Timeline North Korea
Return to home
CIA Factbook: http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/kn.html
History: http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~felsing/kstuff/nkhist.html
Travel Docs: http://www.traveldocs.com/kp/index.htm
USLC: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/kptoc.html
WDR: http://travel.dk.com/wdr/KP/mKP_Intr.htm
1910-1955 http://www.kimsoft.com/korea/eyewit.htm
37BC-668CE The
Koguryo kingdom (Gaogouli in Chinese) flourished during this time. At
its height the territory stretched from central Manchuria to south of
Seoul, Korea. It was later taught to be one of Korea’s three founding
kingdoms.
(Econ, 3/31/07, SR p.8)
1910-1955 http://www.kimsoft.com/korea/eyewit.htm
1912 Apr 15, Kim Il Sung, North
Korea's communist founder and leader (1948-1994), was born.
(AP, 7/8/97)(WSJ, 6/26/97, p.A14)(SSFC, 3/17/02,
p.A22)
1942 Feb 16, Kim Jong il, son of
Kim Il Sung, was born. He took over leadership from his father in 1994.
(SFC, 2/21/02, p.A12)
1945 Aug 8, The Soviet Union
declared war against Japan. 1.5 million Soviet troops launched a
massive surprise attack (August Storm) against Japanese occupation
forces in northern China and Korea. Within days, Tokyo's million-man
army in the region had collapsed in one of the greatest military
defeats in history.
(SFC, 9/9/96, p.A19)(AP, 8/8/97)(AP, 8/6/05)
1945 Aug 15, Korea was
liberated after nearly 40 years of Japanese colonial rule, but it
soon faced the tragic division of the North and South along the 38th
parallel.
(www.koreanconsulate.on.ca/en/?mnu=a06b03)(SFC,
6/17/00, p.A9)
1945 Sep 8, Korea was partitioned
by the Soviet Union and the United States. The US invaded Japanese-held
Korea.
(HN, 9/8/98)(MC, 9/8/01)
1945 Dec 27, Foreign ministers
from the former Allied nations of the United States, the Soviet Union,
and Great Britain agreed to divide Korea into two separate occupation
zones and to govern the nation for five years.
(MC, 12/27/01)
1948 Jan 23, The Soviets refused
UN entry into North Korea to administer elections.
(HN, 1/23/99)
1948 Sep 9, The Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) emerged out of Soviet
occupation. Kim Du Bong stood as Chairman of the Presidium of the
Supreme People’s Assembly.
(www.worldstatesmen.org/Korea_North.htm)
1948 There was a rebellion on
Cheju Island. The documentary film “Red Hunt” was about the brutality
of the South Korean government during the rebellion.
(WSJ, 8/12/99, p.A20)
1949 Jun 28, The last U.S. combat
troops were called home from Korea, leaving only 500 advisers.
(HN, 6/28/98)(WSJ, 5/26/00, p.W8)
1949 Jun 29, US troops withdrew
from Korea after WW II. [see Jun 28]
(MC, 6/29/02)
1949 Oct 6, China and Korea
established diplomatic relations. Korea became one of the first groups
of countries having diplomatic relations with new China.
(www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/wjb/zzjg/yzs/gjlb/2701/default.htm)
1950 Jun 25, The Korean War
started as forces from the communist North invaded the South. It lasted
till 1953. A Truman administration statement that Korea was “outside
the US defense perimeter” in the Pacific was said to have invited the
attack. Gen. McArthur led a UN expeditionary force in response to North
Korea’s attack on South Korea. The Chinese entered the war and the UN
forces were pushed into a Christmas retreat. 2.5 million people were
killed. No peace treaty was ever signed. About 1.7 million Americans
were involved and there was an estimated 3 mil casualties including
150,000 (54,246) Americans and over 1 mil Chinese. In 1990 North
Korean officials revealed that Stalin knew about and encouraged North
Korea’s aggression as did Mao Tse-Tung.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.255)(WSJ, 8/8/95, p. A15)(SFC,
4/8/96, p.A-9)(SFEM, 11/10/96, p.12)(SFC, 2/17/96, p.A26)(AP,
6/25/97)(WSJ, 7/21/97, p.A22)
1950 Jun 26, President Truman
authorized the US Air Force and Navy to enter the Korean conflict.
(AP, 6/26/07)
1950 Jul 26-1950 Jul 29, US troops
killed up to 300 South Korean refugees trapped under a bridge at No Gun
Ri. The villagers had gathered there to avoid strafing from US planes
which killed some 100. US troops feared the refugees included
infiltrators from North Korea. The killings were not made public until
1999. On Jan 11, 2001 the US Army admitted that civilians were
massacred and Pres. Clinton offered his regrets. The US Army blamed the
"fog of war" in apology and acknowledgement. In 2007 the Army
acknowledged it had found, but did not divulge, that a high-level
document said the US military had a policy of shooting approaching
civilians in South Korea.
(SFC, 9/30/99, p.A1,16)(WSJ, 6/5/00, p.A32)(SSFC,
12/30/01, p.D2)(AP, 4/13/07)
1950 Jun 27, North Koreans troop
reached Seoul. UN Security Council called on members for troops to aid
South Korea.
(HN, 6/27/98)(MC, 6/27/02)
1950 Jul 24-1950 Jul 27, US orders
in the 25th Infantry Division were issued to treat civilians in the
Korea battle zone as enemy.
(SFC, 1/12/01, p.A8)
1950 Aug 18-25, The Battles of the
Bowling Alley took place during the Korean War in a narrow valley north
of Tabu-dong, Korea on the Taegu-Sangju road. There the U.S. Army‘s
27th Infantry Division and the Republic of Korea‘s (ROK) 1st Infantry
Division faced off against a determined effort by the North Korean
People‘s Army‘s 1st and 13th Infantry Divisions to break through that
segment of the Pusan perimeter. It was part of the overall effort of
the ROK forces and the U.S. Eighth Army to stop the North Korean
advance.
(HNQ, 8/24/00)
1950 Aug 31, Three North Korean
divisions opened an assault on UN lines on the Naktong River in a push
to take Pusan.
(SSFC, 11/7/04, Par p.4)
1950 Sep 1, US Company C, 1st
Battalion of the 23rd Infantry Regiment, was almost completely
annihilated as North Korean divisions opened an assault on UN lines on
the Naktong River. Only Company C and other elements of the 2nd
Infantry Division stood in the path.
(SSFC, 11/7/04, Par p.4)
1950 Sep 26, General Douglas
MacArthur's American X Corps, fresh from the Inchon landing, linked up
with the U.S. Eighth Army after its breakout from the Pusan Perimeter.
United Nations troops recaptured the South Korean capital of Seoul from
the North Koreans. [see Sep 27]
(AP, 9/26/97)(HN, 9/26/99)
1950 Sep 27, U.S. Army and Marine
troops liberated Seoul, South Korea.
(HN, 9/27/98)
1950 Sep 29, General Douglas
MacArthur officially returned Seoul, South Korea, to President Syngman
Rhee.
(HN, 9/29/98)
1950 Sep 30, U.N. forces crossed
the 38th parallel separating North and South Korea as they pursued the
retreating North Korean Army.
(HN, 9/30/98)
1950 Oct 2, Mao Tse Tung sent a
telegram to Stalin. China intervened in Korea.
(MC, 10/2/01)
1950 Oct 30, The First Marine
Division was ordered to replace the entire South Korean I Corps at the
Chosin Reservoir area.
(HN, 10/30/98)
1950 Nov 6, A Chinese offensive
was halted at Chongchon River, North Korea.
(MC, 11/6/01)
1950 Nov 26, China entered the
Korean conflict, launching a counter-offensive across the Yalu River
against soldiers from the United Nations, the United States and South
Korea. North Korean and Chinese troops halted the UN offensive.
(WSJ, 6/24/96, C1)(AP, 11/26/97)(HN, 11/26/98)(MC,
11/26/01)
1950 Nov 27, East of the Chosin
River, Chinese forces annihilated an American task force. Col. Barber
(d.2002 at 82) and 220 soldiers in Fox Company withstood a 5-day
assault to protect an escape pass.
(HN, 11/27/98)(SFC, 4/23/02, p.A18)
1950 Nov 28, In Korea, 200,000
Communist troops launched attack on UN forces.
(HN, 11/28/98)
1950 Nov 30, President Truman
declared that the U.S. would use the A-bomb to get peace in Korea.
(HN, 11/30/98)
1950 Dec 1, In North Korea a US
company of soldiers encountered a swarming Chinese assault near
Kunu-ri. Army Sgt. Richard Desautels was among those captured and taken
to a POW compound, known as Camp 5, near Pyoktong. In 2003 Chinese
authorities said Desautels became mentally ill and died on April 29,
1953, and was buried in a Chinese cemetery.
