group of 58 ra hinge came ashore in ladon, village in indonesia, western arch, a province. and on monday evening the boat carrying a 185 landed further up the coast. it's not yet clear whether this is the boat he had lost a week earlier. like we need to do further communication and intensive investigation was different parties with it in denisia or outside of indonesia. to clarify, if this is the case at the moment, i cannot confirm the information for now, indonesians doing what they can to get these refugees some sense of normality and dignity after their ordeal. but the future remains unclear. agency say the number of a hinge a fleeting by boat from the camps bangladesh has risen fivefold this year 22 and a half 1000. the theories that many more will be subject to the sorts of dangers in the month to come. hurry faucet al jazeera, though the us is considering, and posing cove at 19 restrictions on travelers from china. infections are searching across china as the country abandoned their coven policy. at the same

time, fishing is proposing to issue new passports for the 8th of january. and the reopening borders after more than 2 years of tight restrictions, the u. s. is worried that travelers from china will bring the variance of crone of virus. china reported 3 new cave in 1900 deaths on tuesday. ah. what you have there with me said robin indo reminder of all top stories. ukraine says russian full of shoulder maternity warden cache on an area key reclaimed. last month. the ukrainian military has resumed a counter offensive in the eastern regional hands. 2 of its major cities remained under russian control. charles transferred has more on the shelling of hospital in casual a spokesperson for president. zalinski said that a doctor had literally only just finished operating or giving us this area. and

section 2, a pregnant mom when the shelling started. miraculously, so the spokesperson said, nobody was injured in that attack. russia says it'll by law exports to countries as that price caps on its energy products. the decree will come into effect in february, and last for 5 months. the european union, g 7 and australia agreed to cap the price of russian crude oil. earlier this month, the supreme court has ruled to keep pandemic era border restrictions known as title $42.00. the rules blocked thousands of migrants from entering the country from mexico. at least 64 people have been killed in weather related incidents in north america. a severe winter storm is continuing to batter the region. heavy rains and flooding over the christmas weekend of field at least 25 people in the southern philippines. as few teams are trying to help tens of thousands falls from the homes . forecast to say storms offset, to bring more rain to the southern and central regions of the country. at least 113

people have been rescued from the mediterranean sea off the coast of libya. they are so submitted terrain. a charity says it's ocean viking vessel rescued. the group from an inflatable boat about 30 unaccompanied. mine is all swarm board asian king. viking is any rescue ship in the central mediterranean? those were the headlines. i'll be back with more news and half law here on out era . next, it's inside story to stay with us. ah, now g 0 with every north korean drones that breach of south korean air space. the latest hostile act in a year that seen killing young test via 90 missiles. what's the secretive nation trying to achieve at higher should soul and it's western allies response without

escalating into war? this isn't such story. ah . hello, welcome to the program. i'm im, ron con, south korea spends big on defense with a hostile neighbor across the border. so failure to shoot down the north korean drones and it says, based on monday has cool some along. the military has apologized and president yoon . so gill says, the incident underlines a lack of redness. we'll be discussing this and the wide attentions in the region with all guess shortly. but 1st in is came reports from sol. a brazen incursion by north korea and to south korean. aerospace has left a sense of unease here and so so much so that the military has issued a rare apology for failing to shoot down any of the 5 enemy rounds at flew and

south korean aerospace on monday, a 4 of those drones flew over a con while island on the west coast, while the 5th flew past a border town pied you while flying in as close as the northern tip of sol, where the presidential office stands, some concern that it may have got gotten away with some of the pictures of the presidential office, so the military says it has no such data. the joint chiefs of staff in its apology underline that it is very difficult to detect and to target in civilian territory. drones that are smaller than 3 meters in size, even as they promised to bolster what they can, including potentially running air defense drills at the joint chiefs level, the president, humans hunger meanwhile, and his 1st comments at a cabinet level meeting this morning. recognize that military preparedness was simply not there. that training had lagged in the past years as he called for the

creation of a military drone unit. in fact, to bring it up as soon as possible. that would feature stealth capabilities as well as future technology unit. kim for insights story. now the joins the latest military activity on the korean peninsula. young young has tested at least 90 cruise and ballistic missile, so fall in 2022 more than in any of the year. including the 1st launch over japanese territory since 2017, the shorter force has caused a concern among its neighbors. now in response, south korea hold joint life. i joules with zeile either us extending the military exercises by several days. and japan is increased. it's 2023 defense budget by 20 percent or record at $55000000000.00. that's a shift away from the pacific policies in place since world war 2. ah, let's bring in our guess

