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North Korea: A Fight between Food and Nuke

Oishik writes, it is almost astounding to see that a state like North Korea can do so well in fields that need very high standards of technology and huge monetary investments and yet so poor in providing for its people basic freedoms and necessary elements of a livelihood

North Korea under the supervision of Kim Jong-un fired “unidentified short range projectiles” which the experts in the South Korean Universities believe are solid-fuel ballistic missiles that can neutralise the THAAD anti-missile system the US have deployed in South Korea. The summit in February between Trump and Un brings us to believe that these tests by the North Koreans were done to create some awareness in the Trump administration in order to renegotiate the denuclearisation deal and show a strong stance against the demands of the Americans. The act by the North resulted in one of the strongest statements made by the presidency of the South. They have gone onto to say that the North is continuously violating the inter-Korean Military Agreement and that they need them to stop military actions in order to bring peace in the Korean Peninsula.

The US has time and again failed to come to a consensus on the matter of the North Korean nuclear programme, but what have been persistent are Trump’s assurances that he will be able to bring Kim to the table and thaw out a deal for the security of the peninsula. Recently, as Japan PM Abe joined Trump in the White House, the pacific island nation not far from North Korea expressed concerns towards the growing military programme of the communist state. PM Abe said that they, “will respond together” with the United State against North Korea if denuclearisation talks do not take place.

Recently, the US Department of State launched a ‘soft attack’ on North Korea after the failure of the February summit expressing concerns of the human rights violations that have been taking place in the country. They have described political jails and the torture people with individual voices and their families have to face. They have even said that those who try to escape the regimes rule, are brought back, tortured or even killed by the military. On top of the human rights violations accusations, North Korea yet again faces criticism for not being able to provide for its people. The UN says that four out of ten people in North Korea are in chronic shortage of food and there is expected to be further drop in the per person ration provided because of the worst ever harvest the state has seen in the past ten years.

It is almost astounding to see that a state can do so well in fields that need very high standards of technology and huge monetary investments and yet so poor in providing for its people basic freedoms and necessary elements of a livelihood are taken away from the common man in North Korea at the cost of the regimes insecurities towards the arms race it thinks is happening in the region. In spite of the several assurances that the US has given to them, they have yet not come to consensus on a deal to relax sanctions on the state that the US has imposed in return of denuclearisation. On top of which Kim has retaliated by trying to strong arm talks by the recents tests. Putin also expressed that US intervention is highly unlikely to deescalate nuclear matters in the region. At this hour, there is no way for the world to exert pressure onto the North Koreans other than imposing all possible sanctions and embargoes on them, but honestly it is doing very little at the greater cost of humanity. What happens why the end of the year, which is by when Kim wants a new and improved deal from the US Secretary of State, will show new direction to the fate of the Korean people and the stability of the peninsula along with islands like Japan.

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One thought on “North Korea: A Fight between Food and Nuke

  1. Modira Banerjee says:

    Another well written as well as factual and informative article .. well done Oishik !

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