North Korea and the regional peace

M people of the 10 member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) were not aware that last week North Korea sent the world’s leaders and their security experts scrambling to closely monitor the military muscle- flexing of Pyongyang and its unpredictable

That is because communist North Korea is closely allied militarily, politically and economically with China and Russia since

To recall the chronology of developments, let me point out that the Pyongyang regime has violated several times over the last decades—earning sanctions from the United Nations—the international treaty on nuclear arms

But Russia and China, permanent members of the original (the rest are the US, Britain and France), have continued to trade with North Korea, with food, fuel and energy and even nuclear and And Pyongyang continues to be a UN member though it has been branded by the democracies led

Yet last year, North Korea testfired its ballistic missiles three times; one of them splashed in one more which ended in the for US President Donald Trump to deploy anti-missile missiles in

- at his private Mar-A-Lago resort to said, the US would “take care of Xi responded by ordering the rejection of a coal shipment that Beijing had imported from Pyongyan while the ship was enroute to of North Korea and its main mar

North Korean missiles will rain on American soil if Trump ordered

Meanwhile, the US has been pinned down by its military involvement in Afghanistan—after Iran and Iraq, the lead power against international terrorism— and now with its attack on the

In a way, the US is in a bind opposed to dictator President Bashar al- Assad and wants him terrorist Talibans organized by US aid and initiative to beat the Russians who wanted to annex Afghanistan in the late 1980s) in Syria are supported by the

Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin supports anti- US, anti-Israel Assad because Russia maintains its only air and naval base (outside Russian territory and Crimea) in western Syria facing

It is a safe to presume that China’s cancellation of its coal shipment from Pyongyang was a “soft” move (“sanction” to North Korea) to accommodate

In fact, after its show of - dered the test- firing of another ballistic missile from its facilities in Singpo, eastern North failed as the missile exploded,

Such incidents and other failures of the Pyongyang dictatorship are never published or announced in North Korea where Kim and his forefathers have total mind control over their Defectors to South Korea and

Again, it is highly probable that China knew of last weekend’s failed missile launch but refused to press Kim over it because it was one way to weaken the US military positioning in the Asia

Any other military front up against the US in this region diminishes what China says is the American move to prevent China from succeeding in its ambition to be the lead economic, political and military hegemon in this

North Korea’s role as a flashpoint in the Asia- Pacific area that may ignite a disastrous war— although it appears to be generally presumed that superpowers Russia, China and the US will avoid any shooting war— will not diminish in the Keep an eye on Pyongyang for

Meantime, President Rodrigo making friends with everyone for The rest of the Asean members should do the same so we can have a united front/stand on all concerns of the region and the 10 Commentsandreactionsto