Eye On North Korea

[donsaeid]

خبرگزاري* اينترفاکس* روسيه* به* نقل* از يک* مقام* کره* شمالي* اعلام* کرد اين* کشور درنظر دارد فعاليت* راکتور هسته* اي* يانگ* بيون* را نيمه* دوم* ماه* ژوئيه* متوقف* کند*.

به* گزارش* خبرگزاري* اسوشيتدپرس* *يک* مقام* کره* شمالي* که* خواست* نامش* فاش* نشود اعلام* کرد بر اساس* ارزيابي* کارشناسان* توقف* فعاليت* راکتور يانگ* بيون* مطابق* با اصول* فني* حدود يک* ماه* طول* خواهد کشيد. *

وي* افزود انتظار مي* رود فعاليت* اين* راکتور در چارچوب* توافقنامه* صورت* گرفته* در مذاکرات* شش* جانبه* در نيمه* دوم* ژوئيه* سال* 2007 متوقف* شود.*

[donsaeid]

No military ties between Iran, N. Korea


Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for Asia-Pacific Affairs Mehdi Safari says the Islamic Republic has no military ties with North Korea.

The exiting relations between Iran and North Korea are quite normal, said the Iranian envoy who attended the 16th round of Iran-Japan Political Consultative Committee in Tokyo. He made the remarks in an interview with Japanese television network TBS prior to leaving the country on Friday.

Referring to Iran's nuclear activities as 'peaceful', he commented that it is the legitimate rights of all nations to make use of peaceful nuclear energy as defined by NPT. He also underlined that Iran's nuclear activities are in compliance with the governing rules and regulations of NPT.

"Iran plays significant role in restoring stability and security in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East region", he noted.

As a regional power, Iran spared no efforts to help restore security and stability in the region during the past 27 years, he said.

He described his meeting with Japanese officials as quite fruitful and underlined that Iranian and Japanese officials are determined to broaden all-out ties between the two countries.

The 16th rounds of Iran-Japan Political Consultative Committee studied the two sides' political, economic and cultural relations along with regional and international developments.

[donsaeid]

ژنرال آمريكايي: كره شمالي همچنان تهديدي براي آمريكاست


فرمانده نيروهاي آمريكايي در كره جنوبي، در مصاحبه*اي كره شمالي را همچنان تهديدي براي آمريكا دانست.



به نقل از خبرگزاري آسوشيتدپرس،ژنرال "بي بي بل" فرمانده نيروهاي آمريكايي در كره جنوبي در مصاحبه*اي ضمن انتقاد از آزمايش موشكي هفته قبل كره شمالي و استقبال از همكاري كره شمالي با آژانس بين المللي انرژي اتمي، گفت:

كره شمالي تا زمانيكه به گسترش فناوري موشكي تمايل دارد و آزمايش موشكي انجام
مي دهد،همچنان خطري بالقوه براي آمريكاست.

كره شمالي هفته قبل نوع جديدي از موشك كوتاه برد زمين به زمين را آزمايش كرد.

اين سومين آزمايش موشكي كره شمالي در يك ماه گذشته بوده است.

بل گفت: موشك هاي كوتاه برد كره شمالي تنها تهديد براي شبه جزيره كره نيست، بلكه تهديدي براي كشورهاي منطقه محسوب مي*شود.

وي افزود: سوالي كه مطرح است، كره شمالي قرار است با آژانس هسته*اي همكاري كند ولي چرا تمايل به انجام آزمايشات موشكي دارد.

از سال 1953 و پس از پايان جنگ دو كره 30 هزار نظامي آمريكايي در كره جنوبي مستقر هستند.

كره شمالي موافقت خود را با بسته شدن نيروگاه هسته*اي اين كشور و همكاري با آژانس بين المللي انرژي هسته اي اعلام كرد.

بر اساس اين توافق بازرسان آژانس انرژي هسته*اي هفته پيش از تاسيسات هسته*اي كره شمالي ديدار كردند.

[Rasputin]

[Rasputin]

According to several defectors who say they were involved in the narcotics trade, government trucks transport the opium harvested in North Hamgyong province to a factory outside Pyongyang run by Raemong Pharmaceuticals, a government-owned firm. A North Korean defector who claims he was a key middleman in the narcotics business alleges that Raemong is mainly a normal drug company. But, he says, it also converts opium into heroin headed abroad.

