NightWatch

For the Night of 3 September 2009

North Korea: The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) broadcast on Friday, 4 September, it was in the final stage of enriching uranium, as part of a letter sent on 3 September to the president of the United Nations Security Council concerning sanctions. NightWatch publishes the text of the North Korean letter as published by KCNA.

"We are prepared for both sanctions and dialogue."

“The permanent representative of the DPRK to the United Nations sent a letter to the president of the UN Security Council Thursday.

Noting that he would like to bring the attention of the president to the DPRK's already stated principled stand and countermeasures in connection with a letter addressed to the DPRK by the so-called "Sanctions Committee" of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) requesting a clarification, he continued: The DPRK totally rejects the UNSC "Resolution 1874" which was unfairly orchestrated in June 13 in wanton violation of the DPRK's sovereignty and dignity and that the DPRK will never be bound by this resolution.”

”We do not feel, therefore, any need to respond to the request made by the UNSC ‘committee’.”

”Had the UNSC, from the very beginning, not made an issue of the DPRK's peaceful satellite launch in the same way as it kept silent over the satellite launch conducted by South Korea on August 25, 2009, it would not have compelled the DPRK to take strong counteraction such as its 2nd nuclear test.”

”It is all fair and square to find that the DPRK took its steps of action to cope with the high-handed act and threat which are aimed at depriving the DPRK of its rights to peaceful economic construction.”

”It would be a miscalculation if the UNSC, rather than apologizing for violating the legitimate right of a member state of the UN, thought that we would recognize the ‘sanctions resolution’ which was framed up in the same way as the thief turning on the victim with a club over the DPRK's self-defensive steps.”

”We have never objected to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and of the world itself. What we objected to is the structure of the six way talks which had been used to violate outrageously the DPRK's sovereignty and its right to peaceful development.”

”The denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula is closely related with the U.S. “

”The DPRK has already made clear its countermeasures to cope with sanctions as well.”

”Reprocessing of spent fuel rods is at its final phase and extracted plutonium is being weaponized. Experimental uranium enrichment has successfully been conducted to enter into completion phase.”

”We are prepared for both dialogue and sanctions. If some permanent members of the UNSC wish to put sanctions first before dialogue, we would respond with bolstering our nuclear deterrence first before we meet them in a dialogue.”

”If the UNSC only continues this standoff without making a proper judgment of which path is more favorable for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and of the world, the DPRK will be left with no choice but to take yet stronger self-defensive countermeasures as it had already warned.”

Comment: The NightWatch view is that the North would provide the International Community and the US a month long window of opportunity in which to gauge reaction to its conciliatory steps and decide its next steps. A month ago on 4 August the North began its outreach campaign by releasing the two US journalists.

On 4 September it announced its success in reprocessing uranium, thereby creating a second path for producing fissile material for nuclear weapons.

Today’s announcement does not contain indicators that the North has created an industrial path for enriching uranium, only that it has tested the path as a physics research experiment. The message is that the North has mastered the basic technology of uranium enrichment in a laboratory setting in addition to possessing the industrial technology to reprocess plutonium, which is already established.

Politically, the physics achievement is apparently meant to be a reminder of the North’s weapons potential. The North also conveyed its disappointment over the lack of criticism of South Korea for launching a space rocket, compared to the outrage at the North’s purported attempt at launching a satellite. This part of the North Korean letter is relatively benign, probably because the South Koreans had no more success in orbiting a satellite than the North Koreans.

The most worrisome part of the letter is the announcement about reprocessing plutonium into weapons, if that is true.

The last several paragraphs contain the more promising messages. They signify that the Pyongyang leaders remain open to dialogue, including discussions about denuclearization, without disclosing the terms of such talks.

The timing of the UNSC letter relative to the release of the US journalists evidences the North is following its crisis management procedures, which feature precise time horizons for US responses. Today’s letter is a reminder the 30-day period has closed, but the second 14-day period remains open in which the North expects to receive a response to its conciliatory gestures. The window for US-North Korean engagement remains open for a while yet.

