The Amateur

Computerist

Fall 2009 Netizen Journalism and North Korea Volume 18 No. 1

Table of Contents

Editorial. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 1

Overseas Koreans Remember 6.15. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 4

U.S. Policy Fails to Engage.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 9

UN SC Increases Tension on Korean . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 14

UN SC Controversy: N.K. Satellite. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 17

U.S. Media: Breakdown in 6-Party Talks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 21

NY Philharmonic: Between 2 Peoples. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 25

NY Philharmonic Accepts N.K. Invitation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 27

Review: Hidden History of Korean War.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 30

N.K. Woodblock Prints Exhibit. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 34

Webpage:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/ACn18-1.pdf

Editorial: Netizen Journalism

Counters Media Myths

This issue of the Amateur Computerist is a follow-up to the Vol. 16

No. 1 issue,

the first issue exploring Netizen Journalism and the United

Nations.

In that issue we raised the question of whether the Internet and

netizen media make it possible to counter the “false narratives” in the

mainstream media, like those which provided the pretext for the U.S.

government to invade Iraq.

This issue continues the focus on news and feature articles about the

Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) also known as North

Webpage: http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/

Page 1

Korea. In general the subject of the DPRK is treated by the U.S.

government and the mainstream media with hostility toward both the

country and its policies. Many myths are presented about the DPRK, like

it is a reclusive isolated state, even though it has relations with most

other countries of the world and participates in many international

organizations.

This is similar to how Iraq was treated by the U.S. government and

mainstream media. The U.S. mainstream media reported that there were

Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. There were no such weapons. The

media coverage was contrary to the facts.

With regard to the DPRK, the hostile mainstream media coverage

supports the U.S. government’s unwillingness to relate to the DPRK as

a normal country with a different political system. Such coverage is a

road block to the accurate information needed so there can be public

support for a constructive national policy toward the DPRK.

The question raised in Vol. 16 No. 1 was, “Does the Net give the

power of the reporter to netizens to counter the fictitious accounts that

often make up much of the news?” This continues as the question for

this issue.

In November 2009, Robert Carlin came to the United Nations to

speak with journalists as part of a program sponsored by the United

Nations Correspondents’ Association (UNCA). In the 1990s during the

presidency of Bill Clinton, Carlin was part of the U.S. government team

negotiating with the DPRK. At his UNCA presentation, Carlin described

how negotiating with DPRK officials was fruitful.

Of the 22 different

sets of substantial negotiations, 16 were successful. With the election in

Nov. 2000 of George W. Bush and the change in the U.S. administra-

tion, however these agreements reached under the Clinton presidency

were abandoned. So far, President Obama has only increased the hostile

policy which sees the DPRK as an enemy state. (See “U.S. Policy

Toward North Korea Fails to Engage” in this issue.)

Carlin expressed his view that accurate press coverage in the U.S.

is needed if there is going to be a change from the current hostile policy

of the U.S. government toward the DPRK. The myths support the hard

line, while an accurate reporting would support the development of

normal relations between the U.S. and DPRK. We present this issue of

Page 2

the Amateur Computerist as a step toward that more accurate coverage.

Several of the articles report on the circumstances of the negative

treatment of the DPRK by the UN Security Council. Another article

considers the change in policy made by President Obama which even

increased the hard line against the DPRK. A book review of the Hidden

History of the Korean War documents some of the background of the

U.S. aggressive policy toward the DPRK.

In contrast to these negative events, this issue contains two articles

about the concert by the NY Philharmonic Orchestra in Pyongyang in

February 2008. It also contains an article about a conference on June 15,

2009 of overseas Koreans celebrating the historic friendly meeting

between Kim Dae Jung, the president of the ROK (Republic of Korea

also known as South Korea) and Kim Jong Il, the leader of the DPRK in

June 2000. This is after the bitter legacy bequeath to all Koreans by the

forceful separation of the nation of Korea into two separate countries.

An artistic view of DPRK life is represented in the article about the

exhibit of wood block prints. All the articles in this issue originally

appeared in OhmyNews International.

Notes:

1) Winter 2007.

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/ACn16-1.pdf

2) See, “Negotiating with North Korea: 1992-2007.”

http://fsi.stanford.edu/publications/negotiating_with_north_korea_19922007/

Page 3

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on June 17, 2009]

Overseas Koreans Remember 6.15

Joint Declaration

Conference Discusses Struggle for Peace

and Reunification of Korean Peninsula

by Ronda Hauben

Though the Sunshine Policy that has officially guided the struggle

for Korean Reunification since June 15, 2000 (6.15) may be under siege

by the current government of South Korea, the U.S. government, and the

United Nations Security Council, it was very much alive at the Overseas

Koreans Conference for Peace and Reunification of Korea held in Wash-

ington, D.C. The conference, marking the 9th anniversary of the historic

agreement between the Heads of State of North and South Korea, was

held on June 12-14.

It was with a sigh of

relief that I left New York

on Friday morning June 12

to travel to Washington,

D.C. where the June 15

Joint Korea Declaration

Overseas Committee for

Peace and Reunification of

Korea was hosting this

three-day event.

At noon, in New York City on Friday, June 12, the United Nations

Security Council passed SC Resolution 1874 imposing harsh sanctions

against North Korea. The voice of reason has been drowned out in a sea

of “waiting for Obama” sentiment, giving the Obama administration

license to continue and even outdo the anti democratic policies of the

Bush administration.

For example, Obama’s administration has increased the U.S. troop

Conference participants

Page 4

level in Afghanistan, and encouraged extensive military actions

displacing the civilian population in Pakistan. But when it comes to

North Korea, government policy has been especially harsh. This has

been documented in an earlier article in OhmyNews International: U.S.

Policy Toward North Korea Fails to Engage.

The presentations and discussion at the 6.15 anniversary conference

helped to put what is happening at the UN into the bigger framework of

U.S., Korean relations and North Korea-South Korea relations.

This

broad focus is one where several generations of Koreans have grown up

since the rivalry between U.S. and Soviet Union following World War

II, imposed arbitrary separation on the Korean Peninsula.

“The separation itself is violent,” explained Park Soh-eyn, the first

speaker at the Saturday morning panel, who came to the conference

from Germany. She observed that the June 15 Declaration had a

significant symbolic effect. It provided a common approach toward

reunification for both North Korea and South Korea. After 60 years of

separation, just to be able to look at the North Korean and South Korean

flags in the same space was touching, she recalled.

Part of the impact in South Korea of the 6.15 Joint Declaration was

to legalize discussions of reunification which had been previously

forbidden and criminalized by the National Security Law. The 6.15

Declaration had also broadened the reunification movement so that

people from different sectors of society participated, including diverse

religious organizations, and diverse non-religious organizations

including conservative and progressive political groups. Park Soh-eyn

pointed out that there have been many exchanges between the Koreas

since the 6.15 Joint Declaration.

Park Soh-eyn offered the analogy that if we consider the separation

like a disease with its harmful effects, the reunification process provides

a medication, with curing qualities.

On Friday evening there had been a short set of talks at the dinner

held at a Korean restaurant in Tysons Corner, Virginia. U.S. Congress-

man Eni Faleomavaega of American Samoa, who is the Chairman of the

Foreign Affairs Committee on Asia, the Pacific and the Global Environ-

ment, gave a short presentation about his support for the Sunshine Policy

and his respect for the work done by former South Korean President

Page 5

Kim Dae Jung.

