Chronologies
North Korea - South Korea
Chronology from Sep 2020 to Dec 2020
: DPRK’s Voice of Korea reports: “Delegates to the Eighth Party Congress arrived in Pyongyang in late December.”
: A Politburo meeting—the 22nd session of the Political Bureau of the Seventh Central Committee of the WPK—reviews preparations for the upcoming Eighth Congress, set for “early in January” (still no exact date). Interestingly, this is chaired not by Kim Jong Un (though he attends) but former Premier Kim Jae Ryong, under KJU’s “guidance.”
: Launching the Northeast Asia Conference on Health Security, an initiative of Moon’s, FM Kang expresses hope that North Korea might join. The inaugural virtual meeting comprises South Korea, the United States, China, Japan, Russia, and Mongolia.
: Almost 30 South Korean human-rights organizations file a constitutional challenge to the new anti-leafleting law.
: The Asan Institute for Policy Studies, a private think-tank in Seoul, predicts that North Korea may greet President Biden with a missile test: “the North will consider playing the card of an ICBM launch in a desperate measure to break the deadlock.”
: Statistics Korea, South Korea’s official statistical agency, publishes a raft of economic data and estimates on the North Korean economy in 2019. This includes a number of inter-Korean comparisons.
: The Sejong Institute, a private think-tank in Seoul, reports that Kim Jong Un made 51 public appearances this year: the fewest ever in his nine-year reign, down from 85 in 2019 and 212 in 2013. Fourteen were economy-related, 12 military, and 25 political. Eight were on-site inspections, mostly related to natural disasters or health issues. The Institute speculates that COVID-19 is the main reason for Kim’s relative invisibility of late.
: MOU says it is drafting guidelines on the new ban on sending leaflets into North Korea, to clarify its scope of application.
: South Korea says it is developing ground vibration sensors to better detect movement near the DMZ, after a defector jumped over fences without raising alarms.
: MOU expresses regret that Tomas Ojea Quintana, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the DPRK, has called on Seoul to reconsider the leaflet ban.
: One of the most high-profile (and controversial) balloon-launching activists, Park San-hang of Fighters for a Free North Korea, says he is contemplating a constitutional challenge to the ban on sending leaflets.
: By the same 187-0 margin, the National Assembly passes a revision to the Development of Inter-Korean Relations Act, to ban sending leaflets into North Korea. Maximum penalties are three years jail or a fine of 30 million won ($27,000). Again the PPP boycotts the vote after its filibuster is overruled.
: By 187 votes to 0, ROK National Assembly approves a revision to the National Intelligence Service Korea Act. The spy agency can no longer investigate alleged pro-North activities by South Koreans: this power, abused in the past, now passes to the police. The conservative opposition PPP boycotts the vote after its filibuster the day before is overruled—as the ruling Democratic Party (DP) can do after 24 hours, having over 180 seats.
: Ji Seong-ho, one of two DPRK defectors elected in April as a lawmaker for the ROK conservative opposition (named the People Power Party, or PPP), says that seeking nuclear talks with North Korea without addressing its human rights issue is “quite a hollow thing, such as a sand castle.”
: Ever optimistic, Unification Minister Lee detects a “U-turn” toward a thaw since June’s tensions. He says North Korea may respond to the South’s offers of cooperation on COVID-29 after its upcoming Party Congress.
: At the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) Manama Dialogue in Bahrain, ROK Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-hwa says it is hard to believe the DPRK’s claim to be free of COVID-19: “All signs are that [they are] very intensely focused on controlling the disease that they say they don’t have.” This is not part of her prepared remarks.
: In a saga going back to June 2019, MOU says it is in talks with the UN World Food Programme (WFP) to get back $11.6 million it had sent to supply 50,000 tons of rice to North Korea. Pyongyang rejected Seoul’s offer. (See also Sept. 3.)
: MOU Lee says South Korea should send the North food and fertilizer next spring, when it faces a risk of “extreme famine.” And yet …
: Park Sang-hak, leader of Fighters for a Free North Korea, is charged with assaulting a broadcasting team who visited his home (uninvited) to interview him about his leafleting campaign. He allegedly beat and threw bricks at the journalists, and fired a tear gas gun at police. Park counter-claimed that the journalists were housebreaking.
: Korea Herald reports that on Nov. 4, a DPRK defector in his 20s arrived undetected across the DMZ near the east coast. A former gymnast, the man said he vaulted over fences 3 meters (10 feet) high. ROK authorities make him jump twice to prove it.
