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tv   Inside Story  Al Jazeera  January 18, 2024 5:30pm-6:01pm AST

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to see these really moving from pieces of imagery to wake up on heard voices for 2 people in this row are sitting up against the door right now. i want to be one of them. connect with our community and talking to conversations you will find elsewhere. he's healthy human noises. that is all i want to go and see, you know, as if you were to happen to next to the stream on out to 0, a dramatic shift by north korea. it's tearing off its goal of unification with the south. a policy in place for decades, north korea's leader kim jong and also said his country doesn't want more, but well to avoid one ava. so what's behind his surprised move? this is inside story, the
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hello welcome to the program. i'm adrian said again. it's been said by diplomats and political figures to expect the unexpected from north korea, but even by that measure of the keynote speech this week by supreme leader kim jong own has come a. something of a shock. gone is the north cornerstone principle of seeking unification with the south. that's long been positive adults constitution, which has now to be changed in refining its freight and tends ties with. so if you don't, gang says that south korea will now be classed as a principal enemy. so what does this change mean in a region bristling with weaponry of ministry activity, including from the us in china. abrupt changes in policy by a secretive and isolated country with nuclear weapons will always be a concern. but this is just another attempt by north korea to e, count concessions from the west and relieve sanctions. or is it a dangerous ton for the was? and why the utah now? we'll be discussing hold of this with a guest in just
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a few moments. but 1st let's get a report from image and kim. a significant change on the korean peninsula. north korea's leda. accuse of sol pushing for regime change in his country and says unification with the site is no longer possible for the 2 months. we do not want water. would we also have no intention of avoiding him? we will defend our sovereignty, the security of the people, and right into existence. the warble, terribly destroy the entity called the republic of korea and put an end to its existence. and it will inflict an unimaginably crushing defeat upon the us. long ago times were almost the great between general and i knew the head of the communist delegation and the roles inside korea been in a so called frozen conflict, since the green, who ended in 1953, but no peace treaty was sewing. so technically, they also didn't rule a truce has been signed. the news is maintained detroit for unification. go that
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was written in the constitution, but in a nice meant on state television, kim jones says that's to be changed to me. j unit talked if it is right to specify in the relevant paragraph of our constitution, the education should be intensified to instill into all people the family dia, that the republicans career is the primary phone and invariable principal enemy? sure, sure. i think that's one of the things we do. 3 governmental agencies dedicated to unification of to be scrapped and what's known as the ultra for unification in p on young, constructed by kim joel ins. folder is to be knocked down. south korea sees this historic change is a threat for con goodwin number one good or north korean authorities define south and north korea as to hostile countries, not the same race countries. the shows the north korean regime admit since a group that stands against history and its own people. tensions on the peninsula have been increasing for years,
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particularly since 2019. when you can at diplomacy between kim and and us presidents, donald trump, that's on the policy. and they wasn't in the last few months. most recently, north korea launched themselves near the border with south korea and carried out military exercises. a look at me will you tell us, and then for coming from the perspectives of south korea and to the united states. there were concerns about most for his ability to rapidly deploy massage and protect us and south korean major bases and talk to us. especially as there is a clear challenge intercepting a hypotonic missile, as it has the capability of evasion, flights and low altitude competitive traditional ballistic missiles. a side career says it's minute treat is capable of an overwhelming response. since skim speech north korea's foreign minister has met russian president vladimir putin in what's believed to have been a push to agree on arms cooperation between peeling young and most go on to deep and toys between the 2 countries. so unless say north korea is
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skilled in increasing tensions as negotiating to, to extract concessions. the rest of the world can keep guessing whether the policy shift is more theoretical issue or want to be alarmed by image and came out to 0, the inside story. so let's go deep into the significance and implication of trim and kim's apparent shift back to a wolf 14 by declaring self career. it's and then me will bring in a guess now from evanston in the us, we're joined by a g young hub. and uh, she is a korean historian, a board member of the piece campaign women across the mc from. so we're joined by charlotte typically who's a professor at cooper and university of the north korean army history structure and daily life. and from paging, ida turned good political and economic affairs specialist and city
