North Korean leader, in rare address, seeks end to confrontation with South

SEOUL | Mon Dec 31, 2012 (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called for an end to confrontation between the two Koreas, technically still at war in the absence of a peace treaty to end their 1950-53 conflict, in a surprise New Year speech broadcast on state media.

The address by Kim, who took over power in the reclusive state after his father, Kim Jong-il, died in 2011, appeared to take the place of the policy-setting New Year editorial published in leading state newspapers.

Impoverished North Korea raised tensions in the region by launching a long-range rocket in December that it said was aimed at putting a scientific satellite in orbit, drawing international condemnation.

North Korea, which considers North and South as one country, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, is banned from testing missile or nuclear technology under U.N. sanctions imposed after its 2006 and 2009 nuclear weapons tests.

"An important issue in putting an end to the division of the country and achieving its reunification is to remove confrontation between the north and the south," Kim said in the address that appeared to be pre-recorded and was made at an undisclosed location.

"The past records of inter-Korean relations show that confrontation between fellow countrymen leads to nothing but war."

The New Year address was the first in 19 years by a North Korean leader after the death of Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-un's grandfather. Kim Jong-il rarely spoke in public and disclosed his national policy agenda in editorials in state newspapers. More

 

UK High Court rejects inquiry into British role in Pakistan drone strikes

On December 21, the High Court in London rejected a request for a judicial inquiry into the alleged role of the UK’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) spying operation in aiding drone strikes by the US in Pakistan’s northwest region.

The case was brought by Noor Khan, a Pakistani man whose father was killed, along with 49 other people, by a US drone attack on March 17, 2011. Khan’s father, Malik Daud Khan, was chairing a peaceful jirga (tribal assembly) meeting to discuss chromite mining rights in North Waziristan when he was killed by several missile strikes.

In his legal submission, Khan asked the court to look into whether UK intelligence officials provided assistance in the killing of his father and if they are liable for prosecution under British law.

The revealing 15-page ruling by Lord Justice Moses and supported by Mr Justice Simon came down blatantly in favour of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. In essence, it serves as the legal justification for ensuring that the UK’s role in assisting the US to carry out its murderous drone operations never sees the light of day. As with every ruling designed to conceal the nefarious and illegal activities of the ruling elite, it is cloaked in the guise that to require the UK government to reveal such information would jeopardise “national security”.

Citing evidence given to the court from the Foreign Office, the ruling states “that if the Secretary of State were required to make a substantive response to the claim, the likely consequence would be serious harm to national security and international relations. The United Kingdom Government would be compelled to express a definitive view on legal issues, complicating and damaging relations with our most important bilateral ally and, in consequence, damaging the United Kingdom’s security.”

The ruling refused permission for Khan’s claim, stating that “the real aim and target of these proceedings is not to inform GCHQ employees that if they were prosecuted, no defence of combatant immunity would be available. The real aim is to persuade this court to make a public pronouncement designed to condemn the activities of the United States in North Waziristan, as a step in persuading them to halt such activity.”

The ruling also took note of legal proceedings that Khan has undertaken in Pakistan, in order to reiterate that under no conditions would the UK High Court make a ruling condemning the drone attacks or the GCHQ’s alleged role in these. Referring to Khan’s plea to the Court in Peshawar, Moses writes, “[H]e contends that the Government of Pakistan, and various Ministries, are under a constitutional obligation to take all necessary action to stop ‘illegal drone strikes’ and ‘safeguard its citizens from target killing by an external force’. He pleads that ‘the act of killing of innocent people on March 17 2011 was extra-judicial killing, more generally referred to as murder’. The prayer refers to criminal offences by those inside and outside Pakistan in drone operations.” More

 

