Looks like the North and South Korean delegations in Busan have very little to discuss, so the North Koreans are taking their ball and bat (or Rodongs and Taepodongs, be it as it may) and heading home a day early.
To which, I say DON’T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU IN THE ASS ON THE WAY OUT.
The two sides met this morning at 10:30, but apparently couldn’t narrow their differences (read: the South wouldn’t pay protection money). So the delegated decided to end the meeting following today’s concluding meeting at 2:30.
This would be the first time since November 2001 that intra-Korean ministerial talks have failed to produce a joint statement, and the first time ever that the talks have ended early.
Reportedly, the North kept talking about the 500,000 tons of rice the South promised them, while the South stood firm in its position that until there was an end to this missile mess, there would be no discussion of rice aid. No date has been set for the next round of talks, although the two sides might agree to one this afternoon.
Perhaps we were a little hasty in bashing Seoul’s ballessness? Well, early indicators would suggest we were, but let’s see how this plays out.
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I suspect foreign journalists may have it got it wrong about the lack of backbone on the part of the Government as well as the people about the missile mess. (If there was any misperception by the journalists, it is entirely understandable given the present government’s track record). However, much of the assessment by journalists about the nonchalance of S Koreans about what happened last week may be substantially off given the lack of serious spade work by those who hang out at the SFCC. To wit, check this out:
91% of Koreans Concerned About National Security
Dong-eun Lee / CJB
Maeil Business Newspaper
2006-07-12
A quick survey on 312 over-twenty adults by Embrain, an online research institute (www.embrain.com) via Maeil Business Newspaper’s request, showed that nine out of every ten Koreans are anxious about national security, as led by the participatory government.
Despite the government’s reassurance that the national security system is being operated according to the manual and that no problems were faced counteracting against North Korea’s missile launches, an overwhelming statistical majority were worried about South Korea’s defense.
Furthermore, 65 percent of the Korean people judged the North’s missile launch on July 5 as ‘Serious.’
59.9 percent of the respondents answered ‘Very concerned’ to the question, ‘What do you think of Korea’s current national security system?’ while 31.1 percent chose ‘Slightly concerned’.
Accordingly, it has been realized that over 90 percent of the respondents were worried about the national security.
Only 3.9 percent replied that they were not particularly or not at all concerned and 5.1 answered, ‘Acceptable.’
Regarding North Korea’s missile launches, 51.3 percent said that they considered the issue to be slightly serious and 13.8 percent chose ‘considered very serious,’ which revealed that more that half of the nationals recognized the matter as critical. [sic: I’m not sure “slightly serious” can be equated with “critical” but at least most Koreans are not nonchalant about the matter…]
However, 23.4 percent of the respondents said that they believed the incident was ‘not particularly or not at all serious,’ while 11.5 percent answered ‘Don’t know.’
Such views on national security could explain why 26.3 percent said that they agreed that North Korea should develop missiles and 19.6 percent replied ‘Don’t know.’ The two percentiles together were almost equal to the 54.2 percent which responded ‘Against.’
i’d like to see exactly what the pool of respondents was as well as the exact questions asked. i would find it hard to believe that over half found the matter “critical.”
Hasn’t the missile mess come to an end?
Can’t NK just say, “Did we shoot up a missile yesterday? Did we say we are going to shoot one tomorrow?”
And both North and South can thus say it is over.
Judge Judy, I don’t know if the 90% figure is quite accurate, but TomCoyner’s comments above jive with what I’ve heard in discussions with other people. While a lot of people are worried about Abe’s comments, they are equally dismayed — and highly critical — of how blasé Roh seemed to be in the early hours of the launch.
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[...] I have to give Minister Lee credit, he is the first SK governmental official I have seen to actually stand up to the North Koreans. In fact it appears that he has pissed off the North Koreans so much that they are withdrawing from the talks. From the Marmot’s Hole: The two sides met this morning at 10:30, but apparently couldn¿t narrow their differences (read: the South wouldn¿t pay protection money). So the delegated decided to end the meeting following today¿s concluding meeting at 2:30. [...]