“Of course, we heard a lot of rhetoric like the Republic [North Korea] ‘secured satisfactory compensation from the international community’ and ‘we agreed to give it up because we love peace, not because we were afraid of their threats,’” said two businessmen who had been to Hyesan, Yanggan Province.
But the broadcasts also included a couple of "very interesting remarks," they said.
Radio 3 announced that the facilities to be closed down were out dated anyway. Even after the facilities were gone, the technology would remain, and similar sites could be rebuilt at any time.
The businessmen said Radio 3 also announced that the North Koreans ‘were no aggressors, but needed the nuclear capability to safeguard the nation against aggressors’ and boasted that they already had weapons that would astonish the world.
North Korea experts in Seoul dismissed the remarks as propaganda to shape North Korean perceptions of the changing circumstances.
“After all, the people had been told that nuclear weapons alone could guarantee their system against outside influence. They needed to develop new indoctrination to prevent the people from being shaken,” said Kim Yong-Hyon, a professor of North Korean Studies at Dongguk University in Seoul.
Senior researcher Paik Hak-Soon at the Sejong Institute said: “Those messages are for internal purpose and are not meant for the outside world.”
However, a researcher at the government Korea Institute for National Unification (KINU) think tank said the reference to new weapons could refer to biochemical weapons that are under development.
The researcher predicted that “Pyongyang would now concentrate on developing long-range missiles capable of reaching America with the biochemical warheads.”
