Korean ETFs Tumble On Death Of Kim Jong Il

North Korea’s army was deeply split over whether to accept the command of Kim Jong-un, a former officer has disclosed, giving a possible clue to the tensions lying behind the young leader’s calls to war. Lieut Kim, 42, said he had been forced to flee the country after he murdered a rival officer as the factions within his army unit battled for control. “I killed a three-star company commander, the same rank as me,” he said.

UBC/Handout"Particularly when we do not have active interactions between Canada and North Korea, I think academic exchange is really needed,” said Kyung-Ae Park, a UBC political scientist and founder of the KPP.

Submitted by Jen Alic of OilPrice.com, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un may be colorful, but he isn’t crazy.

Sydney’s skyline erupted in fireworks as Australia ushered in 2013 on Tuesday, while extravagant displays soon followed in Hong Kong and Beijing, and even the once-isolated country of Myanmar joined the party for the first time in decades. Asia greeted the new year with an atmosphere of renewed optimism despite the “fiscal cliff” impasse of spending cuts and tax increases threatening to reverberate globally from the United States and the tattered economies of Europe, where the party was expected to be more subdued.

Yves here. Since I don’t follow the military beat closely (I can do only so many things in a day, plus the runup to the Iraq war and quite a few of our recent Mideast interventions shows you can’t rely on mainstream media reports when US interests are at stake), I can’t judge the accuracy of this assessment. But it certainly is plausible.

GENEVA — North Korea threatened South Korea with “final destruction” during a debate at the United Nations Conference on Disarmament on Tuesday, saying it could take further steps after a nuclear test last week. “As the saying goes, a new-born puppy knows no fear of a tiger. South Korea’s erratic behaviour would only herald its final destruction,” North Korean diplomat Jon Yong Ryong told the meeting.

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama reacted sharply to North Korea’s nuclear test Tuesday, promising swift international action to bring the rogue communist regime in line. The detonation came hours before the American leader’s State of the Union address, where he was expected to address U.S. denuclearization plans.

A picture of North Korea's Kim Jong-Un with a smartphone has triggered fevered speculation about which brand is favoured by the leader of one of the world's most repressive nations.