Special to WorldTribune.com By Lee Jong-Heon, EastAsiaIntel.com Cash-strapped North Korea has unilaterally granted a raise to its workers employed by South Korean companies at the inter-Korean joint industrial complex. The wages paid its workers is actually a major hard currency revenue stream for the North Korean regime. South Korean firms pay the wages in U.S. […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Lee Jong-Heon, EastAsiaIntel.com SEOUL — China has decided to improve its strained ties with North Korea, which has been moving closer to Russia. China has recently set up three principles in dealing with the North: improvement in bilateral ties, resumption of economic aid and increased involvement with local provinces rather than […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Beijing’s success in luring a number of key American allies to join the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has illustrated yet again Washington’s apparent failure to rein in the Xi Jinping administration’s ambitious plans to gradually displace the United States as the sole arbiter of global norms in […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Lee Jong-Heon, EastAsiaIntel.com SEOUL — North Korea’s youthful leader Kim Jong-Un is believed to have suspended the Presidium of the Politburo, the highest-ranking body in the Workers’ Party, officials and sources here say. The Presidium has long consisted three or four members — from the Party, the state, the military and […]
Special to WorldTribune.com EastAsiaIntel.com SEOUL — North Korea’s description of a South Korean man’s attack on the U.S. ambassador to Seoul as “deserved punishment” indicates Pyongyang’s unwillingness to improve ties with Washington, a government source said. In a shocking attack on March 5, U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Mark Lippert was slashed on his face […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com While Premier Li Keqiang got 45 rounds of applause as he read out the annual Government Work Report at the opening of the National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s legislature, on March 5, there is no mistaking that the “Chinese economic miracle” is coming to an end. Li’s report […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Lee Jong-Heon, EastAsiaIntel.com SEOUL — North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un convened an unusual series of meetings of senior Party and military leaders, officials here said. Pyongyang held an expanded meeting of the Central Military Commission of the Workers’ Party on Feb. 22, presided over by Kim Jong-Un who rules the country […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Willy Lam is away for New Years celebrations. The world’s largest military has not considered bodyweight as a factor for promotion — that is until now. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s departments of General Staff, General Logistics and General Armaments jointly issued a new directive on reforming military […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Lee Jong-Heon, EastAsiaIntel.com SEOUL — China sharply increased jet fuel supplies to North Korea late last year, after sharply reducing shipments for the past two years. Sources here said the surge in supplies has led to a sharp increase in the North’s air force exercises. China which had exported tens of […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Even as President Xi Jinping’s closest advisers are preparing for his first official state visit to the United States this September, influential members of China’s foreign-policy establishment have argued that the country’s relationship with its neighbors outweighs that with the world’s only superpower. The official Chinese press is […]