(SFC, 6/20/08, p.A11)
1950 Dec 5, Pyongyang in Korea
fell to the invading Chinese army.
(HN, 12/5/98)
1950 Dec 28, Chinese troops
crossed the 38th Parallel into South Korea.
(MC, 12/28/01)
1950-1953 The Korean War started on Jun 25, 1950.
2.5 million people were killed. No peace treaty was ever signed. About
1.7 million Americans were involved and there was an estimated 3 mil
casualties including 150,000 (54,246) Americans and over 1 mil Chinese.
In 1999 W.D. Ehrhart and Philip K. Jason edited "Retrieving Bones:
Stories and Poems of the Korean War."
(NG, Aug., 1974, H. E. Kim, p.255)(SFC, 4/8/96,
p.A-9)(WSJ, 8/8/95, p. A15) (SFEM, 11/10/96, p.12)(SFC, 2/17/96,
p.A26)(SFEC, 8/29/99, BR p.3)
1950-1953 Soviet pilots ran the air war over North
Korea and accounted for 70% of the casualties in that part of the
conflict.
(WSJ, 6/13/00, p.A1)
1951 Jan 4, During the Korean
conflict, North Korean and Communist Chinese forces captured the city
of Seoul. UN forces abandoned Seoul, Korea to the Communists.
(AP, 1/4/98)(HN, 1/4/99)
1951 Jan 5, Inchon, South Korea
was abandoned by United Nations force to the advancing Chinese Army.
(HN, 1/5/99)
1951 Jan 17, China refused a
cease-fire in Korea.
(MC, 1/17/02)
1951 Jan 21, Communist troops
forced the UN army out of Inchon, Korea after a 12-hour attack.
(HN, 1/21/99)
1951 Jan 25, The U.S. Eighth Army
in Korea launched Operation Thunderbolt, a counter attack to push the
Chinese Army north of the Han River.
(HN, 1/25/99)
1951 Feb 21, The U. S. Eighth Army
launched Operation Killer, a counterattack to push Chinese forces north
of the Han River in Korea.
(HN, 2/21/99)
1951 Mar 7, U.N. forces in Korea
under General Matthew Ridgeway launched Operation Ripper, an offensive
to straighten out the U.N. front lines against the Chinese.
(HN, 3/7/99)
1951 Mar 12, Communist troops were
driven out of Seoul.
(MC, 3/12/02)
1951 Apr 22-25, The Battle of
Imjin River in the Korean War. The 1st Battalion of the “Glorious”
Gloucestershire Regiment made a remarkable last ditch stand to allow
the British 29th Brigade to withdraw in the face of the oncoming
Chinese army.
(http://britishhistory.about.com)
1951 Apr 25, After a three day
fight against Chinese Communist Forces, the Gloucestershire Regiment
was annihilated on “Gloucester Hill,” in Korea.
(HN, 4/25/99)
1951 May 9, The U.S. Far East Air
Force launched a strike on Sinuiju, North Korea, on the Yalu River.
(HN, 5/9/99)
1951 May 16, Chinese Communist
Forces launched a second step, fifth-phase offensive [in Korea] and
gained up to 20 miles of territory.
(HN, 5/16/99)
1951 May 19, UN began a counter
offensive in Korea.
(MC, 5/19/02)
1951 May 21, The U.S. Eighth Army
counterattacked to drive the Communist Chinese and North Koreans out of
South Korea.
(HN, 5/21/99)
1951 Sep 13, In Korea, U.S. Army
troops began their assault in Heartbreak Ridge. The month-long struggle
would cost 3,700 casualties.
(HN, 9/13/98)
1951 Sep 13, Lt. Daniel J. Marini
led 40 marines to capture Hill 712 in Korea near Imjin River. He
received a Silver Star in 1997.
(SFC, 1/9/97, p.A18)
1951 Sep 13, American Lt. Alvin
Earl Crane was shot down while on a reconnaissance flight over North
Korea. His remains were returned by North Korea in 1990, but positive
identification by DNA only took place in 2005.
(SSFC, 5/14/06, p.B6)
1951 Sep, Some 90 US Marines were
killed taking a North Korea ridge called Hill 749. [see Sep 13]
(SSFC, 5/25/03, Par p.5)
1951 Nov 25, A truce line between
U.N. troops and North Korea was mapped out at the peace talks in
Panmunjom, Korea.
(HN, 11/25/00)
1951 Nov 27, Cease-fire and
demarcation zone accord was signed in Panmunjom, Korea.
(MC, 11/27/01)
1951 Dec 18, North Koreans gave
the Allies a list of 3,100 POWs.
(HN, 12/18/98)
1952 Mar 18, There was a Communist
offensive in Korea.
(MC, 3/18/02)
1952 Mar 27, Elements of the U.S.
Eighth Army reached the 38th parallel in Korea, the original dividing
line between the two Koreas.
(HN, 3/27/99)
1952 Apr 28, War with Japan
officially ended as a treaty that had been signed by the United States
and 47 other countries took effect. Japan regained independence. The
government immediately revoked Japanese nationality from ethnic
Koreans, called zainichi. Those loyal to north Korea were called Soren
and those loyal to South Korea were called Mindan.
(AP, 4/28/00)(Jap. Enc., BLDM, p. 216)(Econ, 6/3/06,
p.40)
1952 Jun 23, The US Air Force
bombed power plants on Yalu River, Korea.
(HN, 6/23/98)
1952 Sep 12, Soviet Lt.
Dobrovichin shot down an American B-29 bomber piloted by Capt. Ted G.
Royer.
(WSJ, 6/13/00, p.A1)
1952 Oct 8, The Chinese began an
offensive in Korea.
(MC, 10/8/01)
1952 Dec 14, Eighty-four Korean
Communist prisoners interned on Pongam Island were killed during a riot
after attempting to escape.
(AP, 12/14/02)
1953 Mar 10, North Korean gunners
at Wonsan fired on the USS Missouri, the ship responds by firing 998
rounds at the enemy position.
(HN, 3/10/99)
1953 Mar 25, The USS Missouri
fired on targets at Kojo, North Korea, the last time her guns fire
until the Persian Gulf War of 1992.
(HN, 3/25/99)
1953 Apr 20, Operation Little
Switch began in Korea, the exchange of sick and wounded prisoners of
war.
(HN, 4/20/99)
1953 Jun 7, Pres. Eisenhower
announced that proposals for a Korean truce are acceptable to the US
and appealed to South Korea to accept terms to stop the war.
(SFC, 6/6/03, p.E2)
1953 Jul 14, There was a Communist
offensive in Korea.
(MC, 7/14/02)
1953 Jul 25, A truce ended the
Korean War.
(SFEC, 5/16/99, Z1 p.4)
1953 Jul 27, An
armistice ending fighting in the three-year Korean War was signed by
representatives of the United Nations, Korea and China in Panmunjom.
Lt. Gen. William K. Harrison represented the UN and Gen. Nam Il
represented North Korea. General Mark Clark, commander of the UN
forces, added his signature to the armistice agreement. Armistice
negotiations had begun in July 1951, when the outlook for reunifying
North and South Korea became bleak, and fighting continued. The
cease-fire provided for an exchange of prisoners of war and established
a 2 ½ mile wide demilitarized zone and a demarcation line at the
38th parallel. Not all aspects of the agreement, however, were
finalized—the UN Commission for the Unification and Rehabilitation of
Korea was not suspended until 1977. N. Korea measures 46,540 sq. miles,
its population in 1974 was ~15 million people. 33,651 Americans had
died and 8,000 were still missing in 2000.
(NG, 8/74, p.255)(TMC, 1994, p.1953)(WSJ, 6/24/96,
C1)(WUD, 1994, p.1685)(HNPD, 7/27/98)(HN, 7/27/98)(SFEC, 5/9/99,
p.T10)(SFEC, 6/25/00, Par p.5)(SFC, 7/25/03, p.E6)
1953 Jul 27, Four neutral
countries, Sweden, Switzerland, Poland and Czechoslovakia, were charged
with referring the armistice.
(WSJ, 3/17/00, p.A1)
1953 Aug 5, Operation "Big Switch"
was under way as prisoners taken during the Korean conflict were
exchanged at Panmunjom.
(AP, 8/5/03)
1953 Sep 21, North Korean pilot
Lieutenant Ro Kim Suk landed his aircraft at Kimpo airfield outside
Seoul.
(HNPD, 8/28/00)
1953 Nov 23, North Korea signed
10-year aid pact with Peking.