I was invited to present a greeting at the dinner. I described how as

a featured writer for OhmyNews International, I have reported on UN

events, particularly fo-

cusing on the frustra-

tions among delegates

and others with the ac-

tions of the UN Security

Council. I noted the

widespread feeling that

there is a need for an

English language publi-

cation to counter media

myths as about North

Korea.

Another talk at the

Saturday Conference

was presented by Kim Chang-soo, who had been on the South Korean

National Security Council in the Roh Moo-hyun administration. Kim

Chang-soo reviewed some of the recent events in the relations between

the two Koreas. President Lee Myung-bak has not recognized the June

15, 2000 or October 4, 2007 agreements with North Korea negotiated by

the previous two governments. The Lee regime, in abandoning the

Sunshine policy, turned to criticizing North Korea as well as conducting

military exercises with the U.S. that are viewed as hostile activities by

North Korea.

The media has focused on internal problems in North Korea, failing

to take into account broader issues and context. North Korea has

indicated it is willing to talk about the nuclear issues with the U.S. on a

one to one basis, which would include talking about U.S. protection of

South Korea under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. Kim Chang-soo proposed

that North Korea is trying to get diplomatic recognition from the U.S. as

well as to address its economic issues. But the current world media

focuses on problems with North Korea, rather than why the U.S. is not

doing anything to encourage negotiations.

Kim Chang-soo suggested that the upcoming summit between Lee

U.S. Congressman Eni Faleomavaega of American Samoa

Page 6

Myung-bak and Barack Obama was important and has the potential to

have serious military implications. He cautioned against Obama failing

to realize that Lee Myung-bak is considered as a repressive dictator and

that there is a long tradition of the U.S. government supporting

dictatorial regimes in South Korea. Such support for Lee Myung-bak by

the U.S. government would remind the people of South Korea of this

past history, including the resentment that spread across South Korea in

2002 when two middle school girls were killed by a U.S. military tank.

Kim Chang-soo advised Obama to keep this all in mind when he meets

the President of South Korea.

Kim Chang-soo offered some observations about the current tense

situation created between the U.S. and North Korea by U.S. support for

the harsh Security Council Resolution that has recently passed at the

UN. He referred to several analogous periods when the U.S. made

progress in normalizing relations. One such example was when China

and the U.S. began to normalize relations in the early 1970s. Similarly

despite the hostility of the Bush administration years, negotiations with

North Korea began in earnest toward the latter part of Bush’s tenure in

office.

The current sanctions,

against North Korea, are

problematic. They even go

beyond the mandate of the

Proliferation Security Ini-

tiative (PSI) that in itself

has the potential to pro-

voke military encounters.

The Security Council’s

sanctions present a contra-

diction with the Armistice

Agreement between North Korea and the UN Command, which forbids

one side from blockading the other side. The provision to forcibly

inspect North Korean ships contradicts the terms of the Armistice, as do

the provisions cutting off financial interactions with North Korea.

Kim Chang-soo observed that Obama’s policy is similar to Bush’s

earlier policy. We need to ask for a fresh policy approach from the

Ronda Hauben speaks at conference.

Page 7

Obama administration, he suggested. He advised that there is a need for

a very special high level envoy to go to North Korea to change the

direction. Also he proposed that an exchange of cultural events and

people to people interactions could be helpful.

For the upcoming meeting between the U.S. and South Korean

presidents, Kim Chang-soo proposed that relations with North Korea

need to address not only denuclearization, but also diplomatic recogni-

tion, inter Korea exchanges, and forging peace in Northeast Asia. Kim

Chang-soo advised that Lee Myung-bak recognize the significance of

the June 15 Declaration and continue to implement that spirit and to

promote this spirit when he meets with Obama, rather than a tough

military approach to North Korea.

In thinking about the impact of the events at the conference, it

seems that U.S. and North Korean relations are at a particularly low

point with the danger of a military confrontation. At such a time, it is

particularly important to consider the achievements of the Sunshine

Policy and the 6.15 Joint Declaration as a means to support peace and

reunification, rather than war, on the Korean Peninsula.

The continuing tragedy of the two Koreas is a serious problem for

the world, not just for the Korean people. Also the U.S. government’s

refusal to negotiate a peace treaty to end the Korean war means that

there is a particularly dangerous situation on the Korean Peninsula. The

Armistice is but a temporary truce, not a means of more permanently

preventing a return to military action.

A number of conversations at the conference, however, emphasized

that people in Korea have faced many hardships over the years so that

this difficult time is not unusual for them.

One speaker on Friday evening summing up this sentiment

admitted, “I feel sometimes hopeless.” But along with this sentiment, he

explained his belief that there is a basis for hope. He reminded those at

the conference, “But our people have been through so many hard-

ships…. We shouldn’t be passive. As our voices get bigger, we’ll get

more power. We shouldn’t appeal to Lee Myung-bak. We should appeal

to the people.”

Page 8

Note:

1. Most of the talks presented at the conference and dinner were in Korean. This

account of the conference is based on translations from Korean into English provided

by several colleagues.

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on June 12, 2009]

U.S. Policy Toward North

Korea Fails to Engage

[Opinion] UN Security Council Should be Neutral

in its Dealings with North Korea

by Ronda Hauben

U.S. policy toward North Korea since Barack Obama assumed the

U.S. presidency is very different from the promises of engagement

which he made during his election campaign. This policy presents a

striking example of the disparity between pre election promises and the

action taken thus far during the Obama presidency.

On the first day of the new administration, sanctions were autho-

rized against three North Korean firms under the Arms Export Control

Act, along with several nonproliferation executive orders. The three

firms were KOMID, which had been sanctioned by other administra-

tions, Sino-Ki and Moksong Trading Company, which were being

sanctioned for the first time.

The hostile direction of Obama’s policy, however, has been signaled

most clearly by the change made when the new administration failed to

reappoint Christopher Hill to his position as Undersecretary of State for

East Asia and the head of the U.S. negotiation team for the six-party

talks with North Korea.

Not only was Hill not reappointed, but the role of U.S. negotiator

with North Korea was downgraded and split among several different

officials. A part time position was created for an envoy. Another person

Page 9

would be the U.S. representative to the six-party talks. And still another

official was to be appointed to the position of Undersecretary of State

for East Asia, which was Hill’s former position.

Stephen Bosworth accepted the position as envoy. His official title

is Special Representative for North Korea Policy. Bosworth did so on a

part time basis. At the same time, he maintained his full time position as

Dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University

along with his new part time job.

There has been little public discussion about why the Obama

administration made such significant changes. The Boston Globe, in an

article about Bosworth’s appointment, refers to the concerns expressed

by Leon Sigal, the director of the Northeast Asia Cooperative Security

Project at the Social Science Research Council in New York. The article

quotes Sigal saying that there are officials in the new administration,

“who don’t think we can get anywhere, so they don’t want to do the

political heavy lifting to try.”

In contrast to the loss of Hill as a negotiator with North Korea, the

Obama administration reappointed Stuart Levey, as the Undersecretary

of Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence. Levey’s office in

the Treasury Department, was created in 2004 under George W. Bush.

This office was used to impose economic sanctions on North Korea. One

such action was the freezing of funds that North Korea had in a bank in

Macao, China, the Banco Delta Asia (BDA).

North Korea was not only denied access to U.S. $25 million, but it

was also denied the use of the international banking system. This

freezing of North Korean funds was announced shortly after North

Korea and the five other nations who were part of the six-party talks

signed the September 19, 2005 agreement to denuclearize the Korean

Peninsula.

