North Korea’s semi-feudal, semi-Stalinist regime has historically managed to play off the U.S., Russia and China to its own advantage. But recent events could be interpreted as a “cry for help,” some analysts suggest.
It “might be a failing state, balancing on the verge of famine, but when it comes to diplomatic games, North Korean politicians are second to none,” writes Andrei Lankov, an associate professor at Kookmin University in Seoul.
But now it seems that Pyongyang’s stratagem has been gamed.
This week’s maritime conflict with South Korea’s navy, probably reflects an attempt to ratchet up tensions in advance of President Barack Obama’s Asian tour, although regime bellicosity has sometimes reflected policy divisions within the secretive regime.
The state was this week described as a totalitarian residue of the Cold War, but its own ‘1989’ if far from imminent. There is little prospect of regime change driven by domestic discontent, Lankov told a meeting at the National Endowment for Democracy.
“Pyongyang is often described as the world’s last Stalinist regime, but for all practical purposes, North Korea’s state-run economy of steel mills and coal mines is dead,” he asserts. The ruling elites feel cornered and understand that unity is a major condition for their survival…[and therefore] “continue to support their leader with little regard for the plight of most North Koreans.”
The US should ensure that human rights, including the forced labor camps of the hidden gulag, are also on the agenda of any negotiations addressing nuclear proliferation, a Washington meeting heard this week (full audio available here).
Brookings analyst Roberta Cohen proposes a multilateral security mechanism for Northeast Asia, based on the Helsinki model that linked economic, energy, and human rights issues in negotiations between the democratic West and the former Soviet Bloc countries in the 1970s.
Next month, North Korea will undergo its first review by the United Nations Human Rights Council, a deeply flawed body dominated by authoritarian regimes that routinely violate human rights. The regime has already submitted a statement insisting that it has no human rights problems.
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