(HN, 11/23/98)
1953 Dec 26, U.S. was to withdraw
two divisions from Korea.
(HN, 12/26/98)
1954 Jan 20, Over 22,000
anti-Communist prisoners were turned over to the UN forces in Korea.
(HN, 1/20/99)
1961 Jul 11, China and North Korea
signed the Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance.
This committed China to defend North Korea if attacked.
(www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/wjb/zzjg/yzs/gjlb/2701/default.htm)(Econ,
10/14/06, p.25)
1962 May, US Pvt. Larry Abshier
(19) deserted to North Korea and later died there of natural causes.
(SFC, 8/16/04, p.A5)
1962 Aug 15, US Pvt. James Joseph
Dresnok (21) defected to North Korea. His wife had recently divorced
him and he faced a court-martial. A British film crew met with Dresnok
in 2004. A documentary about his defection, "Crossing the Line," was
released in 2006 and made it to DVD in 2008.
(SFC, 8/16/04, p.A5)(AFP,
1/29/07)(http://tinyurl.com/m59l5v)
1963 Dec, US Cpl. Jerry W. Parrish
(19) deserted to North Korea and later died there of natural causes.
(SFC, 8/16/04, p.A5)
1965 Jan 5, Charles Robert Jenkins
(b.1940) deserted his US Army post at the Korean DMZ hoping to be
arrested, turned over to Russia and returned to the US. His plan failed
and he ended up living in North Korea where he married Hitomi Soga, a
Japanese woman kidnapped by North Korea in the 1970s. In 2004 Jenkins
reunited with his wife in Indonesia and in September turned himself in
to US military authorities in Japan. [see Sep 1, 1965] In 2008 Jenkins
with Jim Frederick authored “The Reluctant Communist: My Desertion,
Court-Martial, and Forty-Year Imprisonment in North Korea.”
(SFC, 11/2/02, p.A5)(SSFC, 5/23/04, p.A18)(WSJ,
7/12/04, p.A1)(AP, 9/1/04)(WSJ, 3/13/08,
p.D9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Robert_Jenkins)
1968 Jan 21, A group of 31 North
Korean commandos trudged undetected for about 40 miles from the border
to the presidential Blue House of South Korean President Park Chung-hee
in downtown Seoul. South Korean security forces repelled the assault.
28 North Koreans and 34 South Koreans were killed.
(SFC, 9/19/96, p.A8)(AP, 12/25/03)
1968 Jan 23, North Korea seized
the U.S. Navy intelligence ship Pueblo, charging it had intruded into
the communist nation's territorial waters on a spying mission. One
crewman was killed in the attack. Cmdr. Lloyd Bucher (d.2004 at 76) was
quickly separated from the 81-man crew. The crew was released 11 months
later.
(NG, 8/74, p.266)(AP, 1/23/98)(SFC, 10/2/01,
p.A15)(SFC, 1/30/04, p.A25)
1969 Apr 15, North Korea shot down
a US airplane above the Sea of Japan. All 31 men aboard the plane were
believed dead.
(www.willyvictor.com/History/Korean_Shootdown/Korea.html)
1968 Apr, The South Korean Silmido
Unit was forged of misfits to "blast Kim Il Sung's palace in Pyongyang
and cut his throat."
(AP, 12/25/03)
1968 Dec 23, The 82 crew members
of the US intelligence ship Pueblo were released by North Korea, 11
months after they had been captured.
(AP, 12/23/97)
1970 Apr 30, Yoshimi Tanaka and a
group of students of the Red Army Faction, including Shiro Akagi,
seized a Japan Airlines jet and flew to Pyongyang, N. Korea, in Japan's
first ever case of air piracy. In 1996 Tanaka was sentenced to 12 years
in prison.
(http://tinyurl.com/3c4bk7)(AP,
6/5/07)(www.tkb.org/KeyLeader.jsp?memID=102)
1971 May 10, Kim Jong Nam, son of
Kim Jong il, was born to Sung Hye Rim, a celebrated actress.
(SFC, 5/4/01, p.A15)
1971 Aug 23, South Korea's
Silmido Unit, organized in 1968 to kill North Korea's Kim Il Sung,
rebelled and murdered 18 of its 24 trainers. A film titled "Silmido"
was released Dec 24, 2003.
(AP, 12/25/03)
1973 Dec 10, North Korea and India
established diplomatic ties.
(AFP, 2/7/06)(http://tinyurl.com/4vzdbf)
1973 North Korea made a filmed
version of the 8-act opera "The Flower Girl" and showed it across China.
(WSJ, 2/23/99, p.A20)
1973 Kim Jong il, son of North
Korean leader Kim Il Sung, authored “On the Subject of the Cinema.” A
collection of his reviews, titled “The Art of Cinema,” was published in
2001.
(http://slate.msn.com/id/2073123/)
1975 Aug, North Korea seized 33
South Korean fisherman near their maritime border. In 2006 Choi Uk-il,
one of the 33, escaped to China and returned home to South Korea.
(Econ, 1/13/07,
p.38)(www.asiafinest.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=102448)
1976 Aug 18, Two U.S. Army
officers were killed in Korea's demilitarized zone as a group of North
Korean soldiers wielding axes and metal pikes attacked U.S. and South
Korean soldiers. Major Arthur G. Bonifas was attacked and beaten to
death by North Korean soldiers as he attempted to cut down a poplar
tree in the DMZ.
(SFEC, 6/25/00, p.T8)(AP, 8/18/02)
1977 Mar 9, Pres. Carter proposed
an end to travel restrictions to Cuba, Vietnam, N. Korea and Cambodia
effective as of March 18.
(www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/print.php?pid=7139)
1977 Nov 15, Megumi Yokota (13)
disappeared after school in Niigata, Japan. It was later suspected that
she, and possibly 9 others, had been kidnapped by North Korea. In 2002
N. Korea admitted the kidnapping.
(SFEC, 10/15/00, p.A25)(SFC, 9/18/02, p.A10)
1977 North Korea passed a land law
whereby all land was made property of the state and co-operatives, with
no rights for sale or purchase. By 2007 even the government was
involved in apartment transactions to satisfy demand for up-market
housing.
(Econ, 11/24/07, p.48)
1978 Jan, South Korean actress
Choi Eun Hee (b.1928), while visiting Hong Kong, was kidnapped to North
Korea. Two weeks later her husband, Shin Sang Ok, prominent South
Korean producer and director, was searching for her in Hong Kong when
he was knocked out with chloroform and shipped to North Korea. In 1986
Sang-Ok (d.2006) and his wife, while on a promotional trip, fled to a
US embassy in Vienna.
(http://tinyurl.com/bnoq)(Econ, 4/29/06, p.90)
1978 Jul, Yasushi Chimura (23) and
Fukie Hamamoto (23) disappeared from Japan. In 2002 they were listed
among those kidnapped by N. Korea.
(SFC, 9/18/02, p.A10)
1978 Jul, Kaoru Hasuike (20) and
Yukiko Okudo (22) disappeared from Japan. In 2002 they were listed
among those kidnapped by N. Korea.
(SFC, 9/18/02, p.A10)
1979 A North Korean chemist in
2004 reported that he witnessed the death of 2 men this year as the
regime tested chemical weapons on political prisoners.
(AP, 3/4/04)
1980-1982 Luise Rinser (d.2002), German author,
visited North Korea 3 times and later authored “Diary of a North Korean
Journey.”
(SFC, 3/19/02, p.A20)
1983 Keiko Arimoto was lured to N.
Korea while job hunting in Denmark. In 2002 N. Korea admitted to having
kidnapped her and listed her as dead.
(SFC, 9/18/02, p.A10)
1984-1998 Ri Jong Ok (d.1999 at 83) served as vice
president. He had helped Kim Il Sung build the North Korean Communist
State.
(SFC, 9/24/99, p.D6)
1986 North Korea started a
5-megawatt nuclear reactor at Yongbyon after seven years of
construction with Soviet help.
(SFC, 6/28/08, p.A3)
1987 Kim Jong il, son of North
Korean leader Kim Il Sung, authored the treatise: “Theory of Cinematic
Art.”
(www.korea-dpr.com/library/209.pdf)
1987 Lim Kook-Jae (33), a South
Korean fisherman, was abducted in the Yellow Sea. In 2008 he died at
one of the North's political camps in the northeastern port of Chongjin
after failed attempts to escape.
(AFP, 10/13/08)
1991 Sep 17, The U.N. General
Assembly opened its 46th session, welcoming new members Estonia,
Latvia, Lithuania, North and South Korea, the Marshall Islands and
Micronesia.