The announcement by the Treasury Department sabotaged

the implementation of this important agreement which would have gone

a long way toward the goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.

North Korea withdrew from the six-party talks until the $25 million was

returned.

It is significant here to note that Levey and his office briefly came

under public scrutiny in 2006 when the New York Times published an

article exposing how the office has access to and uses the SWIFT Data

Page 10

Base to do intelligence work targeting people and transactions that it

claims are in violation of U.S. law.

The SWIFT Data Base contains the

transactions and identification information for the hundreds of thousands

of people and entities that do electronic banking transactions using the

SWIFT system.

The action by the U.S. Treasury using a section of the Patriot Act

against the Banco Delta Asia Bank, however, demonstrated that the U.S.

government has the ability to use this data base information against

those it wants to target politically, rather than those who have committed

any actual illegal acts. Testimony by former U.S. government officials

to the U.S. Congress, and documents submitted to the U.S. government

by the bank owner and his lawyer, demonstrated that there was never

any evidence offered of any illegal acts. Instead the Patriot Act had been

used to allow the U.S. government to act against this bank for political

objectives. (See “Behind the Blacklisting of Banco Delta Asia: Is the

policy aimed at targeting China as well as North Korea?”)

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?menu=c10

400&no=362192&rel_no=1

The new positions, designated to negotiate with North Korea, are at

a lower administrative level than was Hill’s former position. In addition,

the Obama administration, by not reappointing Hill, has lost his valuable

expertise. Hill had effectively countered the sabotage to negotiations

caused by Levey’s office during the Bush administration.

Hill was met with opposition from some in the Bush administration

at each step along the way. Remarkably, Hill effectively countered much

of this opposition, making progress in the negotiations. In August 2008,

however, the Bush administration unilaterally changed what it claimed

North Korea’s obligations were as part of Phase 2 of the six-party Feb

2007 agreement, and falsely declared that North Korea was in violation.

With Hill gone from the North Korean desk at the State Department,

and Levey reappointed to his position at the Treasury Department, it is

significant that Obama sent an inter-agency group to visit the capitals of

Japan, South Korea and China to discuss punishments for North Korea.

Levey was featured as one of the U.S. government officials on the trip.

But is punishment appropriate? There has been no similar effort to

open negotiations with North Korea.

Page 11

Instead, the U.S. administration has given its support to Levey and

others whose actions have sabotaged the success of the six-party talks.

This failure of the Obama administration is similar to previous U.S.

policy on North Korea.

Robert Carlin, part of the U.S. government negotiation team with

North Korea under the Clinton Administration, documents that there

were significant and successful negotiations on 22 issues carried out in

the period between 1993 and 2000.

These achievements, however,

could not survive into the transition to the Bush Administration.

Similarly, Mike Chinoy, a former CNN journalist, in his book

Meltdown, documents both the Clinton years and much of the Bush

years. He chronicles how negotiations were torpedoed not by North

Korea, but by forces within the U.S. government itself.

In addition, the U.S. conducts frequent military maneuvers close to

North Korea which North Korea has claimed as a threat to its peace and

security.

On April 5, 2009, North Korea test launched a communications

satellite using a rocket of advanced design. This test broke no interna-

tional law or treaty to which North Korea is a party.

Still the launch was

condemned by the UN Security Council in a Presidential Statement.

Also new sanctions were imposed on North Korea, stating as authority,

a previous Security Council Resolution 1718.

North Korea has been the target of hostile acts by the U.S. North

Korea has tested rockets and has done tests of two nuclear devices,

which it claims it needs as a deterrent. The U.S. has military agreements

with Japan and South Korea, including them under the protection of the

U.S. nuclear umbrella. There is only an armistice ending the fighting of

the Korean War. The U.S. as the head of the UN command has not been

willing to negotiate a treaty ending the Korean War.

The failure of the UN Security Council to explore North Korea’s

problems in trying to check U.S. hostility demonstrates its failure to

carry out its obligations under the UN charter. The failure of the Security

Council to protect Iraq from U.S. invasion is a warning that the Security

Council should reform its processes so that it doesn’t just become a

vehicle for the political targeting of a nation as happened with Iraq.

In his comments to journalists in response to the sanctions put on

Page 12

North Korea in April 2009, the Deputy Ambassador to the UN from

North Korea, Pak Tok Hun said, “The recent activity of the security

council concerning the peaceful use of outer space by my country shows

that unless the security council is totally reformed and democratized we

expect nothing from it.”

The challenge to the nations of the UN is to provide a more neutral

and considered investigation of the problem it is trying to solve rather

than just carrying out the punishment a P-5 nation may endeavor to

inflict on another nation.

Notes:

1. Karin Lee and Julia Choi, “North Korea: Unilateral and Multilateral Economic Sanctions and

U.S. Department of Treasury Actions, 1955-April 2009,” National Committee on North Korea,

(Paper last updated April 28, 2009), p. 26.

http://www.nautilus.org/fora/security/09035LeeChoi.pdf

2. James F. Smith, “In role as envoy, Tufts dean carries hard-earned lessons,” The Boston Globe,

May 26, 2009,

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2009/05/26/in_role_as_envoy_tufts_dean_carrie

s_hard_earned_lessons/?comments=all

3. Ronda Hauben, “North Korea’s $25 Million and Banco Delta Asia: Another Abuse under the

U.S. Patriot Act,” OhmyNews International, March 3, 2007.

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=351525&rel_no=1

4. Ronda Hauben, “Behind the Blacklisting of Banco Delta Asia: Is the policy aimed at targeting

China as well as North Korea?,” OhmyNews International, May 18, 2007.

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=362192&rel_no=1

5. Erick Lichtblau and James Risen, “Bank Data Is Sifted by U.S. in Secret to Block Terror,”

New York Times, June 23, 2006.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/23/washington/23intel.html?_r=1

6. Ronda Hauben, “U.S. Media and the Breakdown in the Six-Party Talks,” OhmyNews

International, September 28, 2008.

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=383769&rel_no=1

7. Robert Carlin, “Negotiating with North Korea: Lessons Learned and Forgotten,” “Korea

Yearbook 2007,” Edited by Rudiger Frank et al., Brill, 2007, p. 235-251.

8. Mike Chinoy, Meltdown, St. Martin’s Press, 2008.

9. Ronda Hauben, “Controversy at UN Over North Korea’s Launch: Reconvening six-party talks

or penalizing Pyongyang?”, OhmyNews International, April 10, 2009.

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=385061&rel_no=1

10. Ronda Hauben, “Security Council’s Ad Hoc Actions Increase Tension on Korean Peninsula:

[Analysis] North Korea responds by withdrawing from six-party talks as promised,” OhmyNews

International, April 17, 2009.

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=385093&rel_no=1

11. Seumas Milne, “After Iraq It’s Not Just North Korea that Wants a Bomb,” Guardian

Comment Is Free, May 29, 2009.

Page 13

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/may/27/north-korea-nuclear-weapons-us

12. Pak Tok Hun, Informal Comments to the Media at the UN Media Stakeout, April 24, 2009.

http://webcast.un.org/ramgen/ondemand/stakeout/2009/so090424pm2.rm

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on April 17, 2009]

Security Council’s Ad Hoc Actions

Increase Tension on Korean Peninsula

[Analysis] North Korea Responds by Withdrawing from

Six-Party Talks as Promised

by Ronda Hauben

On April 13, the UN Security Council (UNSC) issued a presidential

statement condemning North Korea’s satellite launch on April 5. The

Security Council statement declared the launch “in contravention” of

UNSC Resolution 1718 (2006), even though there was no wording in the

2006 statement against satellite launches. In the 2009 statement, the

Security Council demanded North Korea not conduct further launches,

including of satellites. The presidential statement also mandated that

new sanctions would be added to the sanctions list in the 2006 resolu-

tion.