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a fellow at the time how institute, welcome to you. well, let's go straight to so the stop feel how dangerous a moment is this for the korean peninsula. and how consensus should the rest of us be? oh, i mean see, it's particularly dangerous. it doesn't seem that say it's something we shouldn't need to pull a, i will say my explanation. the kitchen is probably better and better, less than q as in kind of odious a bad. but then it goes by somebody to something which knows. grill is task. okay, on the time going to agree with that has, can made a strategic decision to go to will, you know, i doubt that. i mean, if it were so busy, sometimes trying to read tea leaves, so bottom, the deep yard k, which we can see, we don't pay attention to the obvious. i mean, here's a man who's taking his daughter to work with him. you generally don't take your daughter to work. if you're planning armageddon. he's also been carefully choreographed doing everything and just making sure that he's in essence going to
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trade reunification for peace in the end. because he wants to establish north korea as a separate entity and make sure that his blood line is able to succeed him. so at this point, there was never a real pathway for korean reunification for the kim family because they were not going to be able to rule a north and south korea that was united. so this seems fairly rational. i think a lot of the, the meeting of the drum is to try to get some 3rd party to indicate that they think the piece top should be had. and then um, a lot of this is just positioning in terms of a leverage t on a. do you agree with what i was saying of it took to what extent was, was kim's announcement, the, the oldest, inevitable culmination of use of building tension unprecedented though it was, how does it fit into, into a wide, a historical context?
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you know, i think it's important to remember that or to, to realize that north korea has always tried to engage the united states and to enter the broader global community. that engagement with united states represents. and along the way, it is done a number of different things, everythings from various kinds of a piece of mind and engagement to save around the way. right now it's in a really high sabre rattling phase. kim, john will never initiate war because he knows that initiate a war means war with the united states. and think about the broader context of where north cri is right now. it remains in, in nutritional crisis. where is people are malnourished to some degree or other? it remains an energy crisis where they don't have enough energy to produce space. a
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good is, you don't have enough energy to actually have it's military training. 247 the way the us military trains 247. north korea is in no condition to wage war. it doesn't want to wage war when it really wants is what is always wanted. engagement with the u. s. an entree into the broader global community. fair to say, who was the intended audience to think for kids, remarks? was it the u. s. o, or was it named? all sort of domestic audience. i mean, is, is the timing of kim's announcement, significant as well? i think it's uh, the domestic holdings. i'm there and i don't think it was an international statement. serious, the cna is full. the kitchen is calling us because of richmond. and is there a concept of communication about horses and mental was trapped because if the st best soft, reinstalled the same people, miss austin opened us people bill,
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stalls thinking well, a subdivision must reached a place of pre a place to be just you and his wife the south korea on south street that you can do to that is to say no, but asked me to know if my cost is evil. they cost, i don't my up and it makes boba's sense. the problem is just because it's every man, you know, it's crazy glen into the back of the screens, but most people, his house, okay, turn it off every emotion attached to this business. so i said it probably came to most people, the goals as a complete un office shock, because also can you go from uh, be upon based in traffic from a separate b u r n in napa. ida, do you agree with that? despite the hotline tone of uh, the germans remarks, um,
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does renewals actually want to engage to think, to what extent was they spend just attention grabbing last and a forcing a change in attitude from the us and south korea in particular as well. i, i don't know if that was the a, i don't think it was a achieved. this is not about us or south pre and attitudes. i agree with my colleague when he says, this is for the domestic audience, primarily. but keep in mind, you know, this issue about reunification was the stumbling block to any kind of peace treaty actually being docked because they couldn't figure out how it could. it could be done that would be acceptable to the kids in the family. so you remove that, you say they are the enemy, we're our own country. we're going to take care of our own. um, it's very easy. you can see quite clearly restoring and he's signaling to the international community as well. that he's ready to do something. remember this, and i agree with my other colleague in the united states. they are in dire economic
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circumstances. they were, economy has been shrinking. they do not have enough for, you know, to bounce a huge offensive or anything like that. all they have is their nuclear weapons, the threat of them. but if any, they were to use those on south korea, it would mean the obliteration of uptown, you know, and uh, probably a few other cities there. uh, it's just not a, uh, an acceptable viable option. if he gets real intent is to pass on his uh is uh, you know, powers to his shoulder g on a boat. okay. so, so we, we were getting to move it. we're beginning to get into to the reasons why a came gentleman may have made the remarks that he did, but it's not unusual for relations to blow hot and cold, but, but these remarks, well, unprecedented, went by and how will south korea reacts to them to thanks it was already we out to north,