(AP, 9/17/01)
1991 Dec 13, North Korea and South
Korea signed a non-aggression agreement aimed at eventual
reconciliation.
(AP, 12/13/01)
1991 Dec 14, Former East German
leader Erich Honecker, facing extradition to Germany and trial on
manslaughter charges, was offered asylum in North Korea.
(AP, 12/14/02)
1991 North Korea declared the
4-country armistice referee group a "non-existent organization."
(WSJ, 3/17/00, p.A1)
1991 In North Korea Kim Jong Il
(b.1942) became head of the armed forces under his ruling father, Kim
Il Sung.
(Econ, 9/13/08, p.49)
1992 The two Koreas agreed in a
pact to continue talks to demarcate the sea border while respecting the
Northern Limit Line (NLL) until a new border is set.
(AP, 8/29/07)
1993 Mar 11, North Korea withdrew
from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in a harsh rebuff of Western
demands to open suspected nuclear weapons development sites for
inspection. It later suspended its withdrawal.
(AP, 3/11/98)(AP, 4/24/03)
1993 Jun 11, North Korea pulled
Asia back from the brink of a possible nuclear arms race by reversing
its decision to withdraw from a treaty preventing spread of nuclear
weapons.
(AP, 6/11/03)
1993 Jul 10, President Clinton
ended his visit to Japan, then traveled to South Korea, where in a
speech to the National Assembly he denounced communist North Korea for
raising the specter of "nuclear annihilation."
(AP, 7/10/98)
1993 North Korea refused to
recognize the new Czech Republic as a replacement to Czechoslovakia in
the 4-country armistice referee group.
(WSJ, 3/17/00, p.A1)
1993 Russia annulled an agreement
obliging it to come to the aid of North Korea in case of attack.
(SFC, 4/13/96, p.A-9)
1994 Mar 19, Talks between North
Korea and South Korea collapsed, imperiling a U.S.-brokered deal to
resolve the North Korean nuclear dispute.
(AP, 3/19/99)
1994 May 30, The U.N. Security
Council warned North Korea to stop refueling a nuclear reactor and
allow U.N. monitors to perform full inspections.
(AP, 5/30/99)
1994 Jun 11, The United States,
South Korea and Japan agreed to seek punitive steps against North Korea
over its nuclear program.
(AP, 6/11/99)
1994 Jun 16, Former President
Jimmy Carter, on a private visit to North Korea, reported the Communist
nation's leaders were eager to resume talks with the United States on
resolving disputes about Pyongyang's nuclear program and improving
relations.
(AP, 6/16/99)
1994 Jun 18, The presidents of
North Korea and South Korea agreed to hold a historic summit. Plans
were disrupted by the death of North Korean leader Kim Il Sung on July
8.
(AP, 6/18/99)
1994 Jun 28, North and South Korea
set July 25-27 as the dates for a historic summit. The summit was
derailed by the death of North Korean President Kim Il Sung on Jul 8.
(AP, 6/28/99)
1994 Jul 8, Kim Il Sung ("Great
Leader"), North Korea's communist leader since 1948, died at age 82.
His son Kim Jong Il ("The Dear Leader") succeeded him.
(AP, 7/8/97)(WSJ, 6/26/97, p.A14)
1994 Jul 9, Planned talks between
North Korea and South Korea were put on hold following the death of
North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung.
(AP, 7/9/99)
1994 Jul 19, Funeral services were
held for North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung, who had died July 8 at age
82.
(AP, 7/19/99)
1994 Oct 21, United States and
North Korea signed an agreement requiring the communist nation to halt
its nuclear program and agree to inspections. Fuel rods from North
Korea’s nuclear reactor were to be shipped out of the country, but that
did not happen.
(AP, 10/21/99)(Econ, 7/21/07, p.41)
1994 Nov 14, President Clinton, in
Indonesia, met one-on-one with the leaders of China, Japan and South
Korea, winning pledges to keep the pressure on North Korea to freeze
its nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 11/13/99)
1994 Nov 14, U.S. experts visited
North Korea's main nuclear complex for the first time under an accord
aimed at opening such sites to outside inspections.
(AP, 11/14/99)
1994 Dec 17, North Korea shot down
a U.S. Army helicopter which had strayed north of the demilitarized
zone -- the co-pilot, Chief Warrant Officer David Hilemon, was killed;
the pilot, Chief Warrant Officer Bobby Hall, was captured and held for
nearly two weeks.
(AP, 12/17/99)
1994 Dec 22, North Korea handed
over the body of American pilot David Hilemon, killed when his
helicopter was shot down over the communist country three days earlier.
(AP, 12/22/99)
1994 Dec 29, U.S. officials
confirmed the release in North Korea of Army helicopter pilot Bobby
Hall, 12 days after he was captured in a shootdown in which co-pilot
David Hilemon was killed. Due to the time difference, it was Dec. 30 in
Korea when Hall crossed the demilitarized zone to freedom.
(AP, 12/29/04)
1994 An accord called the Agreed
Framework was made in which North Korea pledged to give up its nuclear
weapons program in exchange for billions in Western aid.
(SFC, 8/17/98, p.A8)(SFEC, 12/6/98, p.A28)
1994 Aoyama, a Japanese-born North
Korean engineer, began spying for Japan. In 1997 as an industrial spy
in Beijing he confirmed that North Korea had developed a nuclear bomb.
(SFC, 11/28/02, p.F5)
1995 Mar, The Korean Peninsula
Energy Development Organization (KEDO) was formed. It was charged with
building 2 light-water reactors in North Korea.
(WSJ, 1/30/03, p.A1)
1995 North Korea expelled Poland
as a member of the armistice referee group.
(WSJ, 3/17/00, p.A1)
1995-1998 In 1999 North Korea reported that some
220,000 people died from famine over this period. South Korean
officials estimated that the population had fallen from 25 million to
23 million. In 1998 a US congressional delegation estimated the number
to be 2 million.
(SFC, 5/11/99, p.A12)(SFEC, 8/15/99, p.A21)
1996 May 20, The US paid North
Korea $2 million to help recover the remains of US soldiers killed
during the Korean War.
(SFC, 5/21/96, p.A-11)
1996 May 23, A North Korean pilot
flew his unarmed Mig-19 jet to South Korea. Capt. Lee Chul Soo (30) was
the first pilot to defect since 1983.
(SFC, 5/24/96, p.A12)
1996 Jun 17, The UN sponsored
Conference on Disarmament agreed to admit 23 new members, among them
Iraq, Syria, Israel, North Korea and South Africa.
(SFC, 6/18/96, p.A10)
1996 Jun 19, A pending application
for membership in the International Air Transport Association by North
Korea could be accepted as early as next month.
(WSJ, 6/18/96, p.A10)
1996 Aug 15, In South Korea some
6,000 police clashed with 7,000 students who protested for
reunification with North Korea and the removal of 37,000 US troops.
(SFC, 8/16/96, p.A17)
1996 Aug 24, In North Korea
American Evan Carl Hunzike was arrested for spying. He entered
illegally from China to get information on the domestic situation.
(SFEC, 10/7/96, A8)
1996 Sep 15, In North Korea the
Rajin-Sonbong Free Economic and Trade Zone, a 288 sq. ml. area with a
local population of 140,000, was being established behind barbed wire
in the northeast corner.
(SFC, 9/15/96, p.A15)
1996 Sep 18, A North Korean
submarine went aground off the coast of South Korea. The bodies of 11
crewmen were found dead nearby. Another 8-9 men were still at large.
Seven more were found the next day and shot to death.
(SFC, 9/19/96, p.A8)(SFC, 9/20/96, p.A14)
1996 Sep 22, In South Korea the
captain of the North Korean submarine, recently grounded, was tracked
down and killed. Another infiltrator and 2 South Korean soldiers were
also killed in 2 clashes.
(SFC, 9/23/96, A10)
1996 Nov 27, Evan C. Hunziker, an
American jailed by North Korea on spy charges, was set free, ending a
three-month ordeal.
(AP, 11/27/97)
1996 A North Korean defector in
1997 claimed that the government had banned abortions and was
encouraging women to bear children to increase the population in order
to maintain the army.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A13)
1997 Jun 30, North Korea agreed to
hold talks with South Korea in NYC beginning Aug 5.
(SFC, 7/1/97, p.A8)
1997 Nov 26, In a small but
symbolic step, the United States and North Korea held high-level
discussions at the State Department for the first time.
(AP, 11/26/98)
1997 Kim Dok Hong, a senior member
of North Korea’s ruling Worker’s Party, defected through China to Seoul.