North Korea has used several methods to get its drugs to market. According to Asher and other diplomats, those methods include having its diplomats carry drugs like crystal meth in their luggage as they head for overseas posts. (Asher says North Korea requires that its missions abroad be self-financing, meaning they need to earn enough money to stay afloat without help from Pyongyang.) In the case of heroin, say sources in law enforcement and intelligence, more traditional methods are typically used. Ships flying international flags head for nearby ports--in particular, Vladivostok in Russia's far east and Hong Kong--where organized-crime groups take over. A former senior law-enforcement source in Russia says the criminal groups "do business with agents of the North Korean government just as they would with any other criminal gang."

The North's neighbors are taking steps to root out the menace of North Korean drugs. In 2006 the Vice Minister for China's Public Security Bureau, Meng Hongwei, held a rare press conference to announce his "fierce determination" to combat North Korean drug rings operating in Jilin province in northeastern China. The North's drug dealings also extend to Japan, where in a four-year span, Japanese authorities seized 3,300 lbs. (1,500 kg) of crystal meth trafficked by North Korean gangs. And the Australian navy in 2003 boarded a North Korean vessel headed for the South Pacific and discovered it was packed with more than $45 million worth of high-grade heroin.

Despite such measures, there is little evidence that North Korea has been deterred from the drug business, particularly as demand rises in Russia and China. An East Asian intelligence source estimates that the trade is still worth "several hundred million dollars a year to the regime."

SMOKES AND MIRRORS

DURING THE COLD WAR, SUBIC BAY IN THE Philippines was a critical strategic base of the U.S. Navy. The Navy is long gone (the base closed in 1992), and Subic Bay's facilities are now used strictly for commercial purposes--including, according to a detailed private investigator's report produced for the international cigarette industry in 2005, the smuggling of contraband cigarettes from North Korea.

North Korea is not the only player in the game. (Until recently, China was by far the biggest source of phony brand-name cigarettes, industry executives say.) The private investigator's report for the cigarette industry found that 10 to 12 factories in North Korea produce a total of 41 billion contraband cigarettes a year, shipped out of the North on "deep-sea smuggling vessels." They are then off-loaded at sea to smaller, high-speed vessels that deliver the cigarettes to traffickers in East Asia. That allows the deep-sea smuggling ships to remain in international waters, beyond the reach of any country's law-enforcement authorities.

In late 2004, private investigators witnessed 6,000 master cases of cigarettes--each containing 10,000 smokes--being unloaded at Subic from a fishing vessel that routinely runs between Taiwan and North Korea. Since then, according to a North Korean defector intimately involved in the smuggling of phony cigarettes, "the business has only gotten bigger." This source, who did not want his name used for fear of reprisal in North Korea, where his immediate family lives, says export routes for contraband cigarettes--carrying popular name brands such as Marlboro, Benson & Hedges and Mild Seven, among others--are now multiple and varied.

North Korea's military- and internal-security services are "significant players" in the cigarette business, according to the source who used to be in the game. The North uses both homegrown and imported tobacco in these contraband businesses. A large source of phony cigarettes is the Dongyang Cigarette factory in Pyongyang, owned by a company called Kosanbong, which is controlled by North Korea's internal-security bureau, according to the 2005 private report and a defector interviewed by TIME. The North Koreans have been able to import equipment from Taiwan and mainland China to produce the cigarettes. Overall, the trade generates $80 million to $160 million in profit for the regime every year, the study claims. That cash is then spread among Pyongyang's élite to ensure loyalty to Kim, say multiple sources.

The illicit-cigarette business is a window into how North Korea arranges and moves its whole range of illegal products. The regime uses shipments of contraband cigarettes to export other goods, including narcotics and weapons. North Korea has successfully exported contraband cigarettes from its two major container ports using ships registered in other countries. Some of that material may have found its way to the U.S.--an indication of how easily weapons of mass destruction (WMD) from the North's arsenal could be smuggled to other countries if Kim were tempted to put them up for sale.

THE CASE OF THE SUPERNOTES

IN LATE SUMMER OF 2005, FEDERAL AGENTS involved in two elaborate undercover operations in California and New Jersey--code-named Royal Charm and Smoking Dragon--arrested several alleged members of Chinese organized-crime gangs known as triads. In addition to narcotics, phony brand-name cigarettes and bogus pharmaceuticals, the investigators found $4 million worth of unusually well-produced counterfeit $100 bills. "There's no way an ordinary bank teller in the United States, let alone overseas, is able to identify these notes [as forgeries]," says an American law-enforcement official. In the indictments that followed--the first trial is expected to start this summer--one of the people charged, Chao Tung Wu, a citizen of Taiwan, says the supernotes were produced by the "government of a country" identified in the indictment as "Country Two." That, sources in the U.S. and East Asia say, is North Korea.

