This is shameful.

The Chinese police in Shenyang apparently kidnapped the North Koreans seeking asylum in the Japanese embassy there. So who did the Japanese government criticize for this violation of its sovereign territory? Their embassy staff.

I'm still looking for criticism of the Chinese government from Tokyo, but I won't hold my breath. And the poor souls are probably on their way to Pyongyang right now for torture and interrogation.

I just hope that our embassy officials there, who have some other North Koreans in their protection, will have some testicular fortitude.

Does this count?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/asia-pacific/newsid_1976000/1976702.stm

Japan has summoned the Chinese ambassador to explain his country's actions. They call the kidnapping "extremely problematic and regrettable"---don't know if that's harsh or mild in diplo-speak. They're demanding that the North Koreans be returned (to them, I guess).

Thanks. That's probably harsh, under the circumstances (modern Japan vis a vis China), which is to say, appallingly mild...

There are, of course, several factors at work here:

The Japanese have no lost for the Koreans, North or South. (It says enormous volumes that Koreans would seek asylum at the JAPANESE embassy. The closest equivalent would be Saudis seeking asylum at the Israeli embassy in some country.)

The Japanese have no desire to become the destination of additional defecting North Koreans.

The Chinese are being harsh, not only because of their regime, but because THEY do not want a massive influx of Koreans coming over the border. Beyond the politics of relations w/ Pyongyang, there's also the question of what they could/would do w/ several tens of thousands of refugees, espeically since northern China is the equivalent of the Rust Belt (i.e., significant unemployment).

The rising tide of North Korean refugees suggests that there is SIGNIFICANT internal weakness in North Korea. While we're all focused on the ME, it might not hurt to also keep an eye on developments in the Hermit Kingdom.

An embassy is diplomatically, by tradition dating back to when French was the international language of diplomacy, NATIVE SOIL. Those Koreans were diplomatically IN JAPAN. For the Chinese to have sent in soldiers to remove them was in no practical sense different from militarily kidnapping them from mainland Japan. If the Japanese had wanted the Koreans out, fine: they have embassy guards to show them the door. For the Chinese to have sent men in uniform in after them, without permission, is by tradition an act of war. I'm sorry I ran on about this, but the sanctity of embassies is one of the cornerstones of diplomacy and for the Japanese to give such a mild response to this issue is to me rather frightening.

Does anyone get flash backs of East Germans running across a Czech (if memory is correct) one day then bam there went the wall. And Eastern Euorpe with it. Are the Chinese afraid?

An embassy is diplomatically, by tradition dating back to when French was the international language of diplomacy, NATIVE SOIL.

True ... but this wasn't an embassy, it was a consulate. I'm not sure whether a consulate has the same status.

The Japan Today article seems to convey the same attitude that I'd expect if the Koreans had been attacked by a pack of wild dogs. You don't expect civilized behavior from a pack of wild dogs -- a reasonable person should know that you need to use force to keep them at bay. In other words, the Japanese government seems to be telling the consular staff that they should have known better than to expect the Chinese to behave like civilized human beings.

This just in ...

There's a followup news story at http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=214984

(The italics tag didn't work in my previous post. Let's see whether the anchor tag works ...

link: http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=214984 ...)

Nope. Nor did it take my name!

Posted by Mike Gannis, May 11, 2002 10:08 PM