A UN snub: Two regimes in a tub
By Donald Kirk

LONDON - The magical mystery tour of a decrepit North Korean tub named the Kang Nam I around the rim of China and Southeast Asia exposes one of the more curious alliances of convenience in the international arms trade.

Whatever the Kang Nam is carrying, its destination looks like Myanmar, whose budding rapport with North Korea was rudely interrupted in October 1983 when three North Korean commandos planted a bomb in a plot to assassinate the South Korean president, General Chun Doo-hwan, on a state visit to Rangoon, now Yangon. Chun escaped, but 18 South Korean officials and three local citizens were killed. Myanmar and North Korea were not on speaking terms for years.

Such are the ironies of diplomacy, however, that Myanmar and

 

North Korea resolved to forget the past and become fast friends again when their leaders realized they had much in common. North Korea this week is raising the stakes, almost daring the US Navy to board the Kang Nam while claiming the US is looking for a pretext for "a second Korean war".

Pyongyang's party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, in a particularly pyrotechnic display of rhetoric, has promised "fiery showers of nuclear retaliation" in response to attack. The newspaper likened the meeting between US President Barack Obama and South Korea's President Lee Myung-bak in Washington on June 16 to "a disgusting kiss between master and servant".

Obama at the summit outraged North Korea by signing off on a joint statement affirming for the first time in writing the US commitment to a "nuclear umbrella" over the Korean peninsula. On Wednesday, renewing US sanctions on North Korea, he warned "the risk of the proliferation of weapons-usable fissile material on the Korean Peninsula constitutes a continuing unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States".

Against this background, North Korea is staging naval exercises off its east coast after warning shipping to stay away until July 10. The warning in turn suggests plans for more tests of mid- and short-range missiles, and another test of a long-range Taepodong-2 similar to the one that flew on a 3,200-kilometer trajectory toward Hawaii on April 5.

The Kang Nam sailed out of the port of Nampo on North Korea's west coast and a senior US defense official told the Associated Press on Wednesday that it had already cleared the Taiwan Strait. The voyage might not have created such consternation were it not for rising tensions in which the North has said that stopping one of its vessels would be a "declaration of war" to which it would respond militarily.

In that context, the voyage of the Kang Nam challenges two American-led efforts to stifle nuclear proliferation.

The first is the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), a US-inspired program under which 15 or 16 "core" countries have the theoretical power to stop and board ships on the high seas to see if they're carrying weapons of mass destruction, components or the missiles with which to fire them. PSI also includes scores of observer members who cooperate to the extent of sharing information.

The second revolves around the United Nations Security Council resolutions to which North Korea objects mightily. These resolutions, adopted after North Korea's first nuclear test in October 2006, and again after the second nuclear test on May 25, provide "sanctions" to halt such shipments, to stop the export to North Korea of critical products, including arms, and to cut off international financial transactions in support of such business.

The temptation to check out what's on the Kang Nam is almost palpable considering the tantalizing questions that only a search would answer. A look at its cargo would provide insights into a relationship that supports the military aims of two of Asia's most sordid dictatorships, bonded in hostility and distrust of the outside world and suppression of foes at home.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's "military first" policy far surpasses in intensity the kinship that South Korea's Chun Doo-hwan had hoped to cultivate with Myanmar's military leaders before setting forth on his ill-fated expedition in 1983.

North Korea and Myanmar not only adhere to military rule but also entertain nuclear ambitions that South Korea has sublimated while allied with the US.

By the time North Korea and Myanmar opened ties in April 2007, North Korea was a nuclear power, Myanmar aspired to become one, and Pyongyang was providing Myanmar with arms, ammunition, missiles - and nuclear expertise.

Myanmar technicians were going to North Korea for training while Myanmar served as a useful transhipment point for North Korean military cargo on the way to clients in the Middle East by air as well as sea. In that context, the voyage of the Kang Nam raises the deepest suspicions.

"The suggestion that it is carrying missile equipment to Burma [Myanmar] ring true," said Mark Fitzpatrick, senior fellow for non-proliferation with the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. Fitzpatrick, a former US State Department official, cited "the recent uptake in sightings of North Koreans in Burma" as well as "NK-Burma missile discussions" confirmed around four years ago.

"Much of the chatter in Burmese emigre circles has to do with rumors of NK nuclear cooperation with Burma," he said in e-mailed response to questions.

How much credence to give such talk, however, is another matter. "A nuclear connection is certainly conceivable," said Fitzpatrick, "but a missile connection is more likely." Then again, he noted, it was always possible "the ship is sending conventional arms or tunneling equipment to Burma".

In fact, tunneling is one field in which North Korea has developed a high level of expertise. North Korean engineering is responsible for digging tunnels under the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea, for excavating numerous tunnels on roads through mountainous regions elsewhere and for digging deep excavations in which to hide arms and ammunition and conduct nuclear tests. North Korea in recent years is known to have shared tunneling equipment and expertise with Myanmar and other client states. (Please see Myanmar and North Korea share a tunnel vision, Asia Times Online, July 19, 2006.)

But when and how will intelligence analysts discover what the Kang Nam, with a dead weight of just 2,035 tons, is carrying? The load is less than massive, but the ship will still have to refuel before getting to Myanmar. Therein lies the best, if not the only hope, for fathoming the mystery of what's on board.

"With regard to the route, it stands to reason that the vessel would have to call in one or more ports along the way," said Fitzpatrick, adding that "Singapore is a natural port of call" and "it would be far easier to demand an inspection once the vessel is in a port." If the captain were to refuse, Fitzpatrick noted, "the port can refuse services, or impose restrictions based on customs or other regulations."

Until then, it appears quite unlikely that the American destroyer USS John McCain, tailing the Kang Nam, will not do much more than log its every move while looking for clues to its mission and cargo as US Navy planes patrol the area.

The McCain is an Aegis-class vessel equipped with the latest missiles and technology for spotting and firing on targets. Still, all that weaponry will be for naught in the cat-and-mouse game of tracking an aging vessel that can travel at far less than half the speed of the McCain and has no weaponry other than whatever small arms its crew is carrying.

The greatest deterrent to stopping and boarding the vessel undoubtedly is the reluctance of China to support an incident that could add to the sense of crisis hanging over the Korean Peninsula. China's Foreign Ministry has come up with a rationale that shows how little the UN sanctions really mean in a crunch.

Professing support for the Security Council resolution, a spokesman observed that "ship inspections should be enforced according to relevant international and domestic law" with "ample evidence and proper cause" - meaning, not at all.

Such verbiage will not diminish concerns that the Kang Nam's cargo may not be for Myanmar at all but for the Middle East, possibly Iran or Syria.

North Korean planes are believed to have carried critical cargo to the Middle East via Russia and possibly China and Pakistan, but new UN sanctions, and US pressure, may make those options more difficult. Myanmar seems willing to provide the facilities for offloading cargo from ships and loading it onto planes bound elsewhere.

PSI scored its only real success in 2008, when India refused to grant overflight rights to a North Korean Ilyushin transport plane that was about to take off from Mandalay for Iran with components for missiles. That success was all the more notable considering that India is not a core PSI member.

Under the circumstances, it's hard to take seriously Myanmar's claim of no knowledge of a plan for the Kang Nam to go there. Then again, it's possible the fuss is for nothing. When the Kang Nam docked three years ago in Hong Kong, an inspection revealed nothing on board. The failed search raised the question, what was it going to pick up and bring back to North Korea?

Journalist Donald Kirk has been covering Korea - and the confrontation of forces in Northeast Asia - for more than 30 years.

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