North Korea ‘paranoia’ is all about power

RECENT Amnesty International reports on North Korea and the United States would seem to give the lie to columnist Patrick Kenny’s glib designation of ‘civilised’ to western countries and ‘evil’ to North Korea (Irish Examiner, October 25).

Of course, the reports confirm North Korea has a serious human rights record with reports of “public executions, widespread political imprisonment, torture and ill-treatment”.

Moreover, the report on the US finds that the administration has resorted to “secret detention, enforced disappearance, torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment”.

Thousands of detainees remain in indefinite military detention in US custody in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay. This policy clearly violates international law.

It is also the case that both countries have refused to recognise the International Criminal Court.

It is patent nonsense to claim this dispute is about ‘civilisation’ or ‘good versus evil’. Ultimately, it is about power projection and control over scarce resources.

Despite the presence of US soldiers on the Korean peninsula (not the presence of Korean soldiers on the Florida peninsula), the diplomatic approach to convincing North Korea that it did not need nuclear weapons was working reasonably effectively until George W Bush came to power in 2000.

The ‘sunshine policy’ — still in play — of South Korea towards its estranged northern brothers and sisters was and remains a significant factor.

Japan is also to be commended in its attempts to develop good relations, bearing in mind that it has a lot of ground to make up in the light of its colonial occupation of the Korean peninsula from 1910-1945.

The claim that, somehow or other, North Korea is a serious threat to the west, or even to its neighbours, comparable to that posed by Hitler’s Nazi-Germany exhibits a paranoia on a par with anything that Kim Jong-il or George W Bush could concoct.

North Korea is small country of about 20 million impoverished people who need as much contact with the outside world as possible so as to reduce their and our xenophobia.

The fear-mongers must be engaged and their spurious arguments confronted at every turn.

Con Hayes

Kerry Road

Tower

Blarney

Co Cork