Slashdot Mirror
Russia Writes Off 90 Percent of North Korea Debt
jones_supa (887896) writes "In Russia, the State Duma (lower house) on Friday ratified a 2012 agreement to write off the bulk of North Korea's debt. It said the total debt stood at $10.96 billion as of Sept. 17, 2012. Russia sees this lucrative in advancing the plans to build a gas pipe and railroad through North to South Korea. The rest of the debt, $1.09 billion, would be redeemed during the next 20 years, to be paid in equal installments every six months. The outstanding debt owed by North Korea will be managed by Russia's state development bank, Vnesheconombank. Moscow has been trying to diversify its energy sales to Asia away from Europe, which, in its turn, wants to cut its dependence on oil and gas from the erstwhile Cold War foe. Russia's state-owned top natural producer Gazprom is dreaming shipping 10 billion cubic meters of gas annually through the Koreas. Russia has written off debts to a number of impoverished Soviet-era allies, including Cuba. North Korea's struggling communist economy is just 2 percent of the size of neighboring South's."
Russia sees this lucrative in advancing the plans to build a gas pipe and railroad through North to South Korea
Seriously? Lay critical crucial infrastructure through North Korea to South Korea?
There's no way Pyongyang would manipulate those rails and pipes in a fit of political pique that seems to happen, oh, once every eight months. Absolutely now way.
blog
Russia as a nation is 11 billion dollars poorer, and the communist party members that stole the money in the first place are 11 billion dollars richer.
[Unfortunately?] No. Though I can't think of any post soviet ally that has actually benefitted or gotten ahead from having debt written off. It also occurs to me that many of those states with debt were basically given the debt - Russia gave them things like gas and lumber at particularly low rates but didn't take payment or only took partial payment. So once the debt built up they'd use it as sort of a threat to not go against them. Case in point: Ukraine just got a huge gas bill from Russia http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c211... .
In long term, massively. South Korea will get much cheaper gas, and it might have a stabilizing effect and North Korea will likely be even more closely tied to South through the financial benefits of the functioning pipeline, such as transit fees.
The main problem is that North Korea may start behaving like Ukraine with the gas, stealing it from the pipeline and even using it as a weapon against South Korea. But potential of getting gas pipeline in South Korea will likely far outweigh the cons.
It's $11 Billion. I know that sounds like a lot, but it's not really. Not on a Global scale. It might help stabilize North Korea a bit though. They're a poor enough nation to notice it.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Compared to North Korea, Cuba is a beacon of democracy and human rights. They're just a banana republic that pissed off the wrong people.
I don't know about Korea, but some nation of obese tv-lovin' asshats decided to embargo international trade in...farm machinery, food, medicine and other important things. "Ya, let's starve the shit outta their children. That'll teach 'em good."
Did you know that most of the "evil commies" of yesteryear are dead and gone? The US believes that making sure children starve and die is okay foreign policy. That's just fucked up.
The irony is that most of the people they pissed off are long dead, and half of Cuba now lives in Miami.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
Rather... I am impressed as to how well Putin is acting in Russia's best interests. I can't say the same for Obama.
Compare Cuba to Domincan Republic. Both are quite similar except for the politics - Dominican Republic had an US sponsored coup and is very much capitalist because of that. Still Cuba has a higher GDP and a higher HDI. Or take Jamaica. A capitalist constitutional monarchy and a commonwealth realm with close ties to the Brits. Still, same here, Cuba has a higher GDP and a higher HDI.
Funny thing though. North Korea used to have a milder form of government than South Korea and the people were also better off - up to the early 1970ies. Then the former went downwards, while the latter shot upwards.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
You must be joking right? Powerful armies can and have been defeated many times. Remember the USA and Vietnam?
On the other hand, I believe Russia has the [military] hardware to deliver serious havoc on the US should America take the unwise route.
What would the USA's most powerful president have done in the circumstances anyway?