Living under drones

http://www.warcosts.com
Since 2004, up to 884 innocent civilians, including at least 176 children, have died from US drone strikes in the North Waziristan region of Pakistan. A new report from the Stanford and New York University law schools finds drone use has caused widespread post-tramatic stress disorder and an overall breakdown of functional society in North Waziristan. In addition, the report finds the use of a "double tap" procedure, in which a drone strikes once and strikes again not long after, has led to deaths of rescuers and medical professionals. Many interviewees told the researchers they didn't know what America was before drones. Now what they know of America is drones, death and terror. Follow the conversation @WarCosts #UnderDrones


 

Living under drones

http://www.warcosts.com
Since 2004, up to 884 innocent civilians, including at least 176 children, have died from US drone strikes in the North Waziristan region of Pakistan. A new report from the Stanford and New York University law schools finds drone use has caused widespread post-tramatic stress disorder and an overall breakdown of functional society in North Waziristan. In addition, the report finds the use of a "double tap" procedure, in which a drone strikes once and strikes again not long after, has led to deaths of rescuers and medical professionals. Many interviewees told the researchers they didn't know what America was before drones. Now what they know of America is drones, death and terror. Follow the conversation @WarCosts #UnderDrones

Obama and the Kurdish Question: Drones Are Not the Answer

The role of the Obama administration in suppressing the long-running Kurdish uprising in Turkey is largely unknown.

But a few weeks ago a U.S. diplomat dropped an intriguing clue. Francis J. Ricciardone, Jr., Obama's ambassador to Turkey, revealed that the U.S. had secretly offered Turkey what was, in effect, a bin Laden-style assassination of the top leadership of the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party), the rebels who have been fighting the U.S.-equipped Turkish army since 1984.

"Your enemies are our enemies," Ricciardone told Turkish reporters at a news conference in Ankara. "The power of the multidisciplinary approach is what got bin Laden in the end, and we would like to share that and exploit that intimately."

When I heard the ambassador's remarks, I had just left Syria, where a different Kurdish group is struggling for its own autonomy. I was en route at the time to Mt. Qandhil, one of the highest mountains in neighboring Iraq, where PKK rebels have a sanctuary. I was seeking reaction to news that Turkey was quietly negotiating with Abdullah Ocalan, the notorious PKK founder who was captured in 1999 with U.S. assistance, and who since then, has become a cause célèbre with many Kurds in the Middle East.

The 28-year-old Kurdish uprising in Turkey has resulted in 40,000 deaths, most of them Kurds. The U.S. considers the PKK a terrorist group, but experts say both the rebels and Turkish troops have committed human rights abuses. Today, the struggle goes beyond military conflict. Since 2009, some 8,000 Kurdish civilians have been arrested in Turkey. That includes lawyers and at least 100 journalists -- more than in Iran or China.

This fall, some 700-1,000 prisoners went on hunger strike in Turkey, demanding that Ocalan be removed from solitary confinement and that Kurds receive broadcasting rights, education in their native tongue and ethnic recognition in the Turkish constitution. Turkey claims that most of the prisoners have ties to the PKK, but according to Human Rights Watch, many Kurds were arrested in a "crackdown on legal pro-Kurdish politics."

Against this backdrop came Ambassador Ricciardone's startling disclosure: the administration's misguided proposal to target the Kurdish rebel leadership. In fact, the PKK is not al-Qaeda, nor has it targeted Americans -- and Turkey wisely rejected the U.S. offer. "Bin Laden was caught in a house," Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan sought to explain diplomatically, "but the struggle here is in mountainous geography."

After rebuffing the assassination proposal, Turkey successfully negotiated an end to the vexing hunger strike, which had garnered considerable support in southeast Turkey, where most of the country's 15 million Kurds reside. Had the cockamamie scheme succeeded, the killings would likely have turned Kurdish public opinion against the U.S. and given the rebels a powerful recruiting tool. More

 

PhD in energy security at Central European University

Central European University (CEU, www.ceu.hu) welcomes applicants for a PhD position in the area of energy security and future energy systems.