(WSJ, 1/7/03, p.A1)
1998 May 4, The Clinton
administration invoked sanctions against North Korea and Pakistan for a
secret 1997 missile deal. Pakistan’s military named the acquired
missile, Ghauri, after a famous Muslim warrior who slew a Hindu emperor
named Prithvi, the name of a Russian made Indian missile.
(SFC, 5/14/98, p.A16)
1998 Oct 24, Officials from the
US, China and North and South Korea seeking a permanent peace for the
divided Korean peninsula announced in Geneva they had removed the last
obstacles to full-blown talks.
(AP, 10/24/03)
1998 Dec 10, In North Korea it was
reported that a Fall scientific survey found that 62% of the children
under 7 years old suffered from stunted growth due to malnutrition. An
entire generation of children were feared to be physically and mentally
impaired.
(SFC, 12/10/98, p.C5)
1998 South Korea began running a
tourist resort at Mount Kumgang, just on the northern side of the
divided Korean peninsula. Hyundai Asan began operating the 4,900-acre
compound.
(Econ, 10/28/06, p.49)(WSJ, 5/17/08, p.W7)
1999 Jan 16, The US and North
Korea opened talks on inspections of a suspected underground nuclear
facility.
(SFEC, 1/17/99, p.A10)
1999 Jan 17, US talks with North
Korea over inspection of an underground nuclear site were adjourned.
North Korea demanded $300 million in compensation to inspect the
Kumchangni site.
(SFC, 1/18/99, p.A14)
1999 Mar 16, North Korea agreed to
allow US inspectors to visit a suspected nuclear weapons site in
exchange for assistance to increase potato yields.
(SFC, 3/17/99, p.A8)
1999 Mar 22, The Clinton
administration announced new food deals for North Korea to total $60
million.
(WSJ, 3/23/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 1, A US report on policy
with North Korea indicated that North Korea was involved in the
production and distribution of narcotics. An area 10-17 thousand acres
was estimated to be under poppy cultivation with opium production at
30-44 annual metric tons.
(SFC, 3/27/99, p.A10)
1999 May 17, The US announced a
400,000 ton food aid donation to North Korea, as inspectors flew in to
check on nuclear weapons development.
(SFC, 5/18/99, p.C12)
1999 May 27, In North Korea US
inspectors found an empty tunnel at a suspected nuclear arms site.
(WSJ, 5/28/99, p.A1)
1999 Jun 2, The International
Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. atomic watchdog, reported it could no
longer verify the status of North Korea's nuclear program, prompting
the United States to seek economic sanctions.
(AP, 6/2/04)
1999 Jun 11, South Korean ships
rammed and briefly repelled 4 North Korean patrol boats. North Korea
warned South Korea to withdraw warships from disputed waters in the
Yellow Sea on the 5th day of a standoff.
(SFC, 6/12/99, p.A13)(SFEC, 6/13/99, p.A13)
1999 Jun 13, North Korea agreed to
talk to UN military officers in an attempt to resolve the naval
confrontations with South Korea.
(SFC, 6/14/99, p.A13)
1999 Jun 14, South Korean warships
sank a North Korean torpedo boat and damaged another in the Yellow Sea.
(SFC, 6/15/99, p.A1)
1999 Jun 22, Talks between North
and South Korea broke down after 90 minutes as North Korea demanded and
apology from South Korea for the naval clash in the Yellow Sea where
some 30 North Korean sailors were believed to have died in a June 15
shootout.
(SFC, 6/23/99, p.A14)
1999 Jul 3, In Beijing talks
between the North and South Korea collapsed.
(SFEC, 7/4/99, p.A22)
1999 Jul 26, Japanese government
officials and US Sec. of State Madeleine Albright issued a threat of
economic and diplomatic consequences to North Korea if it fires another
rocket over Japanese territory.
(SFC, 8/3/99, p.A10)
1999 Aug 4, It was reported that
flooding in North Korea had claimed 42 lives.
(WSJ, 8/4/99, p.A1)
1999 Sep 2, North Korea declared a
new demilitarized zone with South Korea that placed 5 islands
controlled by South Korea with North Korean territory.
(SFC, 9/3/99, p.A9)
1999 Sep 12, North Korea agreed
indirectly to freeze its missile testing program.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A10)
1999 Sep 17, The US lifted key
parts of its trade embargo against North Korea following North Korea's
pledge to refrain from testing long-range missiles.
(SFC, 9/18/99, p.A1)
1999 Dec, A US-led group signed a
$4.6 billion contract to build two nuclear reactors in North Korea.
(AP, 4/24/03)
1999 Nicholas Eberstadt published
"The End of North Korea." He viewed the country's political decline as
imminent and its economic decline as irreversible.
(WSJ, 1/6/00, p.A20)
1999 Abdul Qadeer Khan, a
Pakistani scientist, visited North Korea and was shown 3 nuclear
devices according to a report he made public in 2004.
(SFC, 4/13/04, p.A1)
2000 Apr 9, North and South Korea
agreed to a summit meeting in June.
(SFC, 4/10/00, p.A1)
2000 May 18, North and South Korea
agreed to an agenda for their 1st summit meeting. In 2003 it was
reported that South Korea's Hyundai business group drew $186 million
from a government-owned bank shortly before the summit and allegedly
spent the money on unspecified projects in the North. In 2006 it was
reported that Hyundai sent some $500 million to Kim Jong Il to secure
the summit.
(WSJ, 5/19/00, p.A1)(AP, 2/1/03)(Econ, 10/28/06,
p.49)
2000 May 29-31, Kim Jong il
visited China and met with pres. Jiang Zemin and the ruling Communist
Party’s inner circle. He received promises of free food and other
material assistance.
(SFC, 6/2/00, p.A16)
2000 May, A visiting inspection
team found a tunnel complex, suspected of being a nuclear arms project,
unchanged from a year ago.
(WSJ, 5/31/00, p.A1)
2000 Jun 13, Pres. Kim Jong il of
North Korea met with Pres. Kim Dae Jung of South Korea in the 1st
meeting ever between leaders of the 2 countries. They agreed to try to
satisfy their people’s desire for reconciliation. Border loudspeakers
that blasted insults at South Korea were shut off.
(SFC, 6/13/00, p.A10)(SFC, 6/14/00, p.A1)(SFC,
6/17/00, p.A9)
2000 Jun 14, Pres. Kim Jong il of
North Korea and Pres. Kim Dae Jung of South Korea pledged concrete
steps toward unifying their divided peninsula and signed an agreement
to allow visits for some families separated for the last five decades.
(SFC, 6/15/00, p.A1)
2000 Jun 19, The Clinton
administration moved to lift trade sanctions against North Korea.
(SFC, 6/20/00, p.A12)
2000 Jun 21, North Korea extended
its ban on missile flight-testing and the US responded with plans to
renew talks to curb the long-range missile program.
(SFC, 6/22/00, p.A12)
2000 Jun 30, North and South Korea
signed an agreement to allow 100 people each to reunite with families
across their border beginning Aug 15.
(SFC, 7/1/00, p.A12)
2000 Jul 19, In North Korea
Russia’s Pres. Putin met with Kim Jong il. Kim promised to abandon his
missile program if other states provide technology for “peaceful space
research.’ Kim later said this was just a joke.
(SFC, 7/20/00, p.A13)(WSJ, 8/15/00, p.A1)
2000 Jul 27, North Korea joined
the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
(SFC, 7/28/00, p.D3)
2000 Jul 30, North and South Korea
agreed to hold regular high-level talks and to re-open their suspended
border liaisons to implement earlier agreements.
(SFEC, 7/30/00, p.A2)
2000 Jul 31, North and South Korea
agreed to reopen border liaison offices and reconnect a railway linking
their capitals.
(AP, 7/31/01)
2000 Aug 15, One hundred people
from North Korea and 100 people from South Korea held temporary
reunions with family members not seen in 50 years.
(SFC, 8/15/00, p.A13)
2000 Sep 15, Groundbreaking for a
new highway between North and South Korea was scheduled.
(SFC, 8/25/00, p.D5)
2000 Sep 1, South Korea
repatriated 63 North Korean spies as a gesture of reconciliation.
(SFC, 9/2/00, p.A13)
2000 Sep 17, In Korea a
ground-breaking ceremony was held at Imjingak for a railroad to connect
the capitals of North and South Korea.
(SFC, 9/18/00, p.A9)
2000 Sep 25, In Cheju, South
Korea, the North and South Korea defense ministers, Cho Sung Tae and
Kim Il Chul, met and pledged to work for reconciliation.
(SFC, 9/26/00, p.A11)
2000 Oct 10, Pres. Clinton met
with Vice Marshal Jo Myong Rok, the most senior North Korean official
to ever visit the US.
