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Hither and Yon

Peace? Or should the conference theme be ‘Long live the brutal Kim dynasty’?

June 15, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

WASHINGTON – Christine Ahn, a policy analyst with the Korea Peace Network, had what appeared to be good news as she opened a conference here with the portentous title, “Off Ramps to War: Paths to Building Peace with North Korea.”

Otto Warmbier, the University of Virginia student  Read More 
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Key U.S. alliance in Northeast Asia put to the test with election of new South Korean leader

May 19, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

Would Kim Jong-Un mind giving Moon Jae-In a break?

More than any other South Korean leader in years, Moon would like nothing better than to be the one to bring about North-South reconciliation. Wouldn’t it be great, Moon’s newly appointed former activists must be  Read More 
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South Korea’s new leadership has a record of promoting summitry with North Korea

May 11, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

The drama of South Korean history opens a tumultuous new act with the election of a liberal labor lawyer who has promised both to bring about detente with North Korea and satisfy the demands of restive masses fed up with alleged rightist abuses.

Whether Moon Jae-In  Read More 
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Brotherly love lost: More trouble in communism’s first and last dynasty

By World Tribune on February 16, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk

Kim Jong-Nam showed the warm and human face of North Korea’s dynastic family.

You had to like the guy, judging from sightings in the gambling enclave of Macau, across the Pearl River estuary from Hong Kong off China’s southeastern coast.  Read More 
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North Korea curses the world yet again and with more venom than ever

By World Tribune on September 8, 2016
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

You have to credit the North Koreans with chutzpah ― the Yiddish word for “nerve,” brazen arrogance or insolence, all in untranslatable exclamation.

The leaders of the world’s 20 strongest, most powerful nations were gathered in a solemn conclave in China, and  Read More 
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Surreal world: Ever notice how celebrity visitors to N. Korea have nothing to say about horrors there?

By World Tribune on June 9, 2016
Special to WorldTribune.com

DonKirk3By Donald Kirk, EastAsiaIntel.com

North Korea, that is the people who run the place, likes nothing better than endorsements from foreign visitors.

The list of foreigners paying obeisance to the Kim regime, Kim Jong-Un and his father and grandfather before him, is quite  Read More 
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Art of the deal: How about a summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-Un at the Korean DMZ?

By World Tribune on May 26, 2016
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk, EastAsiaIntel.com

Donald Trump may be running neck and neck with Hillary Clinton in the U.S. presidential sweepstakes if the polls are at all credible, but there’s one constituency in which he appears to be well ahead. That’s within  Read More 
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The South Korean split over Gwangju revolt still festers, empowering the North

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, EastAsiaIntel.com

GWANGJU ― The ghosts of the uprising of May 18, 1980, hover over this old but new city in a restive spirit that shows the disunity, the factional splits and the regional hatreds that persist in undermining the ability of South Korea to stand effectively against challenges  Read More 
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South Korea’s Park rains on Kim Jong Un’s coronation parade

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, EastAsiaIntel.com
Kim Jong-Un celebrates his “coronation” in Pyongyang Friday while forgetting about one unpleasant reality that deepens North Korea’s isolation in an already hostile world.
He presides over North Korea’s biggest-ever party, the Seventh Workers’ Party Congress, while Iran, his longtime partner in nuclear  Read More 
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A filmmaker’s stealth coup: Zooming in on North Korean mind control

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, EastAsiaIntel.com
Russian documentary filmmaker Vitaly Mansky has managed to bamboozle his North Korean hosts in a confidence game that’s one of the greater journalistic coups ever scored against the regime.
Mansky, having given the North Koreans the clear impression that he wanted to collaborate fully  Read More 
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