Usually, a presidential statement issued by the Security Council is

considered a non binding statement. Suddenly, the Security Council has

changed its processes, using a presidential statement to deny North

Korea the right to launch satellites, and to impose a new set of sanctions.

South Korea has recently noted that the trajectory of the North

Korean launch was indeed the trajectory for a satellite launch.

Lee

Sang-hee, the South Korean Defense Minister, in response to a question

asked during a hearing held in South Korea’s National Assembly,

replied that “The rocket launched by the North followed the trajectory

of a satellite and later separated in its final two stages before crashing

into the Pacific Ocean.” South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported

Page 14

the minister’s remarks, adding that these remarks were an official

acknowledgment that the rocket was the effort to launch a satellite, not

a ballistic missile.

UNSC resolution 1718 (2006) demands North Korea not conduct

any launch of ballistic missiles, but does not refer to satellite launches.

Pak Tok-hun, the North Korean Deputy Ambassador to the UN,

referred to the fact that his country is being denied a right that other

countries have, and that this treatment is not “fair.” In an interview with

Aljazeera, the Ambassador said that if the Security Council acted against

his country for its satellite launch, North Korea would respond with

harsh measures.

The Ambassador noted that Japan has launched satellites more than

100 times and other countries like the U.S. have launched satellites and

the Security Council has not taken up the issue. He complained that

North Korea is being treated in a way that is different from how other

countries are treated.

Some of what is striking about the action by the Security Council

is the closed process used to consider the issue. There was no public

discussion. There were several closed meetings, called consultations,

among the P-5 members and Japan. During these meetings journalists

were told the P-5 and Japan discussed what the response of the Security

Council should be to North Korea’s launch.

After there was agreement among the P-5 and Japan on what was

to be contained in a presidential statement on the launch, the statement

was presented to the other elected members of the Security Council for

their approval. Despite the obligation specified in Article 32 of the UN

Charter that a nation that is a party to an issue being discussed by the

Security Council be invited to the Security Council for the discussion,

no such invitation was made, according to sources on the Security

Council.

Similarly, though several of the nations on the Security Council

indicated that they favored the resumption of the six-party talks as a way

to deal with the launch by North Korea, there was no indication that

there was any consideration by the Security Council of what led to the

breakdown of the six-party talks. The U.S. government’s effort to

require verification in Phase 2 of the six-party Feb 2007 agreement,

Page 15

rather than in Phase 3, as had been agreed to by the six-parties was not

discussed in the Security Council.

Instead of the Security Council members considering the problem

which derailed the talks, they agreed to impose new sanctions on North

Korea. Since no new Security Council resolution was being issued, there

was no appropriate means of issuing new sanctions. They resorted to

acting in an ad-hoc manner when they announced they would use a

presidential statement to add new sanctions to Security Council

resolution 1718 issued in 2006.

One journalist, at the press stakeout after the Security Council

meeting issuing the presidential statement, asked:

“Mr. Ambassador,

Does this presidential statement set a precedent whereby in the future,

if you want to adjust the sanctions, supposedly for example for Iran, you

can issue another presidential statement to change the content of the

sanctions in a resolution? Is this legally speaking, a precedent?”

Baki Ilkin, Turkey’s Ambassador to the UN, who is the head of the

UNSC Resolution 1718 sanctions committee, responded: “I am a

newcomer. I wish you had asked the previous speakers (Several Security

Council Ambassadors had spoken before Ambassador Ilkin at the

stakeout -ed.).”

After the Security Council issued its presidential statement, North

Korea announced it is leaving the six-party talks. It announced that it

does not recognize the actions of the Security Council condemning its

satellite launch. There is justification for North Korea’s actions. Yet

much of the mainstream media in the U.S. frames North Korea’s

reasonable response as but an indication of how unreasonable it behaves.

North Korea has asked that the IAEA and U.S. inspectors leave

North Korea. It says it will resume its nuclear deterrent development, as

North Korean Deputy Ambassador Pak Tok-hun promised would happen

if the Security Council acted to condemn North Korea. The Ambassador

told Aljazeera and other media that the Security Council could expect

strong measures in response to any action against North Korea. “We

don’t say empty talk. What we say is what we do,” the Ambassador told

journalists.

Page 16

Notes:

1. S. Korean govt. admits DPRK rocket followed satellite trajectory, Xinhuanet, April 14, 2009.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-04/14/content_11185140.htm

2. Ronda Hauben, “Every country has the inalienable right to use the outer space peacefully: UN

Security Council Controversy over North Korean Satellite Launch,” Telepolis, April 8, 2009.

http://www.heise.de/tp/r4/artikel/30/30099/1.html

3. Aljazeera Interview with North Korean Deputy Ambassador to the UN, Pak Tok-hun, April

14, 2009.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjEIvw7I5Ow

4. UN Media Stakeout: Informal comments to the Media by the Permanent Representative of

Turkey, H. E. Mr. Baki Ilkin, on Non-proliferation/Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

April 13, 2009.

http://webcast.un.org/ramgen/ondemand/stakeout/2009/so090413pm7.rm

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on April 10, 2009]

UN Security Council Controversy over

North Korean Satellite Launch

Reconvening Six-party Talks or Penalizing Pyongyang?

by Ronda Hauben

There has been a controversy among the members of the UN

Security Council (UNSC) over how to react to the April 5 launch of a

satellite by North Korea. The Security Council met for emergency

consultations on Sunday, April 5, while the P-5 and Japan have met in

other consultations after the Sunday meeting.

Japan and the U.S. have encouraged the UNSC to take strong

measures against North Korea to punish it for launching the satellite.

The Russian Ambassador to the UN, Vitaly I. Churkin warned against

a “knee jerk” reaction and proposed that the crucial goal was to ensure

the continuation of the six-party talks toward the denuclearization of the

Korean Peninsula. These talks broke down during the Bush administra-

tion and have not yet been resumed.

The Chinese Ambassador to the UN, Zhang Yesui said that the

reaction of the Security Council had to be “cautious and proportionate.”

He said that his delegation would be most willing to consider construc-

Page 17

tive responses.

U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice, called the launch by North Korea, “a

clear-cut violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1718.”

She said that it is the view of the U.S. government “that this action

merits a clear and strong response from the United Nations Security

Council.”

Her position was that SC Resolution 1718 “prohibited missile

related activity and called on the DPRK to halt further missile related

activity.”

Vietnam, one of the elected members of the Security Council, called

for a “prudent reaction.” A spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry said

that Vietnam “hopes the relevant parties have a prudent reaction, find a

reasonable solution and do not complicate the situation and affect peace

and stability in the Northeast Asia region.”

While Vietnam said that it was opposed to the proliferation of

nuclear weapons, an earlier statement indicated that Vietnam supports

“the rights of countries to use science and technology for peaceful

purposes.”

The Japanese Ambassador to the UN, Yukio Takasu requested an

emergency consultative session of the Security Council on Sunday,

April 5. His position was that North Korea’s launch of a satellite was

banned by SC Resolution 1718 which demands that North Korea

suspend all activities “related to its ballistic missile program.”

