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| DPRK leader Kim Jong-un (File Photo) |
By Clint Richards
Being left in the cold usually results in threats from the Hermit Kingdom.
North Korea has never attempted to present a rational front to the international community or its press. In fact, many observers believe Pyongyang maintains a policy that vacillates between appearing weak, fierce and unpredictable. If that is indeed the case, then the strategy has rarely been more evident than it is right now, yet its unpredictability and inherent weaknesses have been much more evident, despite attempts to display its military might this summer with repeated ballistic missile launches.
North Korea’s isolation intensified over the summer, as relations with South Korea stalled and ties with China deteriorated precipitously after leader Kim Jong-un’s uncle, former vice chairman of the National Defense Commission Jang Song-thaek (who was Pyongyang’s strongest link to Beijing) was executed in the culmination of an apparent power struggle. North Korea’s one legitimate lifeline in the region since May has been Japan, which is still negotiating the release of its citizens captured during the 1970s and 80s. However, even those talks have begun to flounder.
After Pyongyang missed the target for its initial report into the abductees last week, frustration has been increasing domestically in Japan as its leaders seek to pressure North Korea to make progress and report on the issue. The Nikkei reported that a survey it conducted over the weekend found that 57 percent of Japanese people now want the government to put additional pressure on Pyongyang, with only 33 percent supporting a “wait-and-see stance.” Meanwhile Japanese and North Korean officials met in the Chinese city of Shenyang on Monday for four hours, with Japan’s director general of the Foreign Ministry’s Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau Junichi Ihara telling the press afterward that he pressed Japan’s “strong interest” in making progress on the report, saying he believed North Korea’s ambassador in charge or normalizing ties with Japan, Song Il-ho “knows very well that the abduction issue is one of our biggest challenges,” according to the Jiji Press.
Read the full story at The Diplomat