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Tillerson lauds sanctions for dead & starving N. Korean fishers found off Japan coast Dying North Koreans a sign US diplomatic strategy works, Tillerson says
(about 5 hours later)
The US is “getting a lot of evidence” that UN sanctions “are really starting to hurt” North Korea, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has said, referring to a recent incident regarding starving North Korean fishermen. Signs of starvation and death in North Korea indicate that US diplomatic strategy works fine, says the secretary of state. The objective now is not to let Pyongyang evoke sympathy around the world for its sanctions-induced woes.
On Wednesday, Tillerson said during an interview at Stanford University with former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that earlier in the week, Japanese officials told a conference in Vancouver, Canada, that more than 100 North Korean fishing boats were recently found by Japan in their waters, without fuel to get back to their country.
Two-thirds of the fishermen occupying the boats were purportedly deceased upon arrival. The unexpectedly-revealing description of what Rex Tillerson apparently considers successful diplomacy came from his own mouth on Wednesday as he was speaking at Stanford University with former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Tillerson said the sanctions imposed on North Korea by the UN Security Council (UNSC) are forcing Pyongyang to send its residents out to fish in the winter time because of food shortages. The punitive measures took effect in December in response to a series of nuclear tests conducted by the reclusive country, further tightening restrictions on its energy supplies and the employment of North Korean workers overseas. “The Japanese… have had over a 100 North Korean fishing boats that have drifted into Japanese waters. Two-thirds of the people on those boats have died,” Tillerson said, citing the Japanese delegation that attended a conference in Vancouver, Canada, earlier this week.
Tillerson claimed that the fishermen who survived wanted Japanese officials to bring them back to North Korea after being found at sea. He added that the fishermen did not have enough fuel to make it back home. He was referring to the regular phenomenon of so-called ‘ghost ships’ from North Korea, which have become stranded on the Japanese coast for years. Last year, a record 104 such cases were reported by Japanese authorities, with some 30 fishermen found dead on arrival. Any survivors usually ask to be returned to their home country, and Japan obliges.
Former Secretary of State Rice talked in the interview about a rapprochement offered by North Korea, to South Korea, which Tillerson sees as an attempt by the north to drive a wedge between the US and its ally in the Korean peninsula. So why are dozens of dead North Koreans a good sign?
“Now they're onto the playbook that you know as well as anyone,” Tillerson said, while speaking to the former secretary about what he feels is an attempt by the north to trick other countries. "And the playbook is, okay, we're going to start our charm offensive to the rest of the world and let them see we're just normal people like everybody else.” “[The fishermen] are being sent in the wintertime to fish because there are food shortages. And they are being sent out to fish with inadequate fuel to get back. So we are getting a lot of evidence that these [sanctions] are really starting to hurt.”
As Tillerson touts US-drafted UN sanctions, residents of North Korea are also said to face a harsh fate if they try to escape the conditions they currently live under. Tillerson claims that the leadership in Pyongyang will be willing to negotiate in the face of starvation and fuel shortages. The same leadership that, according to some US officials, does not value the lives of ordinary North Koreans and has a record of enjoying lavish lifestyle as the county lost an estimated hundreds of thousands to the famine in the mid-1990s.
One North Korean man living in exile in South Korea, only known as “Lee,” told BBC Korean in late 2017 that his wife and 4-year-old son were among 10 people detained in China during a raid by Chinese officials in the early days of November, after they illegally escaped from North Korea. What will Pyongyang do now? Tillerson believes that, “The playbook is: OK, we’re going to start our charm offensive to the rest of the world and let them see we are just like normal people like everybody else. We are going to stir some sympathy. We are going to drive a wedge between South Korea and their allies.”
READ MORE: Rex Tillerson is ‘proud’ of US diplomacy, but should he be? But fear not. The US was assured by South Koreans they won’t allow themselves to think North Koreans are human beings that deserve sympathy.
Lee said he made pleas to Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump to save his family, but his attempts failed. “An extraordinary amount of time yesterday in the group discussion was hearing from Foreign Minister Kang [Kyung-wha] of South Korea about how they are not going to let that happen,” Tillerson said.
“At the moment I believe they are in a detention centre,” Lee said. “I heard that if you spent a month there you become extremely frail due to the lack of food. You lose all your weight because there's nothing to eat. You get 20 kernels of corn at best a day.” READ MORE: 'Reprehensible & racist': African states respond to Trump’s alleged 's***hole countries' comment
“I really can't express how I feel. The world feels like hell to me right now.” Well, one can give that to the diplomat: he’s not trying to sugarcoat this. Evidently, the Trump administration is fine discussing things in public the same as they do in private.
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