While SC Resolution 1718 explicitly demands that North Korea not

conduct any “launch of a ballistic missile,” the members of the Security

Council disagree about whether SC Resolution 1718 forbids the launch

of a communication satellite.

Countries advocating the position that North Korea violated SC

Resolution 1718, point to parts five and 8(a)ii of the resolution as the

parts violated.

Part 5 reads that the Security Council: “Decides that the DPRK shall

suspend all activities related to its ballistic missile program and in this

context re-establish its pre-existing commitments to a moratorium on

missile launch.” (SC Resolution 1718, p. 2)

Section 8(a)ii is about member states preventing the sale or transfer

to North Korea of “materials, equipment, goods and technology as set

Page 18

out in the lists…which could contribute to DPRK’s nuclear-related,

ballistic missile-related or other weapons of mass-destruction related

programs.” (SC Resolution 1718, p. 2-3)

North Korea was not invited to participate in the emergency

consultations of the Security Council, despite the fact that Article 32 of

the UN charter requires that a “party to a dispute under consideration by

the Security Council shall be invited to participate, without vote, in the

discussion relating to the dispute….”

Speaking to reporters at the UN on Tuesday, April 7, the Deputy

Ambassador to the UN from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea

(North Korea), Pak Tok Hun said:

“Every country has the right, the

inalienable right to use the outer space peacefully. Not a few countries,

many countries, they have already launched satellites several hundred

times.”

“Does it mean it would be OK for them to launch satellites but we

are not allowed to do that? It’s not fair. It’s not fair.”

“This is a satellite. Everyone can distinguish (a) satellite with a

missile. It’s not a missile. I know most of the countries now recognize

it’s not a missile.”

A reporter asked, “But you use ballistic technology. You need

ballistic technologies.”

Pak responded: “Those countries who launch satellites use similar

technology and if the Security Council, they take any kind of step

whatever, this is infringement on the sovereignty of our country and the

next option will be ours and necessary and strong steps will follow that.”

Along with the dispute in the Security Council over whether or not

the North Korea’s action is an actual violation of SC Resolution 1718,

there is a controversy over whether the thrust of the Security Council

action should be toward getting the six-party talks reconvened, or toward

penalizing North Korea in some way.

The resolution of this controversy depends predominantly upon the

U.S. because it can be argued that the U.S. was responsible for the

current breakdown of the six-party talks.

In a talk at the Korea Society in NYC last Fall, Leon Sigal of the

Social Science Research Council (SSRC) explained how the six-party

talks broke down over the issue of verification. The U.S. government

Page 19

had changed the terms of the agreement unilaterally, imposing a

condition on North Korea that was not part of the original agreement.

The second phase of the six-party February 2007 agreement

required disabling the reactor, and other processes at Yongbyon and

declaring the nuclear material and equipment which were to be

eliminated in Phase 3 of the agreed actions.

The Bush administration was obligated to provide ‘action for

action’ in response to North Korea’s disabling the reactor and other

steps.

The verification was to occur only later in the six-party talk process,

in Phase 3 “when the dismantling of the North’s nuclear facilities and

elimination of any plutonium or weapons it has would be taken up.”

Instead the U.S. continued to press for a verification agreement during

Phase 2 of the agreement.

Most of the mainstream U.S. media, with the exception of an

important article in the Washington Post, failed to explain the reason for

the breakdown in the talks.

The Washington Post article which

documented how the hostile U.S. State Department environment eroded

the process of negotiation between the U.S. government and North

Korea, was only carried on page 20 of the newspaper. It described how

U.S. government hardliners fashioned a verification procedure to be

imposed on North Korea which was in the words of an expert in nuclear

disarmament akin to “a license to spy on any military site they (North

Korea) have.”

By launching a satellite rather than a ballistic missile, North Korea

has avoided violation of the ballistic missile sections of SC Resolution

1718. This gives the U.S. a chance to respond by returning to the

six-party-talks and seeking to finish Phase 2 before requiring verification

in Phase 3 of the process.

The Security Council has this opportunity to call for all parties to

cease any obstruction and to return to the six-party talks and to intensify

their efforts to complete Phase 2 and enter the next phase of the agreed

path to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

Notes:

Page 20

1. Vietnam calls for ‘prudent’ reaction to DPRK rocket, April 5, 2009.

2. Pak Tok Hun, Deputy Ambassador from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North

Korea) to the UN, speaking to reporters at the UN on Tuesday, April 7, 2009.

http://webcast.un.org/ramgen/ondemand/stakeout/2009/so090407pm2.rm

3. Ronda Hauben, U.S. Media and the Breakdown in the Six-Party Talks, OhmyNews

International, Sept. 29, 2008.

4. Glenn Kessler, “Far reaching U.S. Plan Impaired N. Korea Deal: Demands Began to Undo

Nuclear Accord,” Washington Post, Friday, Sept. 26, 2008; P. A20.

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on Sept. 29, 2008]

U.S. Media and the Break-down

in the Six-Party Talks

America Reneges on Action for

Action Obligation to North Korea

by Ronda Hauben

While much of the mainstream U.S. media has blamed North Korea

for any problems that develop in the six-party talks, a significant article

has appeared in the Washington Post documenting part of the problem

that has led to the recent breakdown in negotiations and which threatens

to end the six-party talk process if it isn’t reversed.

The article, which should be a front page story, instead appears on

page 20 and has drawn little attention. The article by Glenn Kessler

documents the hostile U.S. State Department environment that has

eroded the process of negotiation with North Korea. It describes how

U.S. hardliners fashioned a verification procedure to be imposed on

North Korea which was, in the words of an expert in nuclear disarma-

ment, akin to “a license to spy on any military site they (North Korea)

have.”

Overruling Christopher Hill, the Assistant Secretary of State who

has been the lead negotiator for the U.S. in the six-party talks, and in

spite of warnings from China and Russia, that this was not advisable,

Page 21

U.S. negotiators presented North Korea with a disrespectful verification

plan that if accepted would jeopardize North Korean sovereignty. A

copy of the four page verification presentation is online.

(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/kesslerd

oc_092608.pdf?sid=ST2008092600020&s_pos=list )

In addition, the U.S. President, George Bush, failed to fulfill on his

obligation to remove North Korea from the nations that sponsor

terrorism list. Bush had given notice to Congress on June 26 that he was

requesting that North Korea be delisted, giving Congress the required 45

day notice to enable him to carry out the delisting. Subsequently,

however, when the 45 days passed for Congress to respond, and there

was no objection, Bush failed to delist North Korea, claiming the need

for North Korea to agree to a verification plan.

The Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs of North Korea, Pak Kil Yon,

in a speech

(http://www.un.org/ga/63/generaldebate/pdf/dprkorea_en.pdf ) to the

UN General Assembly on Saturday, Sept. 27, explained, the U.S. is now

using the “pretext of verification as an excuse to hold off on removing

the country from its list of State sponsors of terrorism even after

officially declaring that the DPRK (North Korea -ed) is not such a

nation.”

Discussing the responsibility the Bush administration bears for the

break down in the six-party talks, Leon Sigal of the Social Science

Research Council described the obligation of the Bush administration to

provide action for action in response to North Korea (DPRK) meeting

its obligations in a talk he presented at the Korea Society on Monday,

Sept. 22.