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i'm from the moment that the new president used on the took office. he announced a foreign policy initiative and where she said that engagement with the north, we no longer be any kind of priority for the style. but rather a law, i mean with the us on global engagement goals would be the spouse priority. and what doc, city notes the north was, we no longer care about engaging with the north. so was getting to learn has come back with is, well if you don't care about engaging with us, we'll go one step further. we don't care about engaging with you, is that we're not going to care about unification a longer. and we're going to say that no, as we were doing the war, we are entities. so there's very much a game of, of the n t, but to a large extent, at least from the side of the north. it is a rhetorical, again, a more than it is a game,
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backed up by any kind of resources or ability to actually act filter as a hood and an image of the report at the beginning of the program. since kings remarks, north korea's foreign minister has been to moscow and, and met with russia's president, a lot of me, a pushing what, what are we to make about? well, i'm just saying this is probably just a preparatory meeting because the trash alternate isn't going to be honest to be a problem and i don't know the details of what has been broken beyond these. this problem is just to find out by multi edition port is going to create k a, j, and you won't be able to come in a yeah, you know what? i think the what has to think about what career, how is it historically move between china and russia, if you know, sticking to one or the other, depending on where we could find the advantage. right now for the right reasons, that's moving a little bit closer to russia and part of that has to do with the russian kind of
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needs north through a little bit more. and so therefore, north korea is going to be able to get stuff from russia. then it wants to have, i believe, the dust, what north korea as calculation is, is not really about actually, i'm agreeing with north korea, with russia as policy options are, you know, at russia status on any particular issues by not just wondering what they change have been consulted or warned about about what the controller was about to say. oh, i can assure you they were too. they were surprised at anybody. in fact, um they haven't said anything. there was a report in the south china morning post. but other than that, there has been incomplete silence by the domestic press. i have not been contacted about any shows what they want to do on this issue. they are, as usual, looking over the situation. i'm trying to figure out exactly what it means in terms
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of uh, my colleagues comments though. um improve. yeah, i agree improve relations with russia, but also declining us to generate, i mean, especially over currencies. you see countries going in different directions. this gives some of economic breathing space, or at least some lights at the end of a very dark tunnel up for north korea. they have substantial resources. they'd like to get them out if they can get them out to russia. and then through other meetings, they would be very happy to do that. so, you know, but neither has the us keep that in mind. there's been no reaction really from the us. it's been a number of days the closest they got to it. ready just a diplomatic message that they hadn't met with people in top 3 a day before yesterday and but they had no policy or no uh, statement on it. so as i said, people are just kind of waiting and watching and seeing exactly how this falls out . i do think the south koreans are jumping to the gun in terms of saying, well,
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you know, this means that there are the humanizing us, it for the enemy. the use of nuclear weapons could be there. but as i said, any use of nuclear weapons in the south, korea would involve the death of us soldiers that happen. there's no question there . there would be a new, better response from the us. and that would be overwhelming for the d. b r k. i know how, how would you describe the stage of relations right now between paging and appealing you on how to, how does paging view north korea a way from my perspective, a problem child. they are not happy with the idea of a nuclear north korea because it sets off the specter of a nuclear arms race up at south korea. japan are easily, you know, they have the technology to come up with their nuclear weapons within weeks. if not hours, then you have um, you know about malaysia and indonesia spectrum even maybe uh, it'd be
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a nom saying that they also want them to protect themselves. this would not be to beijing benefit. they want to have is an area of peace relative to suitability um, you know, and also having the specter about a country that could possibly fail the economic situation or dire. you could have with, you know, large numbers of refugees, economic revenue, she's poring, or the border. this is not a border that's heavily armed to other offenses, but you know, it'd be almost impossible stop because it's a long, long border. if you're a, let's put us in this other question to you, then how, how does moscow view north korea right now? most traditionally, most viewed the threat as it saves, if there's any sustain to see if it finds that the, the on the engaged in it's on the rest of the most talks. and i'll tell you, i'll try you like for i just mentioned 2 pallets between different countries.