Why would NK ever agree to do anything to help South Korea? They didn't care about paying bak the money anyway, so it's not that.
No, the real reason NK agreed to have a pipeline built through the country is they plan to insert NK frogmen spies into the pipeline to infiltrate the south. The beauty of the plan is, they cannot be spied upon the other way due to the pipe flow!
Masterful.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It was founded by Kim Il-Sung, who had communist ideals, yes. However it has ventured far, far, away from those ideals. Indeed the present day US is vastly closer to being an ideal free-market state than North Korea is to being anything that can be approximated as being close to actual communism.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Obviously N.Korea is a communist economic horror story. Russia has zero chance of getting paid back anyway. This method of presentation saves face for the Russian government as it was foolish to loan money to N.Korea in the first place and it also saves face for the concept of communism. This can be pushed as an image of one wonderful communist nation doing a good thing for another communist nation. N.Korea is an open sewer deserving the disrespect of all people, everywhere. And most wonderful fat, midget, leader, with really bad hair cut, is the icing on the cake.
Unlike the situation with Ukraine, the West might see that as an improvement. China, on the other hand, might disagree...
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
(Hint: Step 2 is "defect to SK.")
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Invading Syria would have worked as well as invading Afghanistan and Iraq did....
Everyone's all PO'ed at Obama for using diplomacy instead of War.
It's diplomacy that has Iran giving up their enriched uranium. It's (accidental) diplomacy that got Syria to give up their chemical weapons. Diplomacy works. War? Afghanistan and Iraq aren't going too well for us. There's no infrastructure, no democracy, tons of opium, and the Taliban are stronger now than they used to be.
There are other measures of strength besides blowing shit up.
That being said, Obama IS a weak president. :D
That's not the enlightened view. Everything that goes wrong is always someone else's fault. It's the #1 Truth of progressive thinking. Poor people are poor because someone else made them poor. If socialist policies don't fix everything, it's because someone else interfered. If all the someone elses could just be burned or imprisoned or gassed or reeducated, society's problems could finally be solved and progressive paradise would be achieved.
I'm really weirded out by all the people who give accolades to Putin lately. Russia's a shithole man. It's an oligarchy, flat out. He's not standing up to anyone. Standing up would be helping people and NOT debt slaving them with the IMF. How is invading the Ukraine when it's down in any way brave or good?
For some reason, the grudge lives on. It wasn't that great a pissing off either, just your average banana republic tactics.
That weakling got Osama, has Iran giving up it's highly enriched Uranium to lift the sanctions, and cut a deal that got Syria to give up their chemical weapons. There are other measures of strength than blowing shit up. Diplomacy works.
Now, as a dirty lib, I do believe he is a weak president on the homefront. Dude hasn't even TRIED to fulfill his campaign promises and keeps trying to cut deals with the Republicans who clearly aren't going to give him squadoo even though he gives them 90% of what they wanted anyway. Sigh....
If you're going to hate on Obama, hate on him for real reasons. His foreign policy had strengthened us, not weakened us. Bush is the one that took us from having the whole world supporting us to having everyone revile us. Again....
Umm, do you think Putin will sit back while NK messes with his pipeline? I suspect that if NK went that route, something mysterious will happen to Kim Jong-un.
i guarantee that at the slightest perceived provocation NK will shut off the gas. KIS is even more of a petulant child than KJI was.
Well... we'll see it easy for North Korea to be outraged over "the slightest perceived provocation" when they have nothing to loose.
:)
Maybe if we give them something to loose, they think twice before deciding to give it up...
It's not like the impoverishing measures currently in place has much effect.
The only places we've recently seen the population rise and demand democracy is in the middle east, wealth, internet, computer, etc. is required to facilitate this..
Right now, most North Koreans are probably more concern with securing their next meal, than fighting their oppressive government.
A don't think a new approach on North Korea can hurt, it's not like the current one works
Is the US vastly superior?
Globalfirepower rank them about the same, though they include a lot of factors, but shouldn't all those be included?