a mason richie is an associate professor of international politics at hancock, university of foreign studies in soul. he joins us from birmingham, alabama. joining us by skype from london is edward hell, his electra in politics at new college at university of oxford, and lawrence corbett joins us way scope or from washington d. c. he's a senior fellow at the center for american progress. and a former us assistant secretary of defense, a warm welcome to your flight to begin with. mason ritchie in birmingham, alabama. mason. there's no other way of reading this other than north korea tested south korea's defensive capabilities. and one is that right? i think that's a fair argument, and i think that this drone incursion by north korea shows something that frankly speaking many people had already expected. that there were holes and saw 3 in air since, particularly for these smaller drones. for instance, this has been

a pretty big embarrassment for the ministry of national defense for a south korean military. it also exposes, i think, several years or houses more than that. neglect on this type of, you know, relatively asymmetric threat at north korea represents for south korea. it also falls into a line of errors and mistakes that we've seen, the software in military make over this year, including and missiles response. south korea made that went wrong earlier this year where one of its own missiles that was supposed to sort of counter the narrative of a north korean. this will test, i ended up circling back and blowing up on south korean territory near a populated area. so i think this is definitely a wake up call to south korea that it needs to up its game militarily. if it wants

to continue to deter north korea from these kinds of provocations in the future. let's bring in laura called south korea is a key us ally. the u. s. must be looking at this and going where, where's all the money gone with all our support for south korea go with these small drones. they've managed to mount an incursion. well there's no doubt about it, you've got to remember that during the trump administration we downplayed our. busy security relationship with south korea. in fact, president trump was talking about taking all of the american troops out of there. we finally started, you know, having a exercises with them again. and i to say that that's one of the reasons why the noise launch these attacks is because they're concerned about the u. s. and south korea working together and increasing their rub mil mil military kate capability. and they'll forget, in addition to this, i mean,

they've been conducting an awful lot of missile tests. i think of something like 90 in this, in this past past past year. so, and then finally this had held for 5 years. and that certainly is a step in the right direction, but i think my colleague is correct. they're trying to show that their south korea is not that good. and they're probably also concerned that the japanese are having a military buildup. edward how, what does this mean for north korea? is this a new research and confident north korea that we're witnessing? yes, so i think what's important about in mind is that even though this is not the 1st time in recent memory that we've seen north korea use it drones, we saw north korea do 72017 and particularly in light of the deployment of the, the thought the anti miss all defense system in sol. i think what this represents

is kim duncan became regime calling to from phil. what was basically a shopping list, the wish list of where can we all technology, although unconventional weapons that he outlined the 8 party congress last year. so we saw better warheads, new types of intercontinental ballistic missiles, ranging up to 15000 kilometers, solid propellant mis song. and also the coldness sins and combat goods. so the laughter has all usually been taped off. and yes, all of the reasons that my 2 colleagues have mentioned to show that the south korean defense system is weak as a way of provoking the u. s. south korean lions, but it's interesting to show how all the north korea house and exactly responded to

the really the most recent droning coach and north korea. how's he responded to japan's recent pledges to increase in defense spending to 2 percent of its g. d. p by 2027. so i think for north korea, this is another stack for the came the aim ultimately to desire the status old. not only a nuclear state, but also a state with expanded scope and sophistication of a diverse range of capability. it will get into the ethan, he's saying in just a moment, i want to bring mason richey and head. there is this idea of blowback um where the u. s. makes a play and then that kind of backfires on them present. donald trump, i lawrence cove just mentioned that he was not quite a supporter of the kim regime, but he was, you know, certainly talking to them. and then he suddenly con, about the pitch and now,

but the north koreans are re surgeon and they see themselves as being able to mount attacks. like this is a fair assessment why i would, despite the fact i'm not in any way donald trump fan to be on the record. i wouldn't, i wouldn't say anywhere. you're a fan of north korea, but you know, i do think that if anything, what this probably shows, you know, the last 5 years and arguably going back farther you 10 to 20 years or even longer isn't no one knows ministration and washington has a good answer for how to deal with north korea, it's a really, really difficult problem. and frankly speaking, it's also hard for sol, obviously. in fact, arguably, it's even harder for small. they haven't much more complex relationship in north korea because the crimson soul is divided. and obviously because north korea is a much more immediate, indirect threat to south korea. so no one has

a good answer for north korea and nor 3 or frankly speaking, exploits that and so they exploit that. sometimes through the use of strength, through your testing icbm, through provocations which we saw, for instance in 2010 when they were a south korean corvette. and when they show islands to the west of sole and inch on. so sometimes they engage in provocative military behavior, whether be tests or whether be kinetic actions. sometimes they use what researchers are referred to, the tyranny of the week in order to try to symmetrically irritate or some cases terrorize their adversary. and these are extremely difficult and sometimes a symmetric provocations in a symmetric strategies that north korean gauges and that are difficult to respond to. so i don't necessarily claim too much, you know,

trauma or obama before him or bush before him. no one's had a good answer for how to deal with north korea. the same thing is true and sole, but the fact is better as the north korean threat is growing and north korea seems to be on the threshold of convincing the rest of the world. in some sense that its possession of nuclear weapons is normalized, that it should be treated something like a mixture of israel, pakistan and india. and the more that, that is the case, the more that nor 3 is going to have room for these kinds of incursions. drones crossing the border with the military demarcation line mis, just in the east, the mischief in the west sea, and other types of actions that are unfortunately going to cause potential inadvertent escalation, only cream central. and what that happens all bets are off because once you start and go tore spiral, it's awfully hard to stop lawrence cold. what do you think of that? no one in d. c has a good idea of deals on how to deal with north korea. do you agree?

