A North Korean diplomat in Cuba fled to South Korea: NPR

SEOUL, South Korea – South Korea’s undercover agent company said Tuesday that a senior North Korean diplomat stationed in Cuba has fled to South Korea, a de facto defection of the North’s ruling elite that may have threatened leader Kim Jong Un. The pressure has caused damage. To strengthen its management.

The National Intelligence Agency said that media reports of the defection of the North Korean adviser for state affairs in Cuba are true. A brief overview of the NIS National Affairs Office provided negative additional details.

South Korea’s mass-circulation Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported last Tuesday that diplomat Ri Il Kyu had fled South Korea with his wife and children in November.

Chosun Ilbo quoted Ri as telling the newspaper in an interview that he had made up his mind to transition because of disillusionment with North Korea’s political system, an unfair activity analysis by Pyongyang’s international ministry, and the ministry. His hope to negotiate with Mexico regarding his neurological damage was denied. He noted that hospitals in Cuba did not have vital diagnostic equipment to assess his fitness weakness due to world sanctions.

Alternative South Korean media retailers published related reviews on the following Tuesday.

North Korea did not immediately respond to South Korea’s announcement of Ri’s defection. North Korea has previously expressed anger over some high-profile defections, accusing South Korea of ​​trying to kidnap its voters or lure them into transition. In this, some defectors have also been described as traitors or criminals who fled to avoid punishment.

Ri defected before diplomatic relations were established between South Korea and Cuba in February, an event experts say is likely a political threat to North Korea, whose diplomatic base is largely dependent on Cold War allies like Cuba. -Era is dependent on a small group of associates.

The Chosun file mentions that Rhee was busy with efforts to prevent Cuba from opening diplomatic relations with South Korea until his defection. The file noted that Ri had received sanction from Kim Jong Un for his role in negotiations with Panama, which resulted in a detention in 2013 for allegedly possessing contraband items such as missiles and fighter jet parts. The boat was abandoned. The file noted that Ri was closest to the third secretary of the North Korean embassy in Cuba.

A historical past of defection from the North

About 34,000 North Koreans have moved to South Korea to escape financial crisis and political repression, especially during the nineties. Most of them are girls from poor northern areas. However, the number of highly trained North Koreans with professional jobs fleeing to South Korea has recently increased steadily.

According to South Korea’s Unification Ministry, in 2023, about 1 in 10 North Koreans resettled in South Korea were classified as the country’s elite — a higher number than in recent years. Ministry officials have said the increase in high-level defections is likely due to North Korea’s pandemic-related financial difficulties and efforts to improve environmental controls over its networks. People who had to stay abroad longer than scheduled due to COVID-19 restrictions were exposed to freer foreign cultures for longer periods.

“This high-level defection is an insult to North Korea, as Ri played a key role in representing Pyongyang’s interests in Havana,” said Leif-Eric Easley, school master of world research at Ewha Womans College in Seoul.

Easley said, “There is no doubt that the Kim regime is taking steps to make it more difficult for foreign diplomats to defect, but increased repression is likely to further isolate Pyongyang and indeed lead to more “Defection may be encouraged.”

Moon Seong Mook, an expert at the Seoul-based Korea Research Institute for National Strategy, said news of high-level defections like Ri’s would spread to North Korean diplomats and others, causing significant damage to Kim – though not much. The system of governance will probably collapse at any time.

Some North Korean tracking teams question Kim’s obsession with energy. However, witnesses say Kim continues to grapple with economic difficulties, the influence of South Korean pop culture and the growth of US-South Korean military cooperation.

The most high-profile defection in recent years occurred in 2016, when Tae Yongho, a minister at the North Korean embassy in London, defected to South Korea. He noted that he decided to flee because he did not want his children to live a “tragic” life in North Korea as he was driven to “despair” by Kim’s assassination of officials and pursuit of nuclear weapons. ,

North Korea has called them “human scum” and accused them of embezzling government funds and committing other crimes. Tae was elected to the Parliament of South Korea in 2020.

In 2019, North Korea’s acting ambassador to Italy, Jo Music Gil, arrived in South Korea. Apart from this, in 2019, the acting ambassador of North Korea to Kuwait came to South Korea with his community.

In recent months, tensions have increased on the Korean Peninsula over North Korea launching garbage-carrying balloons toward South Korea and its continued missile testing. North Korea says its balloon campaign was a tit-for-tat action against South Korean activists spreading political leaflets through their balloons.

On Tuesday, Kim’s sister and senior dignitary Kim Yo Jong warned of unspecified “miserable” consequences for South Korea, saying that leaflets sent by South Korea had again been found in the North. He issued a similar ultimatum on Sunday. South Korea responded to North Korea’s previous ballooning actions by suspending 2018 de-escalation trade with North Korea.