Sure the US have twice as many people and earn more money (but it's much more unevenly spread and less end up in the government coffins) and spend more money on the military (then again I don't know whatever Russia pay them and if so I guess they pay less and that more production may be government owned or at least be bought for cheaper.)
US seem to have bigger navy and air force and Russia bigger army. Who got the best missile defence? Anti-air?
Even if US is better what are their odds at Russian soil? Because if we are speaking fear of the bully I guess that's where it would be thought?
Many of the US project seem to deliver so-so and cost way more than what was originally planned.
I know lots of people say Russia got old gear but how much truth is there in that? Even if they do how much is newer? How much is newer in the US?
Do F-35 really beat the better models from Russia? Is F-22 clearly superior? I assume the F-15, F-16 and F-18 maybe is more cost effective?
I don't know whatever the SM-2, SM-3 and the S-300, S-400 and S-500 gear/systems is of similar scale but how are they really performing against each others?
I don't really know the composition of either sides nuclear weapons.
How hard is it to sink a carrier? How efficient is the total anti-missile and possibly torpedo defence in a carrier group?
Who win on the ground?
http://www.globalfirepower.com...
I assume the US may rely on missiles from ships and air-force and sure air-plane vs artillery may be a battle with an advantage to the air-plane but this being Russia how many missiles will actually hit and how well would the planes do? Throw in a bunch of submarines in the equation too.
Rather... I am impressed as to how well Putin is acting in Russia's best interests...
Is it in Russia's best interest to become isolated as an international pariah and have its economy shrink?
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
... and ultimately foreign policy is based on military power. Nobody takes us seriously.
I wonder why. Do you respect the father who beats his child?
Assassinating North Korean leadership would be fairly easy for US today if it wanted to do it.
The reason it's not been done is the fact that sudden power vacuum would cause a collapse of North Korean state, and North Koreans have proven to be extremely difficult to acclimate to South Korean society, where they would massively flood to.
Believe it or not, the biggest proponent of keeping the current leadership in power is South Korea. They are the ones who would take by far the biggest hit from North's collapse. They advocate long term assimilation policy instead, where North Korean leadership is slowly made more and more dependent on South's money until eventually they have to open their own country enough for cultural exchange to start to happen, demolishing the power base.
Is in American's best interest to become an international pariah and for the average American income to fall?
Oh, PLEASE tell us all how the Arab Spring was Obama's fault... And Fuck Israel.
Nobody takes us seriously because we started two wars over bad intelligence. No one takes us seriously because we talk about democracy and freedom and then invade countries that don't do what we say. Nobody takes us seriously because we've overthrown democratically elected governments. No one takes us seriously because we're a f'in joke.... We're a child with a giant stick running around hitting other children
It's weird, but plenty of countries are taken seriously without waving their military around. Japan's taken seriously, and they don't even have a military to speak of! We wield enough economic and cultural power that we shouldn't even have to use our military. And strangely enough, when we DO use diplomacy and sanctions, stuff gets done.
"something mysterious will happen to Kim Jong-Un". You mean he might get a decent haircut?
Except that from 1970 to 2008 (years for which data is available), per capita GDP of the Dominican Republic went from 50% of Cuba's to 87% of Cuba's. The HDI has improved more as well.
You seem to view situation as absolute rather than relative. As in relative to what would happen in event of North's collapse. Instead, you apparently think that if North were to collapse, it would just vanish with no negatives involved.
Do they enjoy the current North? Of course not. Is it much better than collapsed North on their border? Of course. North's collapse would cause at least a temporary collapse of social and economic order in the South due to influx of refugees from the North in such an event.
Status quo is MUCH better for South than that scenario. Occasional scuffle with a few lives lost and having to keep a stable border is a whole lot easier than trying to absorb millions of North refugees which are known to be extremely difficult to acclimate to South. Former scenario has been stable for decades. Latter would likely cause at least a temporary collapse of both social and economic order in the South.