(

http://www.koreasociety.org/contemporary_issues/contemporary_issues/updates_o

n_north_korea_a_report_from_the_peace_foundation.html)

Sigal detailed how the second phase of the six-party agreement

required of North Korea the “disabling the reactor, reprocessing facility

and fuel fabrication plant at Yongbyon and declaring the nuclear

material and equipment that were to be eliminated in phase three.” Also

North Korea pledged “not to transfer nuclear materials, technology or

know-how” to third parties. The United States, as its action for action

obligation, promised to “begin the process of removing the designation

Page 22

of the DPRK as a state sponsor of terrorism and advance the process of

terminating the application of the Trading with the Enemy Act with

respect to the DPRK.”

Verification, according to Sigal, was “left to phase three of

negotiations when the dismantling of the North’s nuclear facilities and

elimination of any plutonium or weapons it has would be taken up.”

Sigal pointed out that the first sign that the administration had

“yielded to hardliners” was on July 30 when a National Security Council

official, Dennis Wilder, told reporters that the delisting of North Korea

from the state sponsors of terrorism would require North Korea agreeing

to a verification protocol. Then in a speech on Aug. 7, Sigal explained,

Bush informed North Korea, that North Korea would have to agree to a

verification agreement in order to be delisted.

The U.S. government changed the terms of agreement unilaterally,

imposing a condition on North Korea that was not part of the original

agreement.

The failure of most of the mainstream U.S. media to inform the

public of this arbitrary change by the U.S. government, demonstrates

once again the role this media plays in helping the U.S. government

deceive the public. A similar role the media performed in spreading the

Bush administration’s false narrative that Iraq possessed weapons of

mass destruction has since drawn much criticism.

Despite the widespread critique of the past failure of the U.S. media,

there is a reluctance on the part of the media to expose what the dispute

is about with respect to the recent breakdown of the six-party talks. For

example, UPI offered the view of an alleged expert in North Korea from

a London think tank advising that North Korea is trying to divide the

countries involved in the six-party talks.

Other press reports describe how Chris Hill, the U.S. official for the

six-party talks is to go to North Korea to try to salvage the talks from the

current break down, but little or no explanation is offered of the problem

that has led to the breakdown. And even when there is a news report like

the Washington Post exposure of the harshness of the verification

process presented to North Korea, it is buried in the pages of the

newspaper, instead of getting the front page coverage such a story

deserves.

Page 23

Notes:

1. “Far reaching U.S. Plan Impaired N. Korea Deal; Demands Began to Undo Nuclear Accord,”

by Glenn Kessler, Washington Post Staff Writer, Friday, September 26, 2008; P. A20.

2. A similar situation with the mainstream U.S. media is documented in the lead-up to the Iraq

war. Articles promoting the U.S. government’s false claim that Iraq possessed weapons of mass

destruction appeared on page one of newspapers like the Washington Post and the NY Times but

articles challenging this view would not appear, would be relegated to some later section of the

newspaper. One such example is the White House “disinformation campaign” incident when

Tony Blair and George Bush held a press conference at Camp David on Sept. 7 2002. They cited

a “new report” from the IAEA alleging that Iraq was six months away from building a nuclear

weapon. The fact that no such report existed was not reported by the press, except for an article

in the Washington Times by Joseph Curl which was carried on page 16, and an article in the

Washington Post by Karen DeYoung about the press conference quoted an IAEA spokesperson

saying that there was no such report, but that was not featured in her article, but was relegated

to the later part of her report 21 paragraphs down.

See “Lies We Bought” The Columbia Journalism Review, May/Jun 2003 by MacArthur, John

(

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3613/is_200305/ai_n9239827 ).

3. EU: Iran close to nuclear capability.

A version of this article appears on netizenblog.

(http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2008/09/24/EU_Iran_close_to_nuclear_capability/

UPI-37861222306006/ ).

Page 24

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on Feb. 27, 2008]

New York Philharmonic Performs

“Arirang” in Pyongyang

Concert as a Normalizing of Relations

Between the Two Peoples

by Ronda Hauben

The people of the United States and the people of North Korea want

friendly relations with each other. This was the sweet message that the

New York Philharmonic’s concert in Pyongyang on Tuesday, Feb. 26

made concrete. Not only was an audience present in the wonderful

concert hall that the North Koreans had decked with flowers. Signifi-

cantly the concert could be heard and viewed on radio and television not

only in North Korea, but in the U.S. as well.

The program was broadcast on the public television station on

Tuesday evening at 8:00 p.m. in New York. Not only did the broadcast

capture the orchestra and its program, but it also gave viewers a glimpse

of the audience of North Koreans, and their western guests who had

traveled with the orchestra.

Watching the concert, one could think that this was just another

concert by the New York Philharmonic. The conductor with his baton

flying, as if across the screen, the cellists, the violins, the flutes, the

drums, they were all there. But the sur-

face impression is often different from

the reality. The reality in this situation

was that this was a remarkable event, an

event that is rare, and is to be a memora-

ble experience for those who are able to

take part in it.

The concert was in fact a remark-

able event, remarkable because it made

normal what should be normal. Why

Page 25

shouldn’t there be a perfor-

mance of the New York Phil-

harmonic in Pyongyang, North

Korea? And there was indeed a

performance, just as there

should be.

The choice of the music

was also remarkable, though on

the surface this, too, was not

evident. For example, the music

of Antonin Dvorak’s “New

World Symphony” makes one

wonder if this does mark the beginning of a new world, a world where

friendly relations will replace the hostile relations the U.S. has main-

tained since the Korean war in relation to North Korea. The trumpets,

the violins, the drums, and then the television cameras focus on the

audience for a few brief seconds.

Those watching catch a glimpse of others in what for decades has

been only a far away land, listening. Or they are clapping. Or they are

standing and cheering. This is also as it should be, that the audience at

a concert in North Korea is sharing in the experience of a concert with

others around the world.

The musicians, they are intent on their performance. It is only after

the concert is over, if one reads certain of the reports of the journalists

who could be there in person, that one learns of the waving back and

forth between the members of the orchestra and the audience. Or one

learns that many of the performers were especially moved by the five

minutes of applause that their performance evoked.

For those in the orchestra, it was a thrill we are told. They felt that

something special happened with their audience. For those of us who

could watch in our homes, it was remarkable. It was a normalizing of

relations between two peoples of two different lands.

For its final encore, the Philharmonic played “Arirang” the beautiful

folksong of Korea. For a few moments the vision of a Korea united

some time in the future comes into view. The lovely strains of the music

herald that something new is coming, though how and when is still

Page 26

unknown. And in that future, the people of the United States will have

the privilege to have friendly rela-tions with the peoples of Korea,

however they choose to relate with each other.

While it is a significant event that the concert was presented and

was greeted with such warmth and such a welcoming, it was also a sign

that the peoples of the two countries want their governments to find a

way to transform the hostility of the relationship into one of reconcilia-

tion. It was only disappointing that the U.S. Secretary of State

Condoleeza Rice and the Chief U.S. Negotiator Christopher Hill weren’t

part of the audience. Had they been, perhaps they would better under-

stand that they have an obligation to the peoples of the two countries to

find a means to bring the peace. Sixty years is too long not to have a

peace treaty that will finally end the Korean War.

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on Dec. 13, 2007]

New York Philharmonic Accepts

North Korea Invitation

Concert to Help Show the Way Music

Can Unite People

by Ronda Hauben

The press conference held at the Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln

Center in New York City on Tuesday Dec. 11, was a rare event in a

number of ways. First was the importance of the subject. The press

conference was called to officially announce that the New York

Philharmonic Orchestra had accepted the invitation it received from the

Ministry of Culture in North Korea to bring the orchestra to North Korea

for a concert to be given on Feb. 26.

