News of the Day (January 13)

Communists raid press conference by ROK opposition MPs: Four Members of the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea (a.k.a. the “South” Korean parliament), were holding a press conference in Beijing calling for Communist China to be more lenient toward refugees from Stalinist-controlled northern Korea. The Communists – who send back any SCNK refugee they can find, and thus force the refugees to live as nonpersons – responded with thirteen State Security Ministry thugs who cut power to the presser, assaulted and ejected reports (the Washington Post guy was able to stay inside), and “ordered the South Korean lawmakers to leave.”

All four are members of the opposition Grand National Party (GNP), which is far more pro-American and anti-Communist than the Uri Party of President Roh Moo-hyun. One of the GNP members at the aborted presser – Kim Moon Soo – said this: “I spent three years in prison while fighting for democracy in South Korea, but I have never experienced anything like this.” The Uri-dominated government promised to “take necessary measures.” The GNP demanded a harsher response. Nearly lost in all of this was the issue the lawmakers were discussing: the horrifying plight of SCNK refugees in Communist China, who if they’re lucky will only be imprisoned once they are handed back to the Stalinist regime, a Communist Chinese ally since 1949.

ROK government hopeful on talks, defensive about abductees: The aforementioned President Roh expressed hope that talks on Kim Jong-Il’s nuclear weapons programs could restart “once the re-elected Bush administration had chosen its foreign policy team” (BBC). Earlier rounds of talks – there have been three since the Stalinists admitted to violating a 1994 agreement not to pursue nuclear weapons – have ended in little but American concessions (fifth item). Meanwhile, a bureaucrat from the ROK’s Unification Ministry (the one that handles relations with SCNK) admitted to making no progress on the fate of nearly 500 Koreans abducted from the democratic “South” by the Stalinist regime over the last 50 years. That earned the well-deserved criticism of GNP head Park Geun-hye. The abducted Koreans haven’t garnered nearly as much attention as the Japanese who were kidnapped nearly three decades ago (next to last item), in large part because Japan has been far more forceful on the subject. Report: Washington Times

Outgoing Commerce Secretary given 70% approval by the Communists: Communist Commerce Minister told his visiting, soon-to-be-departing U.S. counterpart Don Evans that “70 percent of what you have done has been pretty good” (AP via Newsmax), leaving Evans flustered because he took the phrase as a criticism. Later, after an explanation by Bo, Evans “told The Associated Press that Bo meant the comment as praise.” Before Evans, who was supposed to be pushing his hosts to take action against piracy in Communist China, basks in any such “praise,” he might want to remember the 100,000 American jobs lost to the Communists every year since 1989 (pdf of Economic Policy Institute/U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission report) – to say nothing of Minister Bo’s previous history of persecuting Falun Gong practitioners.

Canadian PM says “all we should see is opportunity” in Communist China: In preparation for his trip to Communist China (he leaves next week), Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin insisted on playing Pollyanna – “all we should see [in China] is opportunity” (Epoch Times). Never mind the investment risks, which have caused foreign investment to fall by nearly half (fifth item), and the regime’s espionage activities and resource grabs in his own country (Top Story).

Surprise! Communist-owned firms engaged in widespread cheating: The cadres themselves were forced to acknowledge that firms owned by their regime had “widespread cases of incomplete reporting, serious asset losses and outright fabrications” (AP via Newsmax). The story specifically mentioned the chicanery at China Aviation Oil and Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group, noted earlier here (International News) and here (Corruption News).