yeah, i think my colleague is absolutely correct because no matter how you handle it, it's going to be difficult. we don't want another korean war. obviously not that we would like north korea not to become a nuclear power, but we didn't want to pakistan to be called a nuclear power either. and i think we're going to have to accept the fact that there are nuclear power and deal with it in terms of the forces. we have the exercises that, that we conduct. and as also been mentioned, the japanese are increasing their defense capabilities. so while north korea certainly is getting, you know, somewhat more powerful or closer to a nuclear weapon, this security is not an increase. if the united states it and south korea begin to increase their military cooperation. japan does, unless i forget, as

a north korea's are also one of the 2 countries in the world providing arms to russia here during this war in ukraine. edward hell, let's talk about containment if there's no real strategy to be able to deal with north korea. the cost of doing business in that region means that we're just going to have to accept the north korea will now attacks like this and as long as they don't escalate us the best we can hopeful yes, i mean, i don't see that that is a very pessimistic so no, but to reiterate what has been said and to develop on the points based on my colleagues, all we getting to that sort of point. i mean, i just want to, we've, we've, we've discussed the different types. it's called mischief the uncover cations at north korea has engaged in. i think we also need to decide that domain as well. i mean cyber warfare, as we've seen, particularly throughout this year,

but also beforehand has allows, know, who to escalate, quote unquote tensions without really causing much change to the status quo. and by the status quo, i mean, any particular form of response from the international community. you mentioned the idea of containment, and you mentioned the idea of whether in fact we are basically going to have to accept north because there is a new state. well, one of the concerns at the moment is that given the ongoing focus of the united nations security council on russia's continued war in ukraine. actually if north korea was to conduct the 7th new test that many on the list and researches and policymakers have been calling and predicting for many months. now this would present a fundamental weakening of the united nations security council,

but also would not get away with it. more so than in previous years. most likely. yes. so we're seeing north korea take advantage, particularly now of a weekend international order and the weekend sort of scary law tick united nations security council focused on ukraine, which north creek can lead lake to a increase and accelerate it's 12 occasions. whether that's miss sol, testing whether that's during warfare, whether that cyber war or, or otherwise. we have mentioned japan, let's get into that now. mason richey, the idea that japan is now escalating quite massively its own arms program, or perhaps in response to what north korea is doing, but certainly as part of its own regional security. it must be worried about north korea. and china though, is there

a danger of an arms race more significant than we've seen ever before? i don't think that there is a danger of an arms race. there is an ongoing arms race. it's. it's happening as we speak. i in japan is going to raise its defense spending, you know, within the next 5 years, at least that's the plan significantly whether or not they actually hit that 2 percent threshold, i think is, is perhaps a bit of an open question. but and more importantly, how that money is spent, i think matters quite a bit. and whether or not this goes into procuring new systems and whether or not that's done with with wisdom and intelligence and how that fits in with japan. larger evolving, east asian pacific defense strategy is of course a separate question. but it's happening is happening in japan, which is developing or is going to be developing these counter strike capabilities

. which would obviously be able to hit north korea as well as china. and in some sense, i think actually the chinese threat from the perspective of japan, this is really the more salient one of the north, 3, all the north korea is clearly i important, secondary worry south korea has been increasing its defense expenditures for at least the last 6 or 7 years, if i remember correctly by every year, anywhere between 5 and 8 percent to south 3 is pouring money into its defense. it's a national defense. you might ask where some of that money has been going to the extent that they don't seem to be able to have an answer for these smaller is the metric threat. but they are putting money into submarines. they're putting money into potentially a light aircraft carrier. they put money into a 35 of course they're putting money into unmanned system as they're putting money into c 4 i s r. so intelligence recognizance and surveillance capabilities south

are you doing that? we always see china massively increasing its military expenditures in growing it's on nuclear arsenal going forward. so that's taking place in north korea is an instigator of this as well as we've seen, you know, with the development of the walk on 17 icbm, which professor, how referenced earlier with that can range all of the continental united states with a nuclear payload. how accurate that is and how reliable it is a separate question, but to some of your we have to assume that it probably functions. so there is an arms race going on high in the region. and i think one of the responses that we would like to see perhaps if you're washington d. c would be increased trilateral cooperation between top 3 at the united states in japan. and not only in terms of how it is that the alliance shares information with each other or how the alliances share information with each other. but also particularly looking towards a combined, or at least in part,

