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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Nork Smashes Chinese Intelligence Network |
| 2006-10-21 |
| CHINA'S People's Liberation Army is pushing the Government to get tough with North Korea after a Chinese spy sold information to Pyongyang that led to the collapse of Beijing's main intelligence network in the Stalinist state. A well-informed Hong Kong-based Chinese language publication, Asia Week, reported that the co-ordinator of one of China's intelligence networks in North Korea, who was based in the Chinese border city of Yanji, sold key information to the North Koreans for about $400,000. "As a result, the network was dissolved. Since then, China's intelligence on North Korea has been weak," the report said. This accounts for Chinese intelligence continuing to downplay as unlikely a North Korean nuclear test, even on the eve of this month's underground blast. The October 9 nuclear test, in defiance of Chinese urging, coupled with the bribery and the shooting of a 19-year-old Chinese border guard by North Korean soldiers a year ago, has helped drive the PLA, the most powerful institution in China after the Communist Party, into pushing the Government to get tough with Pyongyang. Asia Week said yesterday that elements within the PLA were seeking the amendment of the alliance between China and North Korea formally agreed in 1961. On Monday, the PLA held a memorial ceremony for Li Liang, who was killed by fire from five North Korean soldiers when he shot at them after they had crossed the border. Border guard Li, in the army's Second Regiment, was attempting to prevent the kidnapping of Chinese intelligence officers at Guangping, a small town on the 1300km frontier. An officer at Yanbian PLA base later said: "We have designated him as a model soldier." A series of 30 articles about him is being published in the army newspaper. The officer said the kidnappers eventually escaped without their targets: "North Koreans crossing the border to smuggle, rob or beg are quite common here." Li Jiehua, the father of the dead soldier, said that he had been told the North Koreans were intending "to kidnap Chinese intelligence agents responsible for North Korean information, who were based in a villa in Guangping". The Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, in Hong Kong, said that China had protested to the North Korean ambassador in Beijing and insisted that Pyongyang hand over those responsible for the shooting. But North Korea failed to respond and, the centre said, "the relationship between the two armies has deteriorated rapidly". Incursions and kidnappings by North Korean soldiers have become so common that in the main Chinese border-crossing city of Dandong, people joke: "Don't say anything against North Korea, or you'll find yourself there tomorrow." Early this year, eight North Korean soldiers attempted to rob the Liangshui coalmine in the Yanbian border area. One was shot dead, three were captured and four escaped. China is building a substantial barbed-wire fence along sections of the border, including a road giving easy access for military vehicles. Asia Week cited a senior PLA official in Beijing as saying: "North Korea will turn out to be a running dog, and will sell China off at any time, as soon as the US agrees to talk directly with them.' It would instead place a higher priority on deals with the US, Russia and Japan. The Beijing-aligned Hong Kong newspaper Wen Wei Po reported that after the nuclear test, all leave was cancelled for PLA troops in the Jilin province, which borders North Korea, and anti-chemical warfare training had been stepped up. After North Korea conducted missile tests in July, the PLA deployed an extra 2000 troops along the border, boosting the force to 7000. Despite the tensions, the official China Daily newspaper reported on Thursday that "life seems to be going on as normal" at Dandong, less than 150km from the nuclear test site. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #6 North Korea is bought, sold and paid for by communist China, lock, stock and barrel. Until I see a state department report verifying it, I can only assume that this article has been ginned up largely as yet another bit of communist hand-wringing for public consumption. This, as China's politburo tries to build ever more plausible deniability for North Korea's evildoings. When this century closes, communist China will stand as the great failed Stalinist experiment, right down to the famines, bloody purges and mass murders. It will take a long time for these facts to leak through China's tightly controlled media barriers. Likely, not until the politburo's downfall will there ever be any accurate reporting of their crimes against humanity. North Korea ranks amongst the primary contenders of China's wrongs. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-10-21 15:24 |
| #5 Can you expand on that, Zenster? Thanks! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-10-21 14:17 |
| #4 Sorry folks, this is pure horsefeathers. The White House might as well announce that it has smashed an "intelligence network" better known as the FBI. I'll leave the highly appropriate Chinese Opera comparisons to Zhang Fei. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-10-21 13:36 |
| #3 Perhaps they meant "digested"? Who knows? Meat is hard to come by there, isn't it? |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2006-10-21 11:42 |
| #2 When they said they "dissolved" the Chinese network, I wonder if they used sulfuric or hydrochloric acid? |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-10-21 11:40 |
| #1 Article from The Austrailian. Interesting catch, Anonymoose. It would certainly be amusing if the PLA and the Communist Party rulers find themselves at cross purposes... |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-10-21 11:37 |