According to U.S. and South Korean intelligence reports, the North has been producing the counterfeit bills at least since 1994. The South Korean intelligence service two years ago said it could confirm production only until 1998, but at least twice in recent years, claim U.S. and South Korean sources, the U.S. has presented the South Korean government with supernotes said to have been produced in 2001 and 2003.

[Rasputin]

A 2006 State Department estimate puts the amount of counterfeit currency in circulation at $45 million to $48 million. Estimate is the key word. Of all the illicit businesses from which North Korea profits, counterfeiting is the one about which outsiders know the least. U.S. officials say they don't believe the North Koreans produced the equipment to print such high-quality counterfeit bills. If that's the case, where did they get it from? No U.S. agency interviewed for this story, including Treasury, State and the Secret Service, could say. U.S. sources also say they do not know where in North Korea the notes are produced.

It does seem likely, however, that Kim's government is running the scam. Harvard researcher Chestnut says that since 1994, there have been at least 13 incidents in which North Korean officials, diplomats or employees of government-owned companies have been implicated in carrying counterfeit currency abroad, mostly to embassies in Europe and elsewhere in Asia, from which the bills are sold and slipped into local circulation. Pyongyang last year denied it had ever forged U.S. currency but said it would, in concert with other nations, continue its fight "against all sorts of illegal acts in the financial field."

Hill, the U.S.'s top negotiator with North Korea, says, "I don't think you can ask any government--not ours, not any other government--just to ignore these things and to pretend it's not going on. So we did need to take action." But it's unclear how far the U.S. intends to go. After the release of the $25 million from the Macau bank, North Korea promised to use the money for humanitarian purposes. Now that it is back at the negotiating table, however, Pyongyang has less incentive to clean up its game--and every reason to bet that the world will tolerate its criminal enterprises in exchange for cooperation on the nuclear front. Skeptics of engagement with Kim say, given the nature of the regime, his commitment to any arms-control agreement is doubtful at best. "This is a government that has shown every willingness to sell anything to anybody," says former Pentagon official Dan Blumenthal. "Ultimately our security is at stake in terms of their willingness to possibly sell WMD."

So what can the U.S. and its allies do? As a start, Asher and others argue that Washington could lean more on China and South Korea to beef up their surveillance and interdiction of suspect ships coming out of North Korean ports--which over the long term could dissuade Kim & Co. from pursuing its Sopranos-state operations. But that would take time, and right now the U.S. appears focused on getting a nuclear deal out of Pyongyang, no matter what sort of activities it might have to overlook in the process. For Kim and his cronies in Bureau 39, that means business is only going to get better.

[siamak]

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-03-08-northkorea_N.htm?csp=34

[Rasputin]

Iran Experts Aiding North Korea Rocket Launch

Missile experts from Iran are in North Korea to help Pyongyang prepare for its rocket launch, according to reports.

Amid increasing global concern over the rocket launch, believed by the U.S. and its allies to be an illegal missile launch, Japan's Sankei Shimbun newspaper claimed today a 15-strong delegation from Tehran has been in the country advising the North Koreans since the beginning of March.

The Iranian experts include senior officials with Iranian rocket and satellite producer Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group, the daily said.

The Iranians brought a letter from Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il stressing the importance of cooperating on space technology, it added.

As tensions increase ahead of the rocket launch, Japan's Air Self-Defense Force began deploying units capable of shooting down a rocket to the northern prefectures of Akita and Iwate, according to local media.

Early today, units carrying Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missiles left a base in central Japan and will arrive at the northern prefectures on Monday, according to Japan's national broadcaster NHK.

Tokyo gave its military the green light to shoot down any incoming North Korean rocket on Friday.

Pyongyang has said it will launch a communications satellite over northern Japan between April 4 - 8, but the U.S. and its allies in the region believe the secretive regime is actually planning illegally to test a long-range Taepodong-2 missile that could reach North America.

[Rasputin]

کره شمالی 'آماده پرتاب موشک است'

تصاویر ماهواره ای هم موشک کره شمالی را آماده به پرتاب نشان می دهند
کره شمالی اعلام کرد برای پرتاب یک ماهواره مخابراتی جدید به مرز آمادگی رسیده است و موشک حامل این ماهواره به زودی پرتاب می شود.

خبرگزاری رسمی کره شمالی KCNA از آمادگی یک موشک برای پرتاب "یک ماهواره مخابراتی تجربی" خبر داده و محل پرتاب را نقطه ای در ساحل شرقی این کشور عنوان کرده است.