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suppose that's going to 0. so these are the same which path has been in eastern plates and the lights which include the again, i think the 2nd time that's actually fairly new development because of the previous stage, thoughts. it's not something i'm not even i think it also is probably something called but you know, so once we have to beat the ssl is a new stage of relationship and i think it's more in detail allies of convenience of so we're trying to find a need the when you played stops, i think they be actors. do you want to come in on that? how, how do you think moscow views north korea? oh, well, i'm not sure exactly how moscow view is north korea, but i'm historically, i do know that both beijing and moscow have tried to control north korea. had tried to have and was, could behave like a proper client. stay in north korea has consistently refused and therefore has
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been a problem child for both countries. from the united states point of view, united states is north korea. as a rogue nation, there's unpredictable and dangerous and that is better dealt with by the stick and not the carrot. and i believe actually that that is a big mistake or even a rogue nations are better dealt with by the carrot and the stick. and um, throughout its history, north korea has wanted to engage with the united states as tried by writers messes and has consistently not had the success of that one. and it didn't have success was under the 1994 agreed framework in which the united states exchanged, right light lauder nuclear energy reactors for north korea,
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the new conversation and that worked. and during the use of that word, north korea did not do anything on this nuclear program. it did not launch missiles, it behaved. and then in the early 2, thousands with the bush administration bumbled north korean policy. and north korea was just like, oh well, you guys are serious about this. you asked, you haven't built any energy reactors for us, you're not really moving forward on that at all. so the agreement is no, no, we can't trust to san ever since then. we've been in the cycle of saber rattling, maybe some negotiations more, save around a notice of negotiations. and united states has not been successful is seriously engaging with north korea. all right, so i turned in to just overall, what would your advice be right now to, to the bite and administration?
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how should it react to conjunctions, remarks, or, or, indeed to the, to the incoming administration? is a 5 and fails to, to win reelection? yeah, yeah, so i want to advise the american president to think about the lyrics, the us national as about to where the lyrics says nice days is not only the home of the free, but also the home of the brave. and to take that to heart and have the courage to actually do something positive for peace, to reach out to north korea and say, we don't want, we're with you guys. we want peace with you guys. so let's negotiate. let's start by negotiating a real formal and to the create a more because the army says is not peace. it's only
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a station of possibilities. so let's talk when you go to training, a national peace and a formal and for korean war that we are not always on the brink of war with each other. and the less moved from that to normalize your relationships. you could actually have keys and then the united states can push north korea on every issue that i'm concerned about. do you know, conversation? you can push north korea and south. you won't have to push north korea west here as a formal and to create a war and normal relations. north korea has no incentive. okay, to continue with the nuclear program, we can push the human rights violations, etc, etc. let's let, let's put a question to i know, i mean, do you agree with what, what you were saying that ultimately, i mean, despite we talked about the, the domestic reasons, the domestic audience that he was addressing. but ultimately, he was attempting to
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e count concessions from the west and unrelieved sanctions. that's what this is all about. it's, it's just a, it's, it's another step on, on the long road that he's been trading since that 2019 summit with donald trump in vietnam as well. the 2019 summit was not his finest hour. he beautiful from his point of view, lost a lot of face. another instance just like the during the bush administration, where they lost faith in the united states. i think it's much simpler and that what the great power should be doing is to jointly. it can be a peace conference, it would be naive to think after all these years and sacrifices that north korea is going to give up its nuclear weapons. that is already de facto, but bringing about peace, recognizing them as a separate country. but that would go a long way to defusing the situation and that, you know, these territorial issues can be solved. but, but this, the idea that you entered the cation was always something that was in the clouds,
