The Workers’ Party of North Korea has recently issued a document from Pyongyang to provincial bodies that condemns Beijing for taking part in UN sanctions against the North and openly rallies Party members toward nuclear conflict with China.
Daily NK has obtained a copy of one of the mass-delivered documents, published by the Central Party and circulated to provincial Party committees, via Sino-North Korea relations expert Lee Young
Hwa, a professor at Kansai University, earlier this week. The document appears
to outline a new doctrine on policies toward China and is dated March 10, 2016.
Daily NK could not independently verify the content of the document.
“The Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea has handed down a message
openly lashing out against China and commanding its people to actively confront
it with a ‘nuclear storm’,” Lee explained.
The document was reportedly distributed and
read aloud throughout North Korea by provincial Party secretaries overseeing
provincial Party committee meetings. An approximate translation of the title of
the document is, “All Party members and workers must join in soundly crushing
China’s pressuring schemes with the force of a nuclear storm for its betrayal
of socialism.”
The document goes on to explain that China
has “been an eager participant” in the sanctions because it is “worried that
its status of dominance in Northeast Asia will be challenged,” adding that
these actions call for active resistance against Beijing’s anti-North plot.
Appearing to reflect on Sino-North Korea
relations, the document states, “China had never once been sincere towards the
North, especially when its revolutionary efforts ran into challenges and
struggles”. It adds, “Just as our great Suryong [great or supreme leaders] have
taught us, we must not have even the smallest fantasies about China’s intentions.”
“We must no longer go easy on the Chinese
and instead deal with them equally in order to change their attitude of taking
us lightly,” another part reads. The document then orders members to “unite
more firmly around Marshal Kim Jong Un and fight to the very end for final
victory in our Juche revolutionary feat, even if graver hardships and
difficulties blow this way.”
This document indicates that the North has
now declared China to be an ‘enemy state,’ placing it on the same ranks as
South Korea, the U.S., and Japan, Professor Lee explained.
“It has now positioned the U.S. as the
‘feared enemy’ and China as the ‘detested enemy’,” he said. The use of the term
“nuclear storm” also indicates it is threatening Beijing with nuclear and
missile provocations, Lee added.
North Korea and China had maintained close
ties since the signing of the 1961 Sino-North Korean Treaty of Friendship,
Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance, but this new declaration in effect
announces an end to that agreement, the professor asserted. “There is a high
possibility that Sino-North Korea relations will not only deteriorate, but lead
to tensions as well,” he surmised.
However, a high-ranking defector, who spoke with Daily NK on condition of anonymity, also weighed in
on the document, specifically questioning its alleged audience. “Given the isolation North Korea faces, there can certainly exist negative attitudes towards China right now. People also received ideological training ‘not
to have fantasies about China’ under Kim Jong Il when [bilateral ties]were unfavorable ,” he said, “but those cases were limited to cadres in the upper ranks.
He added, “It is questionable whether [documents including] strong language like ‘China is a
traitor to socialism’ and ‘nuclear storm’ would have been distributed to lower
ranks [as claimed in this case].”