Mick Hartley

More on that strange incident where a South Korean defector was shot by a North Korean patrol boat – for which Kim Jong-un, unprecedentedly, apologised. From the Daily NK:

North Korean military authorities praised the “hard work” of sailors on a patrol boat who recently shot and killed a South Korean fisheries official, Daily NK has learned.

A military source in the country told Daily NK on Friday that there is even the possibility that the authorities will give North Korean navy leaders who oversaw the unit in question a “commendation” signed by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the fisheries official was discovered during the afternoon of Sept. 22 by the crew of a high-speed boat in the Second Formation of the West Sea Fleet (Korean People’s Navy Unit 587)’s Eighth Squadron, which is based in Ongjin, South Hwanghae Province. The crew then reported the discovery to their superiors.

The Eighth Squadron is known for having fired on South Korean military units during the First Battle of Yongpyongdo in 1999 and the Second Battle of Yongpyongdo in 2002.

The source told Daily NK that after shooting the fisheries official to death at around 10 PM and burning his body with gasoline, the high-speed boat returned to port during the morning of Sept. 23. The country’s Naval Command reportedly sent a message through a landline to the head of the squadron’s Second Formation, along with the high-speed boat’s lieutenant, praising them for their “hard work.”

“They will likely receive a commendation soon,” the source said, adding that they had shown themselves to be “naval commanders” who can conduct a “naval operation” even in “times of peace.” The source noted further that the commendations will likely help their prospects of being promoted in the future. […]

While North Korean military officials are of the opinion that the high-speed boat simply carried out its mission based on these orders, there are still questions surrounding why the unit failed to fire upon the fisheries official upon discovering him, why they did so six hours after discovering him, and why they set him on fire.

“They hesitated somewhat about killing a South Korean civilian, so they monitored him while waiting for orders from above,” the source said. “The frontline units that failed to [detect] the defector who crossed the border [and in to Kaesong] were punished, so military leaders ordered that this time [the intruder] should be shot to death.”

According to the source, setting the man’s corpse on fire was largely aimed at preventing the possible spread of COVID-19 into the country.

It's still not clear why the Supreme Leader apologised. I doubt it had anything to do with keeping on friendly terms with the South Korean government. The North regularly and enthusiastically hurls insults at the South. Partly I suppose there's the feeling that it's what proper governments should do if their troops wantonly kill a civilian from a neighbouring country. But you can't help feeling from the above that the Fat Man really had no problem with the killing, but was not unhappy to be drawing attention to the fact that someone from South Korea had actually wanted to defect to North Korea.

And it's set the cat among the pigeons, as it were, in Seoul. The ever-gullible President Moon seems to have been thrilled to receive the Supreme Commander's apology. He probably carries the letter round with him, next to his heart. The letter also served to defuse any angry response from the government, as this editorial in South Korea's Chosun Ilbo notes. Suddenly the ruling party, at one point reluctantly preparing some kind of hard response to Pyongyang's brutality, was now all smiles, talking of a friendly exchange of letters between the two leaders and referring to Kim Jong-un as an "enlightened monarch". Another easy diplomatic victory for the North.

The South Korean public, meanwhile, want to know why the government hushed up the killing for two days, apparently so Moon could deliver a pre-recorded speech to a virtual session of the UN General Assembly the previous day in which he called for a peace treaty with North Korea.