در روز های اخیر هم تصاویر ماهواره ای حاکی از فعالیت هایی در تاسیسات موشکی "موسودان-ری" بود و تصاویر موشک آماده در سکوی پرتاب را نشان می دهند.

چند هفته قبل این کشور خبر داده بود که قصد دارد این موشک را در یک مقطع زمانی بین شنبه چهارم آوریل و چهارشنبه هشتم آوریل و در ساعتی بین 11 صبح تا چهار بعد از ظهر به وقت محلی (دو صبح تا هفت صبح به وقت گرینویچ) پرتاب کند.

ناظران معتقدند احتمال پایبند ماندن کره شمالی به وعده خود بسیار زیاد است و احتمالا به محض اینکه شرایط جوی برای پرتاب مساعد شود، این اقدام صورت خواهد گرفت.

از آنجا که همسایگان کره شمالی، به ویژه آمریکا و کره جنوبی در باره نیات واقعی این اقدام تردید دارند و معتقدند هدف اصلی آن آزمایش یک موشک بالستیک موسوم به "تائه پودونگ-2" (Taepodong-2) است، هرگونه پرتاب موشک از سوی کره شمالی از سوی دیگر کشورهای جهان با دقت دنبال خواهد شد.


برنامه موشکی کره شمالی موجب نگرانی شدید همسایگان این کشور شده است
آمریکا و کره جنوبی بر این باورند که این موشک ها می توانند اهدافی در آلاسکا یا هاوایی را هدف قرار دهند که این قابلیت ناقض قطعنامه های سازمان ملل متحد محسوب می شود.

در کره جنوبی یک جلسه اضطراری گروه کاری ویژه ای تشکیل شده و گفته می شود در ژاپن مسئولان امور امنیتی در وضعیت آماده باش قرار دارند.


بر اساس برنامه زمانی اعلام شده از سوی کره شمالی، این کشور هنوز ممکن است موشک خود را در روز شنبه چهارم آوریل پرتاب کند که این مسئله نگرانی کشورهای همسایه را موجب شده است؛ در مقطعی از روز مقام های ژاپنی اعلام کردند به نظر می رسد کره شمالی موشکی را پرتاب کرده است، اما این گزارش تقریبا بلافاصله از سوی همین منابع پس گرفته شد.

[Rasputin]

كره شمالي از آزمايش دومين بمب اتمي اين كشور خبر داده كه واكنش تند شماري از كشورهاي جهان را به دنبال داشته است.

روز دوشنبه، 25 مه (4 خرداد)، خبرگزاري دولتي كره شمالي متن بيانيه اي را انتشار داد كه در آن آمده است اين كشور "در تلاش براي تقويت همه جانبه قدرت هسته اي بازدارنده خود در روز 25 مه يك آزمايش هسته اي زير زميني را با موفقيت به اجرا گذاشته است."

اين خبرگزاري در اشاره به نخستين آزمايش اتمي كره شمالي در اكتبر سال 2006، افزوده است كه "آزمايش كنوني در سطحي بالاتر از لحاظ قدرت انفجاري و فن آوري، با امنيت كامل انجام شد."

اين گزارش مي افزايد كه آزمايش روز دوشنبه "موانع علمي و فني در راه افزايش بيشتر قدرت تسليحات اتمي و پيشرفت فن آوري هسته اي" اين كشور را مرتفع ساخته است.

در گزارش خبرگزاري دولتي كره شمالي، هدف از انجام آزمايش اتمي روز دوشنبه "كمك به دفاع از حاكميت كشور و ملت و سوسياليسم و تضمين صلح و امنيت در شبه جزيره كره در پيروي از سياست الويت قدرت نظامي" عنوان شده است.

در گزارش خبرگزاري دولتي كره شمالي از محل انجام آزمايش زير زميني اين بمب اتمي نام برده نشده است اما مركز زلزله شناسي كره جنوبي محل اين آزمايش را نقطه اي در شمال شرق شهركيلجو تشخيص داده كه مكان نخستين آزمايش كره شمالي هم بود.

مركز بررسي هاي زمين شناسي آمريكا هم گفته است كه در ساعت نه و چهل و پنج دقيقه صبح روز دوشنبه، لرزشي به بزرگي 4.7 در مقياس ريشتر را در نقطه اي واقع در حدود 375 كيلومتري پيونگيانگ، پايتخت كره شمالي ، را ثبت كرده و وزارت امور خارجه ايالات متحده هم انجام اين آزمايش را مورد تاييد قرار داده است.