Page 27

This would be the first such U.S. cultural event in North Korea and

would be an event in line with the role that cultural and sports events

played to help establish diplomatic relations between the U.S. and the

Soviet Union in the 1950s and between the U.S. and China during the

Nixon era.

Also it was rare for the North Korean Ambassador to the United

Nations, Pak Gil Yon, to appear at a press conference in New York. He,

along with Zarin Mehta, President and Executive Director of the

Orchestra, and Paul B. Guenter, Chairman of the New York Philhar-

monic, provided substantial time for questions from journalists.

In his remarks, Ambassador Pak welcomed the official decision to

accept the invitation. When asked about the origin of the invitation to the

orchestra, Pak said that it had been made by the Ministry of Culture, and

that the Philharmonic would be welcomed as the first guest of the New

Year of 2008.

Pak believed that the visit would be the first of its kind, and would

mark a significant occasion in

the relations between the U.S.

and North Korea. When asked

why North Korea extended the

invitation, the Ambassador re-

sponded that it had been

extended in the hopes of encour-

aging friendly relations between

the peoples of the two countries

and to help to promote the

bi-lateral relations between the

U.S. and North Korea.

The orchestra received

many invitations, said Mehta, in his remarks. One concern the orchestra

had was whether the concert would contribute to the success of the

multinational six-party talks. When the U.S. State Department was

consulted, it encouraged the Philharmonic to agree to the invitation.

There were a number of other questions to be answered, however, before

deciding whether the Philharmonic could agree to the concert, Mehta

explained.

North Korean ambassador to the UN Pak Gil Yon

(right) shakes hands with heads of the New York

Philharmonic Zarin Mehta and Paul Guenter (left).

Page 28

He led a small delegation on a five-day visit to Pyongyang in

October to determine if the difficulties of such a concert could be

effectively handled. For example, he had to know that they would be

able to provide for 150 musicians and many instruments, some of which

are large instruments. He had to see if there were adequate hotel

accommodations and a concert hall large enough for the concert. During

this exploratory visit, Mehta was able to determine that these needs

could be satisfied.

On his trip, Mehta had a chance to meet conservatory school

students. While in Pyongyang, the members of the orchestra will offer

master classes for North Korean music students. They will also hold an

open rehearsal of the orchestra.

On his trip to Pyongyang in October, Mehta saw an after-school

program that provided activities for 5,000 children including calligra-

phy, choirs and playing instruments. He found the experience fascinat-

ing.

Mehta also saw a performance of the mass games, which he said

was “quite spectacular.” This involved a thousand people performing.

There was music and dancing.

During his five-day visit to Pyongyang, Mehta found that North

Koreans “do things that we can’t do, which were mind boggling.” In

music and art, he observed, we all have things to learn from each other.

Describing his hopes for the concerts, Guenter explained that “the

February concerts on the Korean Peninsula are unique – they grow out

of the Philharmonic’s tradition of speaking on a world stage, on

significant occasions, in the international language of music. From the

historic 1959 tour to the Soviet Union, to the 2005 celebration of

Dresden’s rebuilt Frauenkirche, to the February concerts, it is our hope

that the music of the Philharmonic, can, in some way, serve as a catalyst

for positive change.”

The program for the concert will be Wagner’s “Prelude to Act III

of Lohengrin,” Dvorak’s “Symphony No. 9 from the New World” and

Gershwin’s “An American in Paris.”

The symphony will be performed at the East Pyongyang Grand

Theater, a hall that can seat 1,500 people. Also the concert will be

broadcast to people throughout North Korea. Mehta explained that the

Page 29

Philharmonic encourages the broadcasting of its concerts. “We like to

have our concerts diffused to as many people as possible, especially with

a first performance,” he said.

After the concert in North Korea, the orchestra will fly to Seoul,

South Korea where it will give one concert. The program will be

Beethoven’s 5

Symphony.

When asked about the importance of the planned concert in North

Korea and the subsequent concert planned for South Korea toward

Korean reunification, he replied that “One small symphony is a giant

leap.”

“What follows from that is up to the diplomats to deal with, and

government officials.”

He said the Philharmonic hoped this would help to show the way

music can unite people.

Responding to a journalist who asked, “Do you think this visit will

go down in history as a milestone,” Mehta said, “I expect it will, yes.”

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on Feb.14, 2007]

[Book Review]: The Hidden History of

the Korean War

by Jay Hauben

The Hidden History of the Korean War, by I. F. Stone, 364 pages.

Monthly Review Press. 1952, 1970.

The controversial book, The Hidden History of the Korean War by

I. F. Stone was originally published in 1952 during the Korean War

(1950-1953) and republished in 1970 during the Vietnam War (1960-

1975). It raised questions about the origin of the Korean War, made a

case that the United States government manipulated the United Nations,

and gave evidence that the U.S. military and South Korean oligarchy

dragged out the war by sabotaging the peace talks.

Page 30

Publishing such a book in the U.S. during the time of McCarthyism,

while the war was still continuing was an act of journalistic courage.

Forty years later, declassified U.S., Soviet and People’s Republic of

China documents both confirmed some and corrected some of Stone’s

story.

Until his death in 1989, Stone was an experienced and respected,

independent, left-wing journalist and iconoclast. This book-length feat

of journalism, with over 600 citations for his quotes and materials, is a

testament to Stone’s search for a way to strengthen his readers to think

for themselves, rather than be overwhelmed by official stories and war

propaganda.

The standard telling was that the Korean War was an unprovoked

aggression by the North Koreans beginning on June 25, 1950, under-

taken at the behest of the Soviet Union to extend the Soviet sphere of

influence to the whole of Korea, completely surprising the South

Koreans, the U.S., and the U.N.

But was it a surprise? Could an attack by 70,000 men using at least

70 tanks launched simultaneously at four different points have been a

surprise?

Stone gathers contemporary reports from South Korean, U.S. and

U.N. sources documenting what was known before June 25. The head

of the U.S. CIA, Rear Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenloetter, is reported to

have said on the record, “that American intelligence was aware that

‘conditions existed in Korea that could have meant an invasion this week

or next.’” (p. 2) Stone writes that “America’s leading military commen-

tator, Hanson Baldwin of the New York Times, a trusted confidant of the

Pentagon, reported that they [U.S. military documents] showed ‘a

marked buildup by the North Korean People’s Army along the 38th

Parallel beginning in the early days of June.’” (p. 4)

How and why did U.S. President Truman so quickly decide by June

27 to commit the U.S. military to battle in South Korea? Stone makes a

strong case that there were those in the U.S. government and military

who saw a war in Korea and the resulting instability in East Asia as in

the U.S. national interest. Stone presents the ideas and actions of them,

including

John Foster Dulles, General Douglas MacArthur, President

Syngman Rhee and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, which appear to

Page 31

amount to a willingness to see the June 25 military action by North

Korea as another Pearl Harbor in order to “commit the United States

more strongly against Communism in the Far East.” (p. 21). Their

reasoning may have been, Stone thought, the sooner a war with China

and/or Russia the better before both become stronger. President Truman

removed Secretary of Defense

Louis Johnson, according to Stone’s

account, because Johnson had been selling this doctrine of a preventive

war. (p. 93)

Stone shows that Truman committed the U.S. military to the war in

Korea, then went to the U.N. for sanctions against North Korea. “It was

neither honorable nor wise,” Stone argues, “for the U.N. under pressure

from an interested great power to condemn a country for aggression

without investigation and without hearings its side of the case.” (p. 50)

But that is what the U.S. insisted should happen using, Stone argues,

distorted reports to rush its case.

