North Korea Bites the Hand that Feeds It

Written by Jonathan Berkshire Miller   

What is US$40 million to the world’s second largest economy? The number, while not insignificant, is merely a sliver of the nearly US$6 billion in annual bilateral trade between China and its mercurial neighbor, North Korea.

Yet the recent news that Beijing and Pyongyang are at loggerheads over a quashed deal to build a Chinese-backed mine across the border has been the latest setback in a series of disagreements between the two. Earlier this week, the New York Times released a report detailing the fallout from a failed business relationship between Chinese mining giant Xiyang and authorities in North Korea. According to Xiyang officials, North Korea attempted to renegotiate its contract with the company about the mine after the fact in order to provide more financial incentives to the government officials helping to run the site.

After Xinyang officials complained to Pyongyang about kickbacks and lavish handouts to state supervisors with few tasks, the mine was closed and its materials seized. Chinese workers were unceremoniously evicted from the site by North Korean soldiers. The North refutes the accusation, claiming that Xiyang was making soaring profits from the mine due to the cheap price of iron ore in North Korea, as opposed to China. Pyongyang said it was protecting its resources and people from exploitation.  To Read More… 

 My Take - And there is a lot more….as in the roles Russia, Japan, South Korea and India play in this drama.  Nothing about China is never as it seems.  However, I would like to point out that at the heart of all the problems of all of these totalitarian states is “corruption” on a massive scale; and all the issues that go with it….all of which play well into this next article about Russia and Putin.  This is also a follow up on Putin’s efforts to create a financial hegemony I discussed in this post.  Russian-backed Eurasian parliament planned.  And this post is worth viewing.  The Coming Collapse: Authoritarians in China and Russia Face an Endgame Both of these posts are worth viewing before reading the next one.