If the past is prologue, the following period will be a week long final opportunity for a reciprocal US response. If the North fails to receive such a response, it will recycle the path of coercive tactics for bilateral talks.

China: Residents of Urumqi, in western China, told The Associated Press on 3 September that hundreds -- possibly thousands -- of ethnic Han people gathered near the city center to protest deteriorating public safety conditions and to denounce the regional government.

Police ordered residents to remain indoors, as Urumqi was the scene of riots by ethnic Uighurs in July in which nearly 200 people were killed, and ethnic tensions have remained high since then. One protester said riot police were blocking a large crowd of demonstrators from marching on the People’s Square in the city center, and that some of the marchers had been beaten.

Demonstrators shouting “The government is useless” and other slogans called for the regional Communist Party boss, Wang Lequan -- a hardliner allied with President Hu Jintao -- to be sacked.

The latest unrest prompted police to order residents of Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang Province, to remain indoors, Agence France-Presse reported 3 September.

Comment: Unrest by the Han Chinese is much more dangerous to the communist administration than unrest by the Uighurs in western China. The Han expect the Beijing authorities to protect them. A perception of government failure in Urumqi threatens to spread to the heartland of the Han in central China, where land use and other economic complaints have fed simmering discontent in the past year.

If the core Chinese populace in Urumqi ever became convinced the communist party could not satisfy the wants and needs of the Han Chinese, they would be prone to embark on a program of vigilante reprisals against the Uighurs, which would threaten to undermine stability in western China. This would require Han Chinese security forces to use force against Han Chinese vigilantes. The outcome of such confrontations is difficult to predict and is likely to be greater than the Beijing communists are willing to risk.

Unrest by the Han Chinese, the national majority ethnic group, is much more dangerous to the communist regime in Beijing than any threat the Uighurs could ever manage to pose. The Beijing government, regardless of its ideology, is supposed to protect the Han people from the Uighurs and the many other anti-Han minorities in the frontier areas.

Once Han passions are released, the outcome in history has been revolution, by which NightWatch means change of government system. The communists are not likely to allow that possibility to take root. That means they will crack down hard on unrest in Urumqi, as an object lesson to all others, if nothing else.

Iran: President Ahmadi-Nejad said 3 September that Iran welcomes sanctions and that "no one can impose sanctions on Iran anymore," Reuters reported. He added that his country has given global powers its proposed package in reference to talks on Iran's nuclear program.

In the meantime, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said that Iran would talk to the world powers about other issues but would not talk about its nuclear program. Soltanieh said the Iranian nuclear issue could be examined only by the IAEA.

Ahmadi-Nejad’s defiance might play well in Tehran, but it is short-sighted and foolhardy in the context of the community of states. Should the community of states impose and enforce sanctions on Iran as it did against North Vietnam almost 35 years ago, Iran would become an anachronism, frozen in time, just as northern Vietnam became between 1975 and 1992. Sanctions work, when they are enforced.

Ahmadi-Nejad’s bravado is worthy of disregard by serious analysts. Iran cannot survive many more sanctions, regardless of Russian and other outside backing.

Saudi Arabia - Russia: Update. The two nations have been engaged in military-technical cooperation talks, including the possibility of Saudi Arabia buying Russian-made military equipment, Russian daily Kommersant reported 3 September, citing a spokesman for Russia's Foreign Ministry.

This is the second press statement about these negotiations, about which the Saudis have been much more taciturn than the Russians. Retooling the Saudi air force to accommodate Russian aircraft just does not seem practical at this time.

Honduras: The US Department of State announced in an official statement 3 September that the US has terminated a broad range of foreign aid to Honduras. The statement said aid will be restored when "democratic, constitutional" governance is returned to Honduras, and that several individuals and supporters of the current regime have been identified and will have their visas revoked.

Aid had been suspended following the 28 June action that ousted Manuel Zelaya. The statement also said that the US would not support the result of the planned November presidential election unless a settlement between Zelaya and the current regime is reached. This is a study in democracy as understood in the US State Department.

End of NightWatch for 3 September.