North and S. Korea on brink of war, Russian diplomat warns

North and South Korea are on the brink of war, a top Russian diplomat has warned, calling for both countries to exercise restraint and sit down for talks.

North and South Korea on the brink of war, Russian diplomat warns
From The Daily Telegraph www.telegraph.co.uk
By Andrew Osborn in Moscow
Published: 12:04AM BST 24 Sep 2010

In Moscow's bleakest assessment of the situation on the Korean peninsula yet, Russian deputy foreign minister Alexei Borodavkin said tensions between the two countries were running at their highest and most dangerous level in a decade.

"Tensions on the Korean Peninsula could not be any higher. The only next step is a conflict," he told foreign policy experts at a round table on the subject in Moscow.

His prediction came two months after North Korea vowed to wage "a sacred war" against South Korea and its biggest backer, the United States.

Tensions bubbled over in March after Washington and Seoul concluded that a North Korean submarine had sunk a South Korean naval vessel in the Yellow Sea. Mr Borodavkin called for the investigation into exactly who was responsible for the sinking of the vessel, the Cheonan, to be urgently closed in order to remove an obvious source of tension.

Describing the standoff between the two Koreas as a "hangover from the Cold War," Mr Borodavkin said Russia, which is one of the six countries involved in talks with North Korea over its nuclear programme, was doing all it could to try to prevent an outbreak of hostilities.

But he said responsibility for keeping peace in the volatile region was shared equally between North and South Korea. He condemned North Korea's nuclear testing programme but also criticised the way the United States and South Korea had increased their military manoeuvres in the wake of the sinking of the Cheonan.

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Kim Jong-il dictatorship could end within days

The dictatorship of the North Korean leader Kim Jong-il could end within days after a leadership conference was called for the first time in nearly 45 years.

Kim Jong-il dictatorship could end within days
From The Daily Telegraph (www.telegraph.co.uk)
By Malcolm Moore in Shanghai
Published: 6:30PM BST 21 Sep 2010:

The country has announced a "great revolutionary surge" as it prepares for a regime change which could see Mr Kim's son, Kim Jong-un, appointed as his successor.

North Korea will hold a party conference of its ruling Workers' Party next week, for the first time since 1966, to elect its "supreme leadership body".

Ostensibly the conference will appoint new blood into the North Korean bureaucracy, but the rarity of the event has convinced experts that Mr Kim, 68, could use the event to unveil his third son as his successor.

The elder Mr Kim travelled to China last month and may have sought China's rubber-stamp over the transfer of power. China remains North Korea's most important trading power and political ally.

If Mr Kim does hand over power, North Korea will continue to enjoy the apparent contradiction of being a centrally-planned Communist state with a hereditary dynasty in charge.

An announcement yesterday (tues) from the Korean Central News Agency, the mouthpiece of the government, said there would be a "new great revolutionary surge" and that all cadres in the country were "single-mindedly united" behind Kim Jong-il, whatever his decision may be.

The regime is "now ready to go ahead with its move to designate Kim Jong-Un as successor", said Yang Moo-Jin of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul. "The son is expected to take a key party post but that will not be made public for a while," he added.

The meeting had been delayed since the beginning of September, causing many observers to wonder whether the elder Kim was facing an internal challenge to his choice of successor.

"It is possible that the North Korean elite is far less united than usually assumed, so some factions are seriously unhappy about the likely choice of successor or the expected composition of the new leadership," said Andrei Lankov, a professor at Seoul's Kookmin University.

Other analysts noted that the delay could have been triggered by the need to plan and stage-manage the succession and instruct cadres, who have been stationed in Pyongyang for two weeks in expectation of the meeting, about their roles in the event.

However, some observers note that the younger Kim, at 28, may not be ready to assume full control over North Korea and has not been groomed in the same way as his father. The younger Kim has instead been fast-tracked to leadership ever since his father suffered a stroke in 2008, leaving a question mark over his continuing rule.

Another possible option would be for Kim Jong-il to pass power to his brother-in-law, Chang Song-taek, as a regent while his son built his own power base. A bureaucratic reshuffling in 2009 helped to promote Chang, and the forthcoming conference could see him given further roles.

He is currently vice chairman of the National Defence Commission, a position considered second only to Kim Jong-il.

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