Then when the war came to a stalemate at the 38

Parallel, Stone

makes a strong case that U.S. Army headquarters provoked or created

incidents to derail the cease-fire negotiations. When the North Koreans

and Chinese had ceded on Nov. 4, 1952 to the three demands of the U.N.

side, the U. S. military spread a story that “The Communists had brutally

murdered 5,500 American prisoners.” The talks were being dragged out,

the U.S. military argued, because “The communists don’t want to have

to answer questions about what happened to their prisoners” and they are

lower than “barbarians.” (pp. 324-25) At no time after these reports were

these “atrocities” reported again or documented. But hope of a cease-fire

subsided.

Stone takes the story in time only a little beyond the dismissal of

MacArthur on April 11, 1951. He quotes press reports as late as January

1952 that “there still could be American bombing and naval blockade of

Red China if Korean talks fail.”

The evidence which Stone presents is solid but circumstantial. What

else could it be, with the official documents still unavailable? In the

1960s, the Rand Corporation, a major think tank originally funded by the

U.S. Air Force, conducted studies with additional information and

according to one reviewer came to “almost identical conclusions” as

Stone.

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Stone’s telling of the history of the Korean War, emphasizing the

opportunistic response by the forces in the U.S. advocating rollback and

also downplaying the role of the Soviet Union challenged the dominant

assumption that this was Stalin’s war. “Until the release of Western

documents in the 1970s, prompted a new wave of literature on the war,

his remained a minority view.”

Then in the 1990s, documents from the former Soviet archives

became available, as did telegrams and other sources from the PRC

archives. Scholars examining these documents and fitting the pieces

together were able to make the case that Kim Il-sung had sought and

eventually received Soviet support for a military effort to unify Korea.

Stone had been wrong to suspect that General MacArthur and John

Foster Dulles somehow colluded in the start of the Korean War.

But Stone did a service by documenting the role of sectors of U.S.

policymakers looking for an opportunity to push the USSR and the PRC

back from Northeast Asia. Bruce Cummings studied the detailed policy

debate in the U.S. which lead to the policy of active containment.

Cummings’s book, The Origins of the Korean War, Volume II gives

substance to the internal fight between supporters of rollback and those

who supported containment, which for Stone was journalistic specula-

tion.

In 1952 when it was published, The Hidden History of the Korean

War met with almost a complete press blackout and boycott. But that

included no rebuttals or answers from official U.S. sources. There was

a republication in 1970 and the book has been translated at least into

Spanish, Italian, and Japanese. Some chapters also appeared in French.

Used copies are still available, especially from online booksellers.

I. F. Stone’s case is thought provoking and helpful, especially when

tensions are being stirred up again on the Korean Peninsula, and

manipulated wars are still in style. Perhaps however journalism like that

of Stone’s and lessons from the first Korean War are making a second

Korean War less likely.

Notes:

Page 33

1. Wall Street Journal, Jan. 17, 1952.

2. Stephen E. Ambrose, Professor of Maritime History at the Naval College in the

Baltimore Sun.

3. Kathryn Weathersby, “The Soviet Role in the Korean War: The State of Historical

Knowledge,” in The Korean War in World History, edited by William Stueck,

University Press of Kentucky, 2004, p. 63.

4. Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Volume II: The Roaring of the

Cataract 1947-1950, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 1990.

[Editors’ note: The following article appeared in OhmyNews Interna-

tional on Sept. 10, 2008]

North Korean Woodblock Prints on

Exhibit at Korea Society in NYC

Exhibit Helps to Highlight Need for More Cultural Ex-

changes Between North Korea and Other Countries

by Ronda Hauben

The Korea Society in New York is hosting an exhibit of North

Korean woodcut printing. The exhibit which will be on display at their

gallery until Dec. 12 will then travel to other sites around the U.S. The

exhibit features 24 prints from the Nicholas Bonner collection. The

exhibit spans three decades of North Korean woodcut art. The cuts offer

a rare glimpse into the life and customs in North Korea.

A number of the woodcuts were from the 1988-1989 period. There

are also a few which are from the 1990s. One of the few woodcuts from

the early 1990s shows a factory scene where the workers at the factory

continued to work during the difficult period of the famine and

economic crisis that gripped the country after the breakup of the Soviet

bloc countries.

In other woodcuts there are scenes of women workers harvesting

shellfish, of workers from all over North Korea who are part of the effort

to build a railroad through the mountains, of families with their children,

and one woodcut of a teacher being eagerly greeted by her students.

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Constellation of Lake Samji Village:

Power from recently built hydro electric

station on Lake Samji lights up the

windows of a nearby village which

presents as a pattern of glowing stars.

1999: Potato flower flagrance of Taehongden

Province in the North of the country is a major

source of North Korea’s potato crop Soldiers and

sailors who have completed their military service

have volunteered to come and help work in the

field.

The fact the woodcuts show various aspects of life in North Korea

helps to remind the viewer how rare it has been to have any knowledge

of the life and experiences of North Koreans. This is in good part the

situation because of the hostile policy of the U.S. government toward

North Korea. The activities of the Korea Society in holding such an

exhibit are especially welcome as the exhibit is helping to spread some

of the little knowledge that exists in the U.S. about the life and culture

of North Koreans. The colors in the prints are vibrant. There are

different textures portrayed. But most special are the details of working

life shown in the prints that the exhibit presents. Working life is not

often enough the subject of art, despite how central it is to the life of

every society. The prints show working life in both urban and rural

settings and the integration of the two, as for example, is depicted when

soldiers or volunteers go to a rural area to help with a harvest or workers

from around the country go to help dig through a mountain so as to

make possible a railway.

Page 35

Shallow sea harvester 1988: Lifting and

sorting shell fish which are used widely as

part of the Korean’s food died, these women

who harvest them are helping to feed the

nation.

May Day Stadium construction 1988.

Page 36

Propaganda Van Girl: She is congratulating

jubilant workers for exceeding quotas by 270%

Happiness of the Miners: Young miners

enthusiastically read newspaper article

describing their success in exceeding

production quotas.

Page 37

Building a railway thru mountains:

Trough the 1980s workers from all over

North Korea came to help build a rail-

road through the country’s northern

mountains. Suspended on a sheer cliff

high above a raging river and buffeted

by wind and snow the figures pursue

their work.

May 1989: May is the time for

transplanting rice in Northern Korea.

Collective farmers working in a rice

paddy.

The opinions expressed in articles are those of their authors and not

necessarily the opinions of the Amateur Computerist newsletter. We

welcome submissions from a spectrum of viewpoints.

Page 38

EDITORIAL STAFF

Ronda Hauben

William Rohler

Norman O. Thompson

Michael Hauben (1973-2001)

Jay Hauben

The Amateur Computerist invites submissions. Articles can be

submitted via e-mail:

[email protected] Permission is given to reprint articles from

this issue in a non profit publication provided credit is given, with name of

author and source of article cited.

ELECTRONIC EDITION

ACN Webpage:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/ All issues of the Amateur

Computerist are on-line. Back issues of the Amateur Computerist are available at:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/Back_Issues/

All issues can be accessed from the Index at:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/NewIndex.pdf

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