: On the 10th anniversary of North Korea’s shelling of Yeonpyeong island, which killed four, South Korean Defense Minister Suh Wook pays tribute to the fallen and vows a strong defense posture: “True peace needs to be supported by strong power.” The same day, MOU Lee tells officials of major chaebol (conglomerates) including Samsung, Hyundai Motor, SK and LG, whose heads accompanied President Moon to Pyongyang in 2018, to be prepared: an inter-Korean breakthrough “may come sooner than expected.”
: MOU Lee reiterates call for the two Koreas to cooperate on COVID-19: “When vaccines and treatment … are developed … in the near future, a new environment will be created in the Korean Peninsula in which people and goods can come and go.”
: With winter coming, MND says it will wrap up this year’s work excavating remains at Arrowhead Ridge, a Korean War battlefield. This was meant to be a joint effort, but North Korea remains unresponsive. The South will resume work in the spring.
: ROK provincial authorities in Gangwon—the only Korean province bisected by the DMZ—reveal that in August they sent a letter inviting DPRK counterparts to co-host the 2024 Winter Youth Olympics. They live in hope, though no reply has been received.
: Following the US presidential election, MOU Lee urges North Korea to “take a discreet, wise, and flexible approach” during the transition and refrain from provocations.
: In a 1,000 word KCNA commentary clearly meant to draw a line, Pyongyang again expresses “regret” at “the inglorious incident”—but blames Seoul for not controlling its citizen, and slams Southern conservatives for “working with bloodshot eyes to slander their fellow countrymen in the north.” The piece is headlined: “Sustained Confrontational Frenzy of S. Korean Conservative Forces May Invite Greater Misfortune.”
: At a forum in Cheorwon near the DMZ, MOU Lee calls the two Koreas “a single community of life and security.” He avers: “Once the South and the North join hands, the DMZ could be turned into [an] experimental space of coexistence where the possibility of peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula can be tested in advance.”
: Without naming him, KCNA attacks ROK national security adviser Suh Hoon for acting “so sordidly” on “his recent secret junket” to Washington. Suh’s saying that inter-Korean ties also require consultation with other countries, such as the US, shows “the south Korean authorities’ wanton denial, perfidy to and an open mockery of” all past North-South agreements, which put national independence above all. Calling Suh “an American poodle,” KCNA adds: “We can not but doubt his sanity.”
: MOU says it will conduct an ecological survey of the Han River estuary next month. In 2018 the two Koreas carried out a joint survey, but this time the ROK will stick to the South side of the river only.
: Shin Hee-young, newish head of the ROK Red Cross, suggests that instead of one-sided aid which hurts the DPRK’s pride, the two Koreas conduct joint medical research.
: Restating familiar themes, MOU Lee In-young tells a forum in Seoul: “We are faced with the task of moving the US-North Korea nuclear talks forward through inter-Korean trust, allowing individuals to travel to North Korea and reconnecting and modernizing railways and roads as agreed upon by the leaders of the two Koreas … That is the way to go no matter what and the responsibility that cannot be neglected.”
: MOU reports that just 48 North Korean defectors—23 men and 25 women—reached South Korea in the third quarter: well down from the 226 who arrived in Q3 of 2019. Travel restrictions due to COVID-19 are driving a sharp fall: there were 135 in Q1 and a mere 12 in Q2.
: ROK opposition lawmaker says MOU slashed its 2021 budget for the now demolished North-South liaison office to 310 million won ($270,000), from 6.41 billion won in 2020.
: In his latest report on DPRK human rights, UN special rapporteur Tomas Ojea Quintana denounces Lee Dae-jun’s killing as a “violation of international human rights law” and demands that Pyongyang punish those responsible.
: MND assures South Koreans that the ROK can “immediately respond to and incapacitate” DPRK short-range missiles and multiple rocket launchers (MLRs) displayed at the North’s Oct. 10 parade.
: After Kim’s “warm wish,” MOU voices hope for improved inter-Korean ties, but says conditions are not yet right to make specific proposals.
: Saying it is reviewing Kim’s speech, the Blue House reaffirms that inter-Korean accords should be honored “and war should be kept at any cost” (sic).
: North Korea marks 75th anniversary of the founding of ruling Workers’ Party (WPK) with a big military parade: its first in two years, held unusually at midnight. Hardware rolled out includes a huge new ICBM, the world’s largest of its kind, on an 11-axle transporter erector launcher (TEL). Kim Jong Un’s emotional speech includes a “warm wish …to our dear fellow countrymen in the south, and hope … the day would come when the north and south take each other’s hand again.”
: MOU data, requested by an opposition lawmaker, show that in quantitative terms North Korean media criticism of South Korea soared six-fold in 2019 (981 stories) compared to 2018 (152). Three outlets were surveyed: the party daily Rodong Sinmun, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), and Uriminzokkiri, a propaganda website for external consumption. The 2020 total exceeds 600 items so far, with 239 in June alone but fewer than 10 per month subsequently (see Appendix 2 in our last issue).
