When North Korea is eventually opened up – when 200,000 people are released from a single gulag – the effect on world opinion will be like the opening of the gates of Auschwitz. We will ask in agonised introspection how we could have stood by and done nothing while this level of suffering was inflicted on our fellow human beings. Any decision today to stand by while the people of North Korea are butchered, battered and starved will be – to coin a phrase – Not in My Name
Johann Hari makes the case for invading and liberating North Korea – should make for an interesting letters page in the Independent on Saturday.
Of course the case for action is unanswerable from a strictly human rights/liberation point of view – human rights abuses in North Korea are Saddam+Milosevic x100. Morally the case is there but of course it comes down to military/political considerations. I am sceptical about whether the US would be prepared for this, for reasons Hari himself outlines in his piece. But the North Korean regime itself appears more willing to believe an attack could be on the cards.
“The Iraqi war teaches a lesson that in order to prevent a war and defend the security of a country and the sovereignty of a nation it is necessary to have a powerful physical deterrent force only,” an unnamed spokesman told North Korea’s official news agency, KCNA. See North Korea ‘reprocessing nuclear fuel’