(WSJ, 10/10/00, p.A1)
2000 Oct 12, North Korea’s
Vice-Marshal Jo Myong Rok presented Pres. Clinton with a personal
invitation from Pres. Kim to visit Pyongyang. The Clinton
administration and North Korea issued a joint communique asserting a
decision to “fundamentally improve” their relations.
(SFC, 10/13/00, p.A17)(WSJ, 1/2/03, p.A1)
2000 Oct 22, US Sec. of State
Madeleine Albright arrived in North Korea to pave the way for a
possible visit by Pres. Clinton.
(SFC, 10/23/00, p.A10)
2000 Oct 23, Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright held groundbreaking talks in North Korea with
communist leader Kim Jong il.
(AP, 10/23/01)
2000 Oct 24, In North Korea Kim
Jong il promised not to launch any ballistic missiles during talks with
US Sec. of State Madeleine Albright in return for a package that
included the launch of a North Korean satellite.
(SFC, 10/25/00, p.A17)(WSJ, 10/25/00, p.A1)
2000 Nov 30, North and South Korea
made their 2nd exchange of 100 relatives each. Some 100,000 South
Koreans were on waiting lists for family visits.
(SFC, 12/1/00, p.D8)
2000 North Korea launched a
nationwide fiber optic intranet known as Kwangmyong (bright).
(Econ, 2/3/07, p.43)
2000 The population numbered
21,386,109.
(SFC, 6/13/00, p.A1)
2001 cFeb 25, A 3rd reunion began
as groups of 100 arrived in North and South Korea.
(WSJ, 2/26/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 24, EU leaders ended a 2
day meeting in Stockholm announced that they would dispatch a team of
mediators to help the peace process between North and South Korea.
(SSFC, 3/25/01, p.C6)
2001 Apr 15, The 1st Pyongyang
International Marathon was set to start and end at the 70,000 Kim Il
Sung Stadium.
(WSJ, 4/9/01, p.A22)
2001 Apr 17, It was reported that
the most recent harvest was the worst since the famine of 1997 and that
only two-thirds of the food it needs was produced. Dr. Vollertsen, a
German physician who worked there for 18 months (1999-2000) wrote in an
editorial: “Peasants, slaves to the regime, lead lives of utter
destitution… North Korea suffers from society-wide fear and depression
because of the cruel system… The people can’t help themselves, they are
brainwashed, and too afraid to overthrow their rulers.”
(WSJ, 4/17/01, p.A14,20)
2001 May 1, In Japan Kim Jong Nam
(29), the son of Kim Jong il of North Korea, was detained with his son
as they attempted to visit Tokyo’s Disneyland. They were later deported
to China.
(SFC, 5/4/01, p.A14)
2001 May 2, In North Korea Kim
Jong il agreed to hold talks with visiting EU officials about his
missile program and tensions with South Korea. Kim Jong il announced
that North Korea would launch no ballistic missiles until 2003.
(WSJ, 5/3/01, p.A1)(SFC, 5/4/01, p.A14)
2001 May 14, The European
Commission announced that it would establish diplomatic ties with North
Korea.
(WSJ, 5/15/01, p.A1)
2001 Jun 6, Pres. Bush announced
plans to restart negotiations with North Korea on issues ranging from
missile production to border soldier deployment.
(SFC, 6/7/01, p.A12)
2001 Jul 13, It was reported that
record droughts persisted in Afghanistan northern China, North Korea,
Mongolia and Tajikistan.
(SFC, 7/13/01, p.D4)
2001 Jul 25, Kim Jong il of North
Korea rode by rail into Russia for a meeting with Pres. Putin.
(WSJ, 7/26/01, p.A11)
2001 Jul, The US State Department
reported that North Korea was going ahead with development of its
long-range missile.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2001 Aug 3, Kim Jong il arrived in
Moscow following 9-day train ride from North Korea.
(SFC, 8/4/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 4, In Moscow Kim Jong il
and Pres. Putin signed a joint statement declaring that North Korea’s
missile program is not designed to threaten any nation.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.A12)(AP, 8/4/02)
2001 Sep 2, North Korea announced
a desire to reopen stalled peace talks with South Korea.
(SFC, 9/3/01, p.A8)
2001 Sep 6, North and South Korea
agreed to resume talks next week.
(SFC, 9/7/01, p.A16)
2001 Sep 15, North and South
Korea began a 4-day series of meetings.
(SSFC, 9/16/01, p.A28)
2001 Sep 17, In South Korea
negotiators for the North and South concluded 2 days of talks and
agreed on an exchange of family visits. The North agreed to soon begin
construction on its side of a railroad to link the 2 sides.
(SFC, 9/18/01, p.B10)
2001 Oct 16, It was reported that
flooding in North Korea had killed at least 81 people and damaged vast
amounts of cropland over the last week. This portended an 8th year of
food shortages.
(WSJ, 10/16/01, p.A1)
2001 Oct 26, North Korea said it
was no longer interested in dialogue with the US due to Pres. Bush’s
recent description of North Korea as “so suspicious and secretive.”
(SFC, 10/27/01, p.A9)
2001 Dec 22, A fishing boat from
North Korea, suspected of spying, exchanged fire with Japanese coast
vessels and sank after a 6-hour chase. 15 crewmen were lost. 2 bodies
were later recovered. North Korea later denied any links to the fishing
boat and accused Japan of a “smear campaign.”
(SSFC, 12/23/01, p.A15)(SFC, 12/24/01, p.A4)(SFC,
12/27/01, p.A5)
2001 In 2004 the UN gathered
evidence suggesting the North Korea supplied Libya with nearly 2 tons
of uranium in 2001.
(WSJ, 5/24/04, p.A1)
2002 Jan 29, Pres. Bush made his
1st State of the Union address and declared that the “war against
terror is only beginning.” Bush singled out Iran, Iraq and North Korea
as an “axis of evil.”
(SFC, 1/30/02, p.A1)(SFC, 1/31/02, p.A1)
2002 Feb 19, President Bush opened
a two-day visit to South Korea. Bush urged the “despotic regime” in
North Korea to reunite with the free South.
(SFC, 2/20/02, p.A14)(AP, 2/19/07)
2002 Feb 21, Pres. Bush met with
Pres. Zemin in Beijing and both agreed to work on the reunification of
North and South Korea.
(SFC, 2/21/02, p.A12)
2002 Mar 15, China allowed 25
North Korean asylum seekers to leave the Spanish Embassy in Beijing for
South Korea by way of the Philippines.
(WSJ, 3/18/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 25, North and South Korea
issued a joint statement with plans to resume dialogue to improve
relations.
(SFC, 3/25/02, p.A8)
2002 Mar 29, It was reported that
Russia had announced plans to build a nuclear plant for North Korea.
(WSJ, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 15-2002 Jun 29,
Festivities were scheduled in North Korea to celebrate the birthdays of
Pres. Jung-Il Kim and founder Il-Sung Kim
(SSFC, 3/17/02, p.A22)
2002 Apr 6, South Korea envoy Lim
Dong Won said North Korea is ready to resume dialogue with the US.
(SFC, 4/6/02, p.A8)
2002 Jun 23, Twenty-six North
Korean asylum seekers left South Korean and Canadian diplomatic
compounds in Beijing bound for South Korea, ending a monthlong
diplomatic standoff.
(AP, 6/23/03)
2002 Jun 29, A South Korean patrol
boat was sunk in the yellow Sea border waters and four South Koreans
were killed with 22 wounded. North and South Korea blamed each other
for the sea battle which cast a shadow over the South's World Cup
finale as well as reconciliation efforts on the peninsula.
(SSFC, 6/30/02, p.A14)
2002 Jul 31, In Brunei U.S.
Secretary of State Colin Powell met his North Korean counterpart for an
informal chat, as easing inter-Korean tensions stole the spotlight at
an Asia-Pacific security forum.
(Reuters, 7/31/02)
2002 Jul, North Korea introduced
some economic reforms that included the withdrawal of state subsidies
to state-owned enterprises and the legalization of farmers’ markets.
(Econ, 3/13/04, p.41)
2002 Aug 3, North and South Korea
opened a fresh round of talks amid moves by the communist North to
improve ties with the United States and Japan and revitalize its
faltering economy.
(AP, 8/3/02)
2002 Aug 8, South Korea said 10
people were dead after four days of torrential rains that North Korea
reported had also caused scores of casualties and destroyed crops in
the hungry communist state.
(Reuters, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 21, North Korean leader
Kim Jong il toured the shop floor of a Russian defense plant, getting a
firsthand glimpse of how Russia's Sukhoi fighter jets are manufactured.