A successful candidate will work under the supervision of Prof. Aleh Cherp to pursue the Doctor of Philosophy degree at the Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy.

The research agenda will be developed to match the candidate’s interests and capacities and to advance policy-relevant knowledge on present and future national and global energy security challenges including under sustainable energy transitions. It will built on the recently completed Global Energy Assessment, where Professor Cherp led the analysis of energy security. Of particular interests might be such topics as energy security assessments and policies, and the relationship between global energy scenarios and national energy realities. These issues may be studied with respect to entire energy systems or particular energy sectors.
CEU provides a full tuition waiver as well as a living stipend for all PhD students. Research and travel grants as well as support for a “study abroad” year are also provided to good doctoral students. In addition, many PhD students participate in international research projects with CEU faculty.

A candidate for this position must hold a Masters degree relevant to Energy or Environmental studies from a good university of international standing. He or she should have demonstrated academic excellence as well as passion for research and commitment to academic success. Good writing abilities as well as advanced computer and quantitative analytical skills are an advantage.

Central European University is an English-language graduate institution founded by George Soros in 1991. It is accredited in both the United States and Hungary, and offers English-language Master's and doctoral programs. Located in the heart of Central Europe -- Budapest, Hungary -- CEU has developed a distinct academic and intellectual focus, combining the comparative study of the region's historical, cultural, and social contexts with a global perspective on good governance, sustainable development and social transformation. As part of its educational, research, and civic engagement activities, CEU attaches particular importance to scholarship relevant to public policy.

Inquiries about the position can be made to Prof Cherp while applications can be submitted online (http://www.ceu.hu/admissions/apply) by January 24th, 2013.
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Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan Was Not a Grand Design

Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan Was Not a Grand Design But a Grand Entanglement Resulting from Faulty Intelligence, Excessive Secrecy, and a Paralyzed Leadership, According to Conference of Former Decision-Makers

Proceedings from 1995 Conference Reveal Soviet Motivations and U.S. Internal Reactions to Soviet Move

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 409
Posted - December 21, 2012

Edited by Malcolm Byrne and Svetlana Savranskaya

For more information contact:
202/994-7000 or nsarchiv@gwu.edu

http://www.nsarchive.org

Washington, D.C., December 12, 2012 -- On December 12, 1979, the Soviet Politburo gathered to formally approve the decision made several days earlier to send a "limited contingent" of Soviet forces into Afghanistan. The secrecy was so tight that the leadership hand-wrote the authorization document in one copy and hand-carried it to each Politburo member for signature. The order does not even mention Afghanistan by name and uses cryptic language to entrust Andropov, Ustinov and Gromyko to oversee the implementation of the decision. The Yeltsin government declassified the one-page record in 1992 as part of a body of evidence for use at the upcoming trial of the Communist Party.

Ever since December 1979, the war has continued to ravage the country, and scholars and politicians continue to try to come to grips with what went wrong at each stage. Today, the National Security Archive publishes materials from the final conference of the Carter-Brezhnev Project, hosted by the Norwegian Nobel Institute at the Lysebu conference center outside Oslo, a meeting that produced major insights into Soviet decision-making on the eve of the invasion and the U.S. response to it.

According to the full transcript of the Lysebu sessions, the Soviets were concerned with Afghan leader Hafizullah Amin's perceived turn to the West, his ruthless purges of opponents in the Afghan communist party and government, and the possibility of a U.S. grand plan for the Middle East reaching to the Soviets' southern borders. The Kremlin reluctantly approved a limited invasion plan only after a strong push from Yuri Andropov's KGB intending to bring Amin rival Babrak Karmal to power, help secure his regime for its first months in power, and then leave the country. The Politburo's intelligence was badly flawed, however, exaggerating both the danger of U.S. interference and the ease of changing the regime. (For more Soviet documents and analysis, see the Archive's Russian page, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/rus/Afganistan.html)

Check out today's posting at the National Security Archive website -http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB409/

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