: In a video address to the Korea Society in New York, President Moon suggests that the US and ROK work jointly toward a declaration formally ending the Korean War. He says trust will be built by “keeping our ears, mind and heart open toward” North Korea. Although “talks have now stalled, and we are catching our breath … we can neither allow any backtracking on hard-earned progress nor change our destination.”
: MOU admits it okayed an NGO plan to send medical aid to North Korea just after news of the fatal shooting. It has told all six aid organizations granted such approval in September to suspend deliveries for now.
: After its own investigation, ROK Coast Guard concludes that the man was seeking to defect.
: “Parliamentary sources” in Seoul, evidently after intelligence briefings, say the ROK military wiretapped KPA internal communications with and about the MOF official in real time throughout his ordeal. The captain on the spot talked of rescuing him, but was overruled from above. The intel confirms that he was trying to defect.
: Mobilizing 39 vessels and six aircraft, ROK Navy and Coast Guard continue their search for the official’s body, despite the DPRK’s warning against intrusion. They clarify that they are staying strictly south of the NLL.
: Blue House calls for a joint probe with North Korea, and for the inter-Korean military hotline to be reopened to discuss this. Pyongyang makes no response, but its official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA)—rather than the navy or government—warns Seoul against intruding into Northern waters. KCNA adds that the North is “about” to organize its own search, and will “even consider … ways of handing over any tide-brought corpse to the south side conventionally in case we find it.”
: In a most unusual message from the WPK’s United Front Department (UFD), Kim Jong Un apologizes for this “unsavory” case. The North’s explanation of why it shot the man strains credulity. Blue House also reveals that Moon and Kim exchanged fulsome letters early in May, and publishes their texts (unofficial translation here).
: The Blue House (Cheongwadae, the ROK presidential office and residence) condemns this “inhumane” shooting of a South Korean “who had no weapon and no intention to resist,” as an “act against international norms and humanitarianism.” President Moon, calling the incident “shocking” and intolerable, orders South Korea’s military to further strengthen its security posture. MOU weighs in similarly, adding that it has no way to communicate with the North since the latter cut all inter-Korean communication lines in June.
: ROK Ministry of National Defense (MND) “strongly condemns” what it calls “an act of brutality … According to our military’s thorough analysis of diverse intelligence,” North Korean troops found the missing official in its waters, shot him, and burnt his body. In sharp tones, MND urges Pyongyang to explain and punish those responsible. It adds that the man had financial and other problems, and was probably seeking to defect.
: “Sources” in the National Intelligence Service (NIS), the ROK spy agency, say the as-yet unnamed 47-year old was shot and “cremated” by KPA soldiers while trying to defect. They are probing his motives, and say there is “no evidence that any senior official is involved in this case.”
: ROK Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries (MOF) says that on Sept. 21 one of its officials went missing—leaving only his shoes—from an inspection boat patrolling waters off Yeonpyeong island, near the Northern Limit Line (NLL, the de facto inter-Korean maritime border). An intensive search fails to find him. MOF adds that “according to our military intelligence, he was found in North Korean waters late Tuesday [Sept. 22]).
: South Korean police reveal that on Sept. 17 they caught a defector trying to go back to North Korea across the DMZ. Arrested in a military area in Chorwon in central Korea, the unnamed man in his 30s, who had come South in 2018, was found with cutters and four mobile phones.
: Moon marks summit anniversary with a Facebook post: “Together with Chairman Kim Jong-un, I declared denuclearization and peace on the Korean Peninsula.” Since then “internal and external restraints” have stopped the peace clock, but a “seed sown in history” is sure to bear fruit. The ROK holds no official commemoration of the anniversary, which passes wholly unmentioned in DPRK media.
: The day before the second anniversary of his third summit with Kim Jong Un, Moon tells Buddhist leaders: “If (we) don’t give up hope for meetings and dialogue, we will surely move on to the path of peace and unification.”
: MOU Lee tells DMZ Forum 2020 that the two Koreas should “set up a joint disaster control system in the DMZ” to tackle inter alia “flooding, damage from blight and harmful insects [and] forest fires.” This could “also bring in people to slow-developing border regions and get the peace engine up and running if roads and railways are connected.”
: On his first visit to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) as Unification minister, Lee calls on North Korea to implement 2018’s inter-Korean accords, reopen cut communication lines, and resume “open-minded” dialogue. At Panmunjom Lee waves to DPRK soldiers. It is not shown, or stated, whether the Korean People’s Army (KPA) waved back.