(AP, 8/21/02)
2002 Aug 22, North Korean leader
Kim Jong il made his second visit to Russia in a year, meeting with
President Vladimir Putin in Vladivostok.
(AP, 8/22/03)
2002 Aug 23, The United States
imposed symbolic sanctions on a North Korean company and the North
Korean government for exporting medium or long-range missile components.
(Reuters, 8/23/02)
2002 Aug 23, North Korean leader
Kim Jong il capped his second visit to Russia in a year with a long
meeting with President Vladimir Putin and a taste of the consumer
delights that are in short supply in his country. Putin pressed North
Korea on Friday to forge a new Asia-Europe freight route by extending
Russia's trans-Siberian railway across the Korean peninsula to bypass
China.
(AP, 8/23/02)(Reuters, 8/23/02)
2002 Aug 30, It was reported that
North Korea has made changes in its economic system that included a
phase out of its public distribution system, price increases and salary
increases.
(SFC, 8/30/02, p.A14)
2002 Sep 14, South and North Korea
have set a date to begin mine clearing and establish a military hotline
during reconstruction of railway links across their fortified border
divided for 50 years.
(Reuters, 9/14/02)
2002 Sep 17, Kim Jong-il
apologized to Japanese PM Junichiro Koizumi for abductions of Japanese
citizens and offered concessions on security issues of global concern.
Both leaders exchanged apologies. Of 11 Japanese on an official North
Korea list of those who were kidnapped in the 1970s and 1980s, only 4
were still alive. Details of the kidnapped were made public Oct 2.
North Korea announced that it will indefinitely extend its moratorium
on missile testing as part of the North Korea-Japan Pyongyang
Declaration signed during a meeting between Japanese PM Junichiro
Koizumi and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.
(AP, 9/17/02)(SFC, 10/3/02,
p.A8)(www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron.asp)
2002 Sep 19, North Korea announced
it had made the city of Sinuiju on its border with China a "special
administrative region," a move South Korean media said was the first
step towards creating a new economic zone.
(Reuters, 9/19/02)
2002 Sep 28, In South Korea
torches from 44 diverse lands converged and rival South and North
Korean teams marched together as Asia kicked off its biggest festival
of sport.
(Reuters, 9/29/02)
2002 Oct 4, North Korean officials
told a visiting US delegation that the country has a second covert
nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2002 Oct 16, A Bush administration
official reported that North Korea had told the United States it has a
secret nuclear weapons program in violation of a 1994 agreement signed
with the Clinton administration.
(AP, 10/16/02)(SFC, 10/17/02, p.A1)
2002 Nov 14, Diplomats from the
United States, European Union, South Korea and Japan decided to cut off
the shipments of oil to North Korea in response to its violation of a
1994 nuclear agreement.
(Reuters, 11/15/02)
2002 Nov 21, A US-led consortium
said it is suspending construction of 2 new nuclear reactors in North
Korea.
(SFC, 6/28/08, p.A3)
2002 Nov, North Korean leader Kim
Jong Il in a private message to Pres. Bush said the US and North Korea
"should be able to resolve the nuclear issue in compliance with the
demands of the new century." The message was not disclosed until 2005.
(AP, 6/22/05)
2002 Dec 9, US and Spanish forces
seized an unflagged ship from North Korea that was carrying Scud
missiles to Yemen.
(SFC, 12/11/02, p.A1)
2002 Dec 11, Yemen said Scud
missiles found hidden aboard a North Korean ship seized by Spain and
the United States were destined for its army and demanded them back.
Pres. Bush ordered them released. Bush later created a coalition of
members to block arms shipments "of proliferation concern."
(Reuters, 12/11/02)(SFC, 12/12/02, p.A19)(WSJ,
10/21/03, p.A1)
2002 Dec 12, North Korea said it
was immediately activating the nuclear reactor at Yongbyon that was
shut down in 1994, due to suspension of fuel deliveries.
(SFC, 12/13/02, p.A1)
2002 Dec 22, North Korea said it
had begun removing U.N. monitoring equipment from a nuclear reactor at
the centre of the communist state's suspected pursuit of nuclear
weapons.
(Reuters, 12/22/02)
2002 Dec 23, North Korea
dismantled UN surveillance cameras and broke locks on the Yangbyon
reprocessing plant for spent nuclear fuel.
(SFC, 12/24/02, p.A1)
2002 Dec 24, North Korea ratcheted
up its standoff with Washington, starting repairs at a long-frozen
nuclear reactor and warning that U.S. policy was leading to an
"uncontrollable catastrophe" and the "brink of nuclear war."
(AP, 12/24/03)
2002 Dec 26, The Int’l. Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA) said North Korea had moved 1,000 fresh fuel rods
to a nuclear reactor that produces plutonium used in nuclear warheads.
(AP, 12/26/02)
2002 Dec 27, A defiant North Korea
ordered U.N. nuclear inspectors to leave the country and said it would
restart a laboratory capable of producing plutonium for nuclear
weapons. But the U.N. nuclear watchdog said its inspectors were
"staying put" for the time being.
(AP, 12/27/03)
2002 Dec 28, The U.N. nuclear
agency said its inspectors would leave North Korea early next week
after the communist state said it would expel them and press on with
its nuclear plans.
(Reuters, 12/28/02)
2002 Konstantin Pulikovsky, a
Russian representative in North Korea, authored “Orient Express,” a
book on Kim Jong il’s journeys to Russia.
(SFC, 12/6/02, p.J3)
2002 North Korea’s first cyber
cafe opened. Access to the Internet was highly restricted.
(Econ, 2/3/07, p.43)
2002 The freighter Turubong 1
sailed from the North Korean port of Chongjin. Somewhere in the Sea of
Japan off the coast of the quiet village of Sakaiminato, its crew
dumped 522 pounds of amphetamines overboard for retrieval by smugglers.
In 2006 Japanese police made their first arrests in the case, seven
Japanese and a South Korean intermediary. Authorities said North Korea
was involved as a government.
(AP, 8/11/06)
2003 Jan 10, North Korea announced
that it was pulling out of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.
(SFC, 1/10/03, p.A1)
2003 Jan 11, North Korea said it
might end a self-imposed moratorium on missile testing and warned that
it was ready to "mercilessly wipe out" other nations that infringe upon
its sovereignty. North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty.
(AP, 1/11/03)(SFC, 6/28/08, p.A3)
2003 Jan 14, North Korea said that
it was running out of patience and warned it was prepared to exercise
"options" in its dispute with the United States over its nuclear
activities.
(AP, 1/14/03)
2003 Jan 23, South and North Korea
agreed to peacefully resolve the international standoff over North
Korea's nuclear programs after Cabinet-level talks.
(AP, 1/23/03)
2003 Jan, China ended a “100-day
campaign” to hunt down North Korean refugees. 3,200 were deported and
another 1,300 awaited deportation. A Christian sponsored underground
railroad reportedly helped some 300,000 North Koreans escape their
homeland.
(SFC, 2/15/03, p.A14)
2003 Feb 5, North Korea said that
it had reactivated its nuclear facilities and is going ahead with their
operation "on a normal footing."
(AP, 2/5/03)
2003 Feb 6, Pre-emptive attacks on
North Korea's nuclear facilities would trigger a "total war," the
communist state warned after Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld
labeled the North's government a "terrorist regime."
(AP, 2/6/03)
2003 Mar 2, Fidel Castro
offered to mediate with North Korea over its nuclear program, though he
acknowledged Cuba’s ability to stem the growing crisis was limited.
(AP, 3/2/03)
2003 Mar 2, North Korea
deployed 4 MiGs to intercept a US RC-135S spy plane some 150 miles off
its coast.
(WSJ, 3/4/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 21, North Korea condemned
the US-led war on Iraq and said American war games in South Korea were
pushing the divided peninsula "to the brink of a nuclear war."
(AP, 3/21/03)
2003 Apr 12, North Korea hinted it
could accept US demands for multilateral talks to discuss the communist
country's suspected nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 4/12/03)
2003 Apr 16, US, Chinese and North
Korean officials announced talks in Beijing to try to resolve standoff
over North's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2003 Apr 18, North Korea said it
was ready to begin reprocessing more than 8,000 spent nuclear fuel
rods. US experts said it will give the communist state enough plutonium
to make several atomic bombs.
(AP, 4/18/03)(SFC, 4/19/03, p.A3)
2003 Apr 25, Nuclear talks in
Beijing ended after U.S. officials said North Korea claimed to have
nuclear weapons and might test, export or use them.
