Kim’s Triumph

137

August 9, 2009

Published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
(Germany) on 5 August 2009
by Peter Sturm (link to original link to original)

Translated from by Albert Minnick. Edited by Robin Silberman.

Taking hostages does pay off. North Korea detained two female American journalists, who supposedly crossed the Chinese–North Korean border illegally. The sentence of 12 years in a labor camp was, from the beginning, believed to be a signal to Washington.

It was clear that America would not allow them to rot in North Korea. That Pyongyang was successful in forcing the political price up so high for the release of the journalists can certainly be called a triumph for Kim Jong-Il.

Bill Clinton is certainly considered to officially be a prominent private citizen. But the mere fact that he had to concoct a canard about carrying a message from President Obama to Kim Jong-Il shows that the superpower had allowed itself to be blackmailed by the small country.

That is why it makes little sense that Washington is pushing North Korea for a return to negotiations on its nuclear program. Pyongyang will never give up the one thing it can boast of in negotiations. And hostages do not show up on the border every day.

Nordkorea

Kims Erfolg

Geiselnahme lohnt sich. Nordkorea hält zwei amerikanische Journalistinnen fest. Diese sollen illegal die chinesisch-nordkoreanische Grenze überschritten haben. Das Urteil, zwölf Jahre Arbeitslager, war von Anfang an als Signal an Washington gedacht.

Dass Amerika die beiden nicht in Nordkorea „versauern“ lassen würde, war klar. Dass es Pjöngjang gelungen ist, den politischen Preis für die Freilassung der Journalistinnen so weit
in die Höhe zu treiben, darf man getrost als Erfolg Kim Jong-ils bezeichnen.

Zwar ist Bill Clinton offiziell lediglich ein angesehener Privatmann. Aber allein die Tatsache, dass er von Kim Jong-il durch die Falschmeldung, er habe eine Botschaft Präsident Obamas
überbracht, vorgeführt wird, zeigt, dass die Supermacht sich von dem Kleinstaat hat erpressen lassen.

Deshalb hat es auch wenig Sinn, wenn Washington in Nordkorea für eine Rückkehr zu den Verhandlungen über das nordkoreanische Atomprogramm wirbt. Pjöngjang wird das einzige, womit es in Verhandlungen auftrumpfen kann, nie aufgeben. Und Geiseln finden sich auch nicht jeden Tag an der Grenze ein.

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