landed in the same area.
He declined to confirm details of the Chosun Ilbo report.
Another ministry official told The Associated Press on Sunday that the missiles appeared to have traveled about 250 miles (400 kilometers), meaning that key government and military facilities in South Korea were within range. The official spoke on condition of anonymity citing department policy.
North Korea has long-range missiles as well. The Taepodong-2 has a potential range of more than 4,100 miles (6,700 kilometers), putting Alaska within striking distance.
The country is believed to be developing a missile with an even longer range that could potentially put the US west coast, Hawaii, Australia and eastern Europe within striking distance.
The launches on July 4—the US Independence Day holiday—also appeared to be a poke at Washington as it moves to enforce UN as well as its own sanctions against the isolated regime for its May 25 nuclear test.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned they were "very destabilizing, potentially."
North Korean state media have not specifically mentioned the launches but boasted Sunday that the country's military could impose "merciless punishment" on those who provoke it.
"Our revolutionary forces have grown up today as the strong army that can impose merciless punishment against those who offend us," the North's main Rodong Sinmun newspaper said in a commentary carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.
The North has engaged in a series of acts this year widely seen as provocative. It fired a long-range rocket it said was a satellite in early April, and in late May it carried out its second underground nuclear test following the first in late 2006.
The UN Security Council punished Pyongyang with tough sanctions centered on clamping down on North Korea's alleged trading of banned arms and weapons-related material.
The US has been monitoring a North Korean freighter because of suspicions it may be carrying illegal weapons, possibly to Burma. The ship, however, turned around a week ago without stopping at any port and headed toward home.
Won, the Defense Ministry spokesman, said the Kang Nam 1 was expected to arrived in the North later Monday.
Separately, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman pledged to work with the US to block North Korea from using the Southeast Asian nation's banks for any weapons deals.
"If America has any information that is available to them, then I think they should give it to us so that we can act upon it," Anifah told reporters. "If they have evidence, we'll be most willing to work together to solve this problem."
The assurance came as US envoy Philip Goldberg, in charge of coordinating the implementation of sanctions against Pyongyang, met with Malaysian officials in Kuala Lumpur.
South Korean media have reported that North Korea sought payment through a bank in Malaysia for a suspected shipment of weapons to Burma.
Associated Press writers Jae-soon Chang in Seoul and Julia Zappei in Kuala Lumpur contributed to this report.
N Korea spent $880m on nuclear tests
From correspondents in Seoul
(News.com.au) - Agence France-Presse
IMPOVERISHED North Korea has spent an estimated $US700 million ($880 million) this year on nuclear and missile tests, enough to solve its food shortage for at least two years, South Korean news reports say.
The figure includes the estimated $US43 million ($54 million) cost of test-firing five Scud and two Rodong missiles on Saturday, according to unidentified government officials quoted by Chosun Ilbo newspaper.
The latest tests, staged on the US Independence Day holiday, were seen as a show of defiance to Washington as it seeks tough enforcement of UN sanctions aimed at shutting down the communist state's nuclear and missile programs.
Officials quoted by Chosun estimated it cost $US300 million ($378 million) to launch a long-range Taepodong-2 missile on April 5, and another $US10 million ($12.6 million) to launch 10 short-range missiles in recent weeks.
In addition, they estimated the May 25 underground nuclear test - the country's second since 2006 - cost between $US300 million to $US400 million ($378 million to $504 million).
JoongAng Ilbo gave similar figures. Neither paper gave the methodology for the cost calculation.
Chosun quoted an unidentified official as saying the North could have bought one million tonnes of rice on the international market for $US300 million ($378 million).
"This amount of rice could have solved the North's food shortage for about a year," the official was quoted as saying.
The UN World Food Program has said that according to a study last year, nearly nine million North Koreans - more than a third of the country's 24 million people - are estimated to need food aid.
Saturday's launches were the biggest salvo of ballistic weaponry since the North fired a Taepodong-2 and six smaller missiles in 2006, also on July 4 US time.
US Vice-President Joseph Biden on Sunday dismissed the launches as "like almost attention-seeking behaviour" and said the focus was on further isolating Pyongyang.
"We have succeeded in uniting the most important and critical countries to North Korea on a common path of further isolating North Korea," he told ABC Television in the US, referring to Russia and China.
These have been traditionally resistant to tough sanctions on Pyongyang but backed the latest measures approved on June 12.
US and South Korean officials believe ailing leader Kim Jong-Il, 67, is staging a show of strength to bolster his authority as he tries to put in place a succession plan involving his youngest son Jong-Un.
North Korean weapons ship heads home
By Jack Kim
(News.com.au) -A NORTH Korean ship tracked by the US Navy on suspicion of carrying a banned arms cargo is expected to return home after a voyage that tested UN sanctions aimed at punishing Pyongyang for its May nuclear test.
The ship's return may decrease tensions that were raised after North Korea fired seven ballistic missiles on Saturday in an act of defiance towards the US on its Independence Day.
The ageing cargo ship Kang Nam, which set sail in mid June, was headed back to North Korea and is expected to arrive on Monday, South Korean Defence Ministry spokesman Won Tae-jae said.
Local dailies said it was headed for the North's port of Nampo after a journey that took it close to Singapore and Myanmar.
A US envoy coordinating the enforcement of UN sanctions on the North is in Malaysia for talks with officials on possibly shutting down bank accounts used by the North for its illicit trade deals, reports in South Korean dailies said.
"The Obama administration has uncovered suspicious North Korean bank accounts in Malaysia," the Joongang Ilbo newspaper quoted a diplomatic source in Washington as saying.
A Malaysian official described the visit by US Ambassador Philip Goldberg as "routine".
Mr Goldberg last week discussed enforcing sanctions with China, the North's biggest benefactor whose participation is essential for the punishment to take effect.
The UN sanctions imposed after the North's nuclear test were aimed at halting its arms trade, which is a vital source of foreign currency for the cash-short state. They also called on states to clamp down on the North's suspected arms shipments.
Missle tests and sanctions
US Vice President Joseph Biden dismissed North Korea's recent missile launches as predictable and said in a TV interview aired on Sunday it was part of "attention-seeking" behaviour by the reclusive state.
Analysts said the missile test may be related to the UN sanctions because the North wants to show its customers, who face greater risks in purchasing missiles, that its products are reliable and accurate.
"North Korea has been making profits through arms trading and this could also have been a test to measure their force," Dongguk University professor Koh Yu-hwan said.
"They want to test their performance on how much they have developed in the past months."
North Korea appears to have launched five Scud missiles, which could hit anywhere in South Korea, and two mid-range Rodong missiles, that could strike most of Japan, in the salvo fired on Saturday, South Korean officials told reporters.
The missiles flew as far as 420 km and displayed greater precision than previously shown, one official said.
Defence Ministry spokesman Won said the North had "greatly improved" the accuracy of its missiles.
A senior South Korean official quoted by the Dong-A Ilbo daily said: "They showed the North is capable of dealing a serious blow to military command centres, airfields and major government installations throughout the South."
"The level of threat is of an entirely different scale when compared to previous launches of surface-to-ship and surface-to-air missiles."
The Scud and Rodong are ballistic missiles. Their launch would mark an escalation by the North, which has fired several non-ballistic, short-range missile since the May 25 nuclear test.
North Korea is barred by UN resolutions from firing ballistic missiles.
It has more than 600 Scud type missiles and 300 Rodong missiles which have been deployed and target US allies South Korea and Japan, defence officials have said.
Reuters