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not necessarily something that could be achieved on the ground. so having described south career as top class stooges deals, i think that he was attempting to diminish south korea's regional power. a basic feats hop skipping and jumping over them to move toward direct talks with the us. i mean, well, i'm gonna say it's more like uh, as i sent a message to the golgi and said in one to 2 minutes, south korean paula sound. but the south ran simple that all the 3 in steeple semester station, q, vi. shopping, talking to the united states that has some it spent on this call will be still call some of the results. it's given off. it is the name which has developed countries. you happens to log again and i don't think anything, boats, captain, the good sign of these friendship. i think this a while the kids have at least all enough to me. yeah. oh,
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not then feel compliment for a change in the relationship between the congress go inside or drop it about a minute left on on the program. despite that, that the, the dramatic shift by north korea that the shock of, of, of what kim jonathan said in, in, in that speech. and we write to think that the, actually, this is nothing bolden then came gentleman being kim jong on it. so it's another step on, on the road of that, there's nothing we need to worry about. we're not going to see we're on the korean peninsula anytime soon. yeah, i don't think we, i think it's actually much more likely that there will be some kind of a nuclear accident simply because somebody made a mistake. not because anybody actually intended to. and i find that even scarier. okay. i know. do you want to last? what do you do you agree? yeah, i look at the timing of this us is preoccupied in god's in ukraine. china obviously
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has issues with the us. i don't think is by accident that he's choosing his time to press forward. what i believe is the succession of his family, about the relocation of korea. okay. but it's like some data g on. yep. a photo touch etzky on a tank and for being with us today. and many thanks to you for watching. you can see the program to get it any time by go into the websites of elders 0 dot com. so . so the discussion join us on facebook page, you'll find that at facebook dot com forward slash a j inside story. out of course good join the conversation on x. i handle the is at a j inside story from me, adrian said again the team here and so i will see you again, bye for the, the as the situation in gaza escalates. we bring you expert analysis. he's going to ask
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you the 20000 people, 70 percent of whom are women and children. these are the has destroyed. garza is a little worried when we see certainly civilians being moved from one area to another and the area themselves. the reason for us here is, is having life in because that's become so heavy that the thousands of one thing and forced to fits in the i spoke to really put where he said openly, health plan is so expelled, palestinians stay with us for the latest developments on our hard hitting into blues as a un ambassador position given to you by well, does have both. you've described that is better than that at any of the thoughts provided. hang on my question to you all. the good cooks, i think is the most difficult question. i've had to answer facing realities, usb t o. in the security council. this is a may just something book is a problem to access it. you hear the story on told to how does era
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as the world is increasingly good to know mental health epidemic. i was getting inside the tax every day before school. it was horrifying. for po to spilled in diverse corners of the globe, us big questions about how we can improve our well be remove those unconscious images. i never felt anything walk if it meets the people trying to make a difference. we welcome people and we offer the many things here. you can just be yourself monkey changing the way you think about mental health on obviously the,
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[000:00:00;00] the, [000:00:00;00] the, the clock this isn't news on like from the coming up. the next 60 minutes is really strange. pounds, southern guns was how this thing is more than 16 people killed and attacked from residential area. no phone calls,
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no internet. no communication causes cut off from each other on the outside world. for the 7th day run is ready for it has continued to ray to come in the occupied

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