to integrated missile defense posture. but that's something that's going to have to move extremely slowly because south korean japan aren't particularly good terms and a lot of ways. and so this type of defense cooperation is a relatively tricky endeavor. domestically in tokyo angel, well, let's bring in lawrence called her lawrence. you mentioned earlier, this idea that there is a very difficult way of dealing with north korea the perhaps we don't have a grasp on, but is there anything immediate that the u. s. can do now in dealing with north korea, is there a short term right now? solution well basically i think make it clear to doubt that if they don't stop this behavior, we're going to, i'd cars is south korea to respond. don't forget, after the sucked incursion here, the south koreans did go into north korea. and i think we need to make it clear that in a conventional war with, ah, south korea, they would not,

they would not do well. i think the north koreans are also thinking that everybody's focus on taiwan. so they can get away with this now. and of course, as you know that, that if you look at the united states national security strategy, it's all about china and taiwan. so i, b, i can't get into kim's heads when i do say he thinks we were dirt word this distracted. and it's important that we convey to him when the japanese, if they go through with this, they'll be the 3rd largest military budget in the world. and is this something that he wants, given the history for tooth to japan? and the korea's edward hell, is there a way of bringing the north koreans into the league of nations of to use a very old fashion to? yeah, i think most interesting is what we need to understand now does not have

a good time for north korea to north korea does not want to engage in any kind of dialogue. let's see me on the north has always pasted tone policy based on this idea that it's preferred outcomes will be met. you know, north korea will only join any form of dialogue, negotiation, whatever, when it feels that it's come get it desired outcomes. we saw this in hanoi in 2019 the 2nd summit between kim dungan and trump, which ended in conclusively because north korea was not getting wanted wanted from the united states which, which at that point was on particular easing up by particular sanctions. is there any way that north korea can come back and join the negotiating table at the moment? i think it's not in north korea interest to do so at the moment. you know,

as we speak, the, the, the end of the party cleanup of the work is policy has just begun. we seen qindzhong on discuss issues of crises happening in the, in the, in the north clear in the, in, across this year. and usually what we see, so we already talk, sorry i would, we are running out of time and i do want to bring in mason rich. you very quickly, mason. the one country that we haven't really got into and talked about is, is china. does china have a role to play in bringing the korea to the table or the, you know, interested either? it's a very tricky, complicated question and it probably depends to some degree on what you know, what point you're asking and what you know, what you mean when you talk about the role that china has. but the short answer to that is china. it could, if it wanted to make life extremely difficult for the regime to the point that it could very likely cause the regime to fall in the way that it would do that would be to shut off. well supplies coming in through pipelines from china. however,

it has no interest in seeing a failed state, especially a nuclear hill state. and of course, is nominally an ally of north 3 if you have mutual defense treaty. and thirdly, you know, north china has no interest in the moment, at least in bringing its buffer state to heal. it's not particularly enthusiastic about north korea, having functioning nuclear program and having nuclear weapons. and indeed, you know, from a north korean perspective, i think in the back of their previous head, they probably look at those nuclear weapons as an insurance against chinese meddling in north korea and affairs as much as they look at it. or at least in part with respect to how they look at it as a tool to be used against the u. s. and saw 3 alliance. but at the end of the china has limited leverage. because north korea is an independent minded state. there's a lot of what it wants to do, and there is the sort of tyranny of the weak, where china, you know, it's, it becomes too involved in trying to manage north 3 and affairs will see its own back fire effect. and if it goes to foreign,

might end up causing instability on the korean peninsula, which is what china once absolutely took away. and so to that extent, it actually how's you all to we wanted to leverage. i want to thank all our guests . mason richey, edward, how and lawrence cove and i want to thank you as well for watching. now you can see the program again anytime by the single website out there dot com. and for further discussion, go to facebook page at facebook dot com, forward slash asia inside story. and you can also join the conversation on twitter . handle is a inside story for me and broncos, and the whole team here. the hong kong was once celebrated as a beacon for press freedom in asia, but as china tightens its grip on the city journalists fear, they can no longer speak truth to power journalists and media organizations like

oral us, have to respect and comply with them all in 2019 increasing fears that china was eroding hong kong. so autonomy and judicial independence spot months of massive sometimes violent protests. the national security law, which criminalizes terrorism, secession, subversion, and collusion with foreign forces was introduced in 2020. it might be a conversion talking to you now accepting your interview it has become a dangerous depression, but dangerous occupation for people who are still interested in reporting the facts a sense with

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