The Malaysian Insider :: Features
The Malaysian Insider :: Features |
| Meet North Korea’s new Kim, same as the old Kims? Posted: 03 Apr 2013 12:13 AM PDT
There are indeed signs of an earlier method in what might seem like Kim's rhetorical madness, which US policymakers say is patterned after more than a half century of rule over the reclusive state by his father and grandfather. But with a large degree of uncertainty surrounding Kim and limited US intelligence on North Korea's leadership, Washington is still trying to gauge how far the untested 30-year old leader might go to prove himself to his people, and his generals, or to make a belligerent point to South Korea's new president and the world. North Korea's surprise announcement yesterday of plans to restart a long-shuttered nuclear reactor, while not issued by Kim personally, could further raise the stakes in his standoff with the West. "All bets are off on whether this guy recognises where the off-ramps are," one senior administration official said. "We don't have enough history with him to know whether or not he has the sophistication that his father displayed in dealing with diplomatic confrontation." This official and others spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss months of North Korean threats and actions, including missile and nuclear tests, that pose a challenge to President Barack Obama's policy of "strategic patience" toward Pyongyang. That policy — a refusal to offer new incentives to Pyongyang until it suspends its disputed nuclear programme — has yielded little but defiance since Obama took office in 2009. Joseph DiTrani, formerly the US intelligence community's top expert on North Korea, said the "cadence change" displayed by Kim's tough talk and military gestures, such as this year's nuclear test, indicate he is under heavy pressure from the country's military elite.
No cause for alarm? Though Kim has fired or demoted some generals since taking power, Pyongyang's military leadership remains a political force to be reckoned with. He has sought to placate them by paying homage to the "Military First," or Songun, philosophy his late father, Kim Jong-il, preached to justify use of impoverished North Korea's scarce resources to build a 1.2 million-strong army and a nuclear weapons programme, Asia experts say. Still, the Obama administration insists there is no cause for alarm. Pyongyang's assertion over the weekend that it had entered a "state of war" with South Korea over its joint military drills with the United States, has not led to corresponding movements of North Korean forces, the White House said. And while Pyongyang's bluster may be unsettling, images of Kim posing in front of maps portraying missile targets on the US mainland require a stretch of the imagination, given that North Korea has yet to prove it has mastered ballistic technology capable of reaching American shores.
The younger Kim, little known to the West when he took power in December 2011, appears intent on stretching the limits of his family's playbook. He has taken the spotlight not only to issue some threats in person but has gone a step further, hurling them at his country's superpower foe. "There are clear differences in style and tone (between father and son)," another senior US official said. "He is much more personally involved in the forefront ... and these threats are more specific and more directly oriented at the United States this time around." But this official insisted that even with this new variation of what he called North Korea's "crazy man strategy," Kim would not succeed in getting Washington and its allies to "buy them off" with aid, fuel or other concessions, as previous US administrations have periodically tried to do.
Targeting domestic audience Some US officials believe Pyongyang's bellicosity is aimed primarily at a domestic audience. They see Kim trying to keep his vast, poorly paid army motivated with anti-US propaganda and improve his status among North Korea's largely dirt poor population by standing up to foreign enemies, even as he seeks to cement his grip on power. But there is growing concern that Kim's inexperience coupled with his drive to prove himself could lead to a limited strike on a South Korean target, such as a ship or border post, or that the two sides could stumble into military confrontation. "The greater likelihood is miscalculation," former US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta told CNBC on Monday. "And if they do something that escalates quickly, that's the greater danger." US officials and independent Korea watchers alike acknowledge, however, they are so short on personal information about Kim that predicting his behaviour remains a guessing game.
Despite that, most Korea watchers believe Kim is a rational actor who understands his military is no match for Seoul and its US ally and that straying too far from historic North Korean practices could jeopardise his own political survival. Kim dialed down the harsh rhetoric in his latest speech this week when he avoided repeating recent threats to attack South Korea and the United States. And he has occasionally tried to project a warmer image. Weeks after ordering an internationally banned nuclear explosion, he indulged his passion for basketball by hosting former NBA star Dennis Rodman. "An awesome kid," said Rodman, who has now spent more time with Kim than any Western officials ever have. — Reuters |
| Private dailies re-emerge in Myanmar, face difficulties Posted: 02 Apr 2013 11:57 PM PDT
Sixteen dailies were granted licences by authorities, but only four were published. The government-affiliated Union Daily, one of three dailies available free of charge, used financial clout to beat out competitors like D-Wave, the paper of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), for which publication preparations are still underway. "All four papers sold out quickly today," Kyi Kyi, a roadside book vendor, told Reuters. "But it's very hard to predict their future sales since three of them were distributed free of charge today and the remaining one was sold at 150 kyat (about 50 sen) per copy," Myanmar's quasi-civilian government took power in early 2011 after the military dictatorship relinquished a half-century stranglehold on the former Burma. It embarked on media reforms as part of its democratisation programme in August 2012, when it relaxed draconian censorship. The three other newspapers distributed were the Voice Daily, Golden Fresh Land and The Standard Time Daily, all Burmese-language publications. Competitors were unwilling, or unable, to get their dailies into the hands of the public quite as quickly. "Frankly it's quite early to say for sure when ours will come out. We are still making necessary preparations to publish the daily," said Han Tha Myint, a member of the NLD's Central Executive Committee, which publishes D-Wave Weekly. Stumbling blocks Distribution, poor infrastructure, outmoded printing equipment and staffing issues are some of the stumbling blocks for media organisations wanting to expand into dailies. "To be frank, the government granted licences much earlier than we expected and we were caught by surprise," said the editor of one private paper, who uses the pseudonym Ko Maung. "There are a lot of things we have to prepare like printing facilities and training staff," he told Reuters, pegging well-funded state-owned dailies as the likely major competitors in a market that will become very crowded, very quickly. The Ministry of Information has invited local and foreign partners to invest in a joint venture to publish the New Light of Myanmar, a former state propaganda newspaper and the only English-language daily in the country. Other media groups are waiting for clarity on how Myanmar will treat publications benefitting from foreign investment. "It's been an excruciating wait, a bit like a tree trying to grow through a crack in a rock, but we have now arrived at the starting line and no one seems at all in a hurry," Ross Dunkley, managing editor of The Myanmar Times, which is applying for licences for both Burmese and English dailies, said last month. Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranks Myanmar 151st out of 179 countries in its Press Freedom Index, up 18 places compared to the previous year. RSF has warned that a media bill, presented to parliament in March, could threaten the "fragile" progress Myanmar has made since 2011. It criticised provisions that could result in newspapers being declared illegal for publishing material liable to threaten national reconciliation, denigrate religions or disturb the rule of law. — Reuters |
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