: JCS nominee Won In-choul (currently Air Force chief of staff), also replying to questions from lawmakers, opines that the North “could launch an SLBM by using catapulting devices.” It is unclear if this difference denotes a changed military assessment, or confusion. No launch occurs.
: Responding to lawmakers’ questions ahead of his confirmation hearing, Gen. Suh Wook—nominated by President Moon as Minister of National Defense (MND); hitherto he was chairman of the ROK Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS)—says that “no signs indicating imminent firings of an SLBM [submarine-launched ballistic missile] have been detected.” There is speculation that the DPRK might mark the 75th founding anniversary of its ruling Workers’ Party (WPK) on Oct. 10 with a launch of a new missile.
: MOU Lee tells a forum in Seoul that better inter-Korean ties—for instance, cooperation in public health—can move denuclearization forward and “open the era of complete, verifiable and irreversible peace, with the two Koreas taking the lead in cooperation with the international community … We hope that the North will respond to this new start.”
: ROK Red Cross says MOU has commissioned it to create virtual reality (VR) content featuring the Northern hometowns of divided families: “As the separated families are aging rapidly and there are not enough opportunities for reunions, we decided to push ahead with this project using cutting-edge technology to offer them consolation.”
: Pyongyang vows “severe punishment” for officials in Wonsan, accusing them of failing to prepare for Typhoon Maysak which struck the east coast of both Koreas on Sept. 2. An unspecified incident in the port city caused dozens of casualties.
: Pyongyang vows “severe punishment” for officials in Wonsan, accusing them of failing to prepare for Typhoon Maysak which struck the east coast of both Koreas on Sept. 2. An unspecified incident in the port city caused dozens of casualties.
: NK News reports that in late August a court in Incheon acquitted a lawyer who had brought back North Korean books and newspapers after attending a business forum held in Pyongyang in November 2018. The judge ruled that since MOU had approved his trip, the defendant could legally possess such items—otherwise banned under the National Security Law (NSL) —for personal research use.
: NK News reports that in late August a court in Incheon acquitted a lawyer who had brought back North Korean books and newspapers after attending a business forum in Pyongyang in November 2018. The judge ruled that since MOU had approved his trip, the defendant could legally possess such items – otherwise banned under the National Security Law (NSL)—for personal research use.
: At the annual Seoul Defense Dialogue (SDD), ex-USFK commander Gen. Vincent Brooks predicts that North Korea will hold off re-engaging with the South until 2021, when the election campaign for Moon Jae-in’s successor may give it more leverage.
: A propos another stalled project, MOU says it may redeem funds from the UN World Food Programme (WFP) if there is no progress by end-2020. In June 2019 Seoul had announced plans to send 50,000 tons of rice aid, and gave WFP $11.6 million to cover costs—but Pyongyang rejected the offer. (See also Nov. 30.)
: Meeting Shin Hee-yong, new head of the ROK Red Cross, MOU Lee says he hopes the two Koreas “can kick off video reunions over the Chuseok holiday” (the Korean harvest festival, this year falling on Oct. 1). This seems optimistic, as North Korea has never even accepted the video equipment which Seoul paid for—obtaining a UN sanctions waiver as long ago as March 2019. In the event, no reunions are held.
: At the annual Seoul Defense Dialogue (SDD), ex-USFK commander Gen. Vincent Brooks predicts that North Korea will hold off re-engaging with the South until 2021, when the election campaign for Moon Jae-in’s successor may give it more leverage.
: MOU says it may redeem funds from the UN World Food Programme (WFP) if there is no progress by end-2020. In June 2019 Seoul announced plans to send 50,000 tons of rice aid, and gave WFP $11.6 million to cover costs—but Pyongyang rejected the offer.
: Meeting Shin Hee-yong, the new head of the ROK Red Cross, MOU Lee says he hopes the two Koreas “can kick off video reunions over the Chuseok holiday” (the Korean harvest festival, this year falling on Oct. 1). This seems optimistic: North Korea has never accepted video equipment which Seoul paid for, and obtained a UN sanctions waiver as long ago as March 2019.
: National Security Adviser Suh Hoon ‘clarifies’ that the ROK-US working group forum on North Korea is “basically … useful,” and critics are misinformed. Seoul and Washington are consulting on how to improve it, by “adjusting the aspects of it being misunderstood and excessively functioning” (sic).
: ROK National Security Adviser Suh Hoon “clarifies” that the ROK-US working group forum on North Korea is “basically … useful,” and its critics are misinformed. Seoul and Washington are consulting on how to improve it, by “adjusting the aspects of it being misunderstood and excessively functioning” (sic). (See Aug. 21 in the previous issue.)