در حاليكه گزارش دومين آزمايش اتمي كره شمالي همچنان در راس اخبار جهان قرار داشت، ساعاتي بعد خبرگزاري كره جنوبي گزارش كرد كه احتمالا كره شمالي يك موشك جديد با برد نزديك هم آزمايش كرده است.

واكنش بين المللي

كره شمالي به نشانه اجراي توافقنامه پكن برج خنك كننده رآكتور خود را منهدم كرد

در ماه اوت سال 2006، منابع رسمي دولت كره شمالي انجام نخستين آزمايش هسته اي اين كشور را اعلام كردند اما دستگاه هاي اطلاعاتي خارجي گفتند كه اين آزمايش چندان موفقيت آميز نبوده است و تا اواسط سال گذشته نيز كارشناسان بر اين نظر بودند كه كره شمالي داراي تعدادي بمب ساده اتمي است اما از توانايي فني لازم براي تبديل آنها به كلاهك هاي قابل حمل توسط موشك برخوردار نيست.

با اينهمه، برخي ناظران گفته اند كه مراكز هسته اي كره شمالي در خلال چند ماه گذشته فعاليت خود براي توليد بمب هاي پيشرفته تر را افزايش داده اند و در نتيجه، اين كشور به توانايي لازم براي حمله اتمي به كشورهاي همسايه، به خصوص كره جنوبي و ژاپن، دست يافته است.

ماه گذشته، كره شمالي يك موشك دوربرد را آزمايش كرد و اعلام داشت كه اين موشك براي حمل ماهواره به فضا ساخته شده است اما شوراي امنيت سازمان ملل اين اقدام را به شدت محكوم و تحريم هاي جديدي را عليه اين كشور وضع كرد كه در اعتراض به آن، مقامات كره شمالي گفتند كه فعاليت هاي اتمي و موشكي خود را گسترش خواهند داد.

در پي انتشار خبر آزمايش هسته اي كره شمالي، لي ميونگ-بك، رئيس جمهوري كره جنوبي، دستور تشكيل جلسه فوري شوراي امنيت ملي اين كشور را صادر كرد تا اين موضوع را مورد ارزيابي قرار دهد.

همچنين، وزارت خارجه ژاپن نيز با صدور بيانيه اي، ضمن محكوم كردن آزمايش هسته اي جديد كره شمالي، خواستار تشكيل جلسه اضطراري شوراي امنيت سازمان ملل براي بررسي اين موضوع شد.

اتحاديه اروپا اقدام دولت كره شمالي را "نگران كننده، توصيف كرده، آمريكا از مشورت با متحدان اين كشور خبر داده، بريتانيا آزمايش روز دوشنبه را مغاير قطعنامه هاي مصوب شوراي امنيت دانسته و روسيه نيز گفته است كه پس از دريافت و بررسي اطلاعات لازم، نسبت در اين مورد اظهار نظر خواهد كرد.

برنامه هاي هسته اي كره شمالي از سال 2004 موضوع اجلاش شش جانبه اي با شركت اين كشور، ايالات متحده، ژاپن، كره جنوبي، روسيه و چين بوده كه در سال 2007، به امضاي توافقنامه اي منجر شد كه بر اساس آن، دولت كره شمالي توقف اين برنامه ها را در برابر دريافت كمك هاي اقتصادي و فني خارجي پذيرفت و حتي برج خنك كننده يكي از رآكتورهاي هسته اي خود را در برابر دوربين هاي تلويزيوني منفجر كرد هر چند به نظر مي رسد بخش اصلي تاسيسات اتمي خود را دست نخورده باقي گذاشت.

كره شمالي دليل ناديده گرفتن اين توافقنامه را خلف وعده كشورهاي امضا كننده به خصوص آمريكا در اعطاي كمك هاي اقتصادي عنوان كرده، اما برخي ناظران مي گويند كه احتمالا شرايط سياسي داخل كره شمالي، به خصوص قدرت و نفوذ قابل توجه نظاميان، عامل اصلي در تغيير سياست هسته اي اين كشور بوده است.

آزمايش هسته اي كره شمالي همچنين سياست خارجي معتدلتر دولت جديد آمريكا را با چالشي جدي مواجه مي سازد و واكنش ايالات متحده نسبت به اين مساله مي تواند بر برخي تحولات بين المللي، از جمله فعاليت هاي هسته اي ديگر كشورها، تاثير بگذارد.