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| Korea |
| North Korean Scientists Defect in China |
| 2003-04-21 |
| TOKYO, April 20 -- The United States and at least 10 other countries helped arrange the defections of up to 20 top North Korean officials, including key nuclear scientists, in an operation that began in October, according to an Australian newspaper. The Weekend Australian reported that a man it identified as the "father" of the North Korean nuclear program, Kyong Won Ha, was among the defectors and is providing intelligence information to Western officials. Kyong and the other officials had escaped to China and went on to other countries with the help of consulates and embassies, the newspaper reported. The United States helped set up -- and pay for -- an embassy in Beijing for the tiny Pacific Island of Nauru specifically to help move the defectors, though none went to the embassy, the Australian said. Nauru, an eight-square-mile island in Melanesia northeast of Australia, was persuaded to cooperate in part because of a promise that the United States would help it avoid financial sanctions being considered for the island nation as a "non-cooperative country." It has been singled out for sanctions by Washington as a "primary money-laundering concern" under the U.S.A. Patriot Act. The Chinese route for defections from North Korea has become an increasingly sensitive issue. China, an ally of North Korea, does not accept Koreans who cross the shallow river border as refugees, and has forcibly returned many people. But other Koreans have been helped out of China by church groups, aid organizations and some diplomatic offices in China. According to the newspaper, the diplomatic route was galvanized by the United States under the code name "Operation Weasel" to get the top North Koreans out of the country. The report could not be independently verified by The Washington Post. According to the Weekend Australian, the plan took the defectors in China through a network of other countries. In the past, China has chosen not to challenge the underground route operated by diplomats, who in return have tried to be discreet about it. Defectors who ended up in South Korea, for example, were instructed by that government not to disclose that they had gone through China, to avoid embarrassing Beijing. Some defectors in this latest group, which the newspaper described as members of the "military and scientific elite," have ended up in the United States or other Western countries. Kyong, the nuclear scientist, is "believed to be in a safe house in the West," according to the Weekend Australian. The newspaper said Kyong had provided "unprecedented insight" into North Korea's nuclear program, but no specifics were reported. The United States is scheduled to meet with North Korea and China in Beijing on Wednesday in their first negotiations over North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. The newspaper said one organizer of the defection network was a Washington lawyer named Philip Gagner. He had contacted the president of Nauru in October and asked the country to agree to open embassies in Washington and Beijing, free of charge. "Some of the governments involved, including governments in the Pacific and the United States government, would like to have the assistance of the Nauru Government in a diplomatic matter of very great sensitivity," Gagner wrote Nauru's president then, Rene Harris, according to the report. The matter "involves a country -- not Iraq -- which may have acquired weapons of primary concern to other governments and other countries in the region and the world," said the letter, according to the paper. He added, "This is a matter of sufficient concern that the government of the United States would likely recommend removing Nauru from the list of non-cooperative countries." "We were going to get a [North Korean] nuclear scientist and his family from a farm in China and then take them in a Nauru consulate car to an embassy," the paper quoted Kinza Clodumar, Nauru's former finance minister, as saying. Among the other countries involved in the operation, according to the paper, are New Zealand, Vanuatu, Thailand, the Philippines and Spain. The newspaper said it had uncovered the network "through confidential documents and interviews with key players in Washington, the Pacific and North Asia." It said Australia was not involved and that the operation "has now been wound up." Wow! fake countries, hidden support by otherwise unsupportive countries. This could be a "movie of the week". |
| Posted by:Frank Martin |
| #5 No wonder that little midget who proclaims he's a god is so pissed; hooray for us. |
| Posted by: Anonymous 2003-9-1 11:27:51 AM |
| #4 If memory serves, Vanuatu was also famous for being the home of the "cargo cults". Primitive native cultures developed a religion that worshipped US Army cargo planes as deities, seeing as how during WWII they were frequent visitors to the strategic island, bringing in military cargos of goods that impressed the natives as being positively god-like. |
| Posted by: Scooter McGruder 2003-04-21 16:15:41 |
| #3 Actually, none of those are "fake" countries. Nauru is a small island most famous for phosphates and Internet domain names (Steve Den Beste's "USS CLUELESS" is registered in Nauru). Vanuatu used to be called the New Hebrides. Today, it's (in)famous for 900-numbers and whopping telephone bills for unsuspecting dialers. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2003-04-21 15:21:11 |
| #2 Kimmie's got to be more nervous than a Russian tank salesman. |
| Posted by: Matt 2003-04-21 13:40:36 |
| #1 "Kim Jong Il: Father of Nuclear Fission", Tuesday at 8 on KCNA... |
| Posted by: tu3031 2003-04-21 13:22:44 |