(AP, 4/25/03)
2003 Apr 30, North Korea was
reported to be a country with 1.17 million military personnel, the
world's 5th largest. Its air force had more than 1,700 aircraft and the
navy more than 800 ships. In March Gen. Leon J. LaPorte said "North
Korea maintains a substantial chemical weapons stockpile and a
production capability that threatens both our military forces and
civilian population centers in South Korea and Japan." In addition, he
said, North Korea has the capability "to develop, produce and
potentially weaponize biological warfare agents."
(AP, 4/30/03)
2003 Apr 30, South and North Korea
agreed in Cabinet-level talks to peacefully resolve the nuclear crisis
on the Korean Peninsula.
(AP, 4/30/03)
2003 May 12, North Korea declared
that the 1992 agreement with South Korea to keep the Korean Peninsula
free of nuclear weapons was nullified, citing a "sinister" U.S. agenda.
(AP, 5/12/03)
2003 May 31, In St. Petersburg,
Russia, Japanese PM Junichiro Koizumi and Hu Jintao, the new president
of China, agreed in a summit to work at defusing tensions over North
Korea.
(AP, 5/31/03)
2003 Jun 2, North Korea said it
has nuclear arms.
(WSJ, 1/2/04, p.R10)
2003 Jun 5, The United States
agreed to pull its ground troops away from the Demilitarized Zone
separating North and South Korea.
(AP, 6/5/04)
2003 Jun 14, North and South Korea
connected railways at their heavily armed border in a symbolic ceremony
linking the two countries for the first time in more than a
half-century. North Korea still had 7 miles of tracks to complete
before trains could run.
(AP, 6/14/03)(SSFC, 6/15/03, p.A14)
2003 Jul 14, It was reported that
Kim Jong il of North Korea maintained an unpublicized trading network
and slush fund named Division 39 with a cash hoard as large as $5
billion. Its operations included counterfeiting, drug trafficking and
trade in illicit weapons systems.
(WSJ, 7/14/03, p.A1)
2003 Aug 1, North Korea eased its
insistence on one-on-one talks with Washington and agreed to join
U.S.-proposed multilateral talks, where it will find little sympathy
for its suspected nuclear weapons programs.
(AP, 8/1/03)
2003 Aug 27, The US and North
Korea held direct talks for the first time in months, meeting for a
half-hour on the sidelines of a six-nation summit in Beijing designed
to resolve the standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 8/27/03)
2003 Aug 28, A North Korean envoy
at 6-nation talks said his nation intends to declare that it has atomic
arms and to test one as proof.
(WSJ, 8/29/03, p.A1)
2003 Aug 29, Six nations trying to
defuse a standoff over North Korea's nuclear program ended their talks
in Beijing with an agreement to keep talking.
(AP, 8/29/04)
2003 Sep 3, North Korea's
parliament re-elected Kim Jong il as the isolated country's top leader
and approved his government's decision to "keep and increase its
nuclear deterrent force" to counter what it calls a hostile U.S. policy.
(AP, 9/3/03)
2003 Sep 15, More than 100 South
Korean tourists flew to North Korea's capital on the first commercial
flight between the two countries since they were divided nearly six
decades ago.
(AP, 9/15/03)
2003 Oct 2, North Korea said it is
using plutonium extracted from spent nuclear fuel rods to make atomic
weapons.
(AP, 10/2/03)
2003 Oct 19, Pres. Bush said he
would consider a deal promising not to attack North Korea as long as
the guarantee is not a formal treaty.
(SFC, 10/20/03, p.A1)
2003 Oct 20, President Bush pushed
North Korea's nuclear threat to the forefront of a 21-nation
Asia-Pacific summit in Thailand.
(AP, 10/20/04)
2003 Oct 21, North Korea rebuffed
Pres. Bush's proposal to give it multi-nation security assurances if it
agrees to scrap its nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 10/22/03)
2003 Oct 22, A human rights report
on North Korea said hundreds of thousands of prisoners worked in at
least 36 hidden camps with torture and meager rations routine.
(SFC, 10/22/03, p.A14)
2003 Nov 20, A group of UN
agencies is asking for $221 million in international aid for North
Korea, where food shortages, poverty and poor health care services have
put the country in a state of "chronic emergency."
(AP, 11/20/03)
2003 Dec 1, North Korea said the
US military conducted at least 150 spy flights against it in November
and accused Washington of "watching for an opportunity to crush" the
communist regime.
(AP, 12/1/03)
2003 Dec 9, North Korea offered an
apparent counterproposal to a U.S.-backed plan to resolve the standoff
over its nuclear program, saying it would freeze the project in return
for energy aid and being removed from Washington's list of countries
that sponsor terrorism.
(AP, 12/9/03)
2003 China began building wire
fences on major defection North Korean routes along the Tumen River.
Since September 2006, China began building wire fences along the Yalu
River.
(AP, 10/16/06)
2004 Jan 1, North Korea confirmed
that it would allow a U.S. delegation to visit its main nuclear complex
next week, the first such inspection since the isolated communist
country expelled UN monitors more than a year ago.
(AP, 1/2/04)
2004 Jan 6, North Korea offered to
refrain from producing nuclear weapons in order to rekindle talks over
its arms programs.
(SFC, 1/6/04, p.A3)
2004 Jan 10, North Korea said it
had shown its "nuclear deterrent" to an unofficial U.S. delegation that
visited the disputed Yongbyon nuclear complex.
(AP, 1/10/05)
2004 Jan 20, Amnesty Int'l.
released a report at the World Social Forum in Bombay, India, that
charged North Korea with public executions of people stealing food.
(SFC, 1/21/04, p.A12)
2004 Jan 28, Nigeria said North
Korea had agreed to share its missile technology. Nigerian VP
Atiku Abubakar reached the accord with Yang Hyong Sop, the visiting VP
of North Korea's Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly.
(AP, 1/28/04)
2004 Feb 9, Japan passed a law
making it easier to impose economic sanctions on impoverished North
Korea, prompting the communist country to demand that Tokyo be barred
from future multilateral talks on its nuclear program.
(AP, 2/9/04)
2004 Feb 23, Envoys from 6 nations
gathered in Beijing for talks on the North Korean nuclear crisis.
(WSJ, 2/24/04, p.A1)
2004 Feb 28, Six-nation talks on
North Korea's nuclear program ended without any major breakthrough. The
North denounced the United States, saying it wasn't willing to reach a
settlement.
(AP, 2/28/04)
2004 Mar 25, China's Foreign
Minister Li Zhaoxing, arriving home from North Korea, saying his
three-day trip yielded an agreement from that country's reclusive
leader to "push forward" toward a third round of talks on its nuclear
program.
(AP, 3/25/04)
2004 Mar 30, A North Korean
engineer credited with smuggling out documents on alleged gas chamber
experiments in the isolated communist state said that the papers were
fake.
(AP, 3/30/04)
2004 Apr 18, North Korean leader
Kim Jong il crossed into China in a special train for a summit to
discuss the North's nuclear weapons program with the Chinese president.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 19, North Korean leader
Kim Jong il reportedly held talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao
about the North's nuclear arms program and requests for economic aid.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 20, China urged North
Korean leader Kim Jong il to rethink his demands for a written U.S.
pledge not to attack, saying only a softer line can ease the standoff
over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 22, In North Korea 2
trains carrying oil and liquefied petroleum gas exploded near the
Ryongchon train station when workers knocked wagons against power
lines. Over 160 were killed including 76 children, 1,249 injured and
8,100 homes were destroyed.
(SFC, 4/23/04, p.A1)(AP, 4/25/04)(SSFC, 4/25/04,
p.A14)(WSJ, 4/28/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 28, The six nations
involved in resolving the North Korea nuclear arsenal dispute — the
United States, China, the two Koreas, Russia and Japan —scheduled to
begin working level talks May 12 in Beijing, China.
(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 May 22, North Korea agreed to
release the family members of Japanese citizens kidnapped by Northern
agents, and Japan pledged aid to the impoverished country at a summit
between the two nations' leaders.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 Jun 3, Germany’s Goethe
Center opened a reading room in Pyongyang, North Korea.
(www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,1207346,00.html)
2004 Jun 4, The two Koreas agreed,
after an all-night negotiating session, to try to ease tensions by,
among other things, ending blaring propaganda efforts on their border.
(AP, 6/4/04)
2004 Jun 22, North Korea, the US,
and four other nations agreed to discuss a freezing of the North's
nuclear program and inspections that would lead to its eventual
dismantlement.
(AP, 6/22/04)
2004 Jun 26, In Beijing, China, 4
days of talks on North Korea’s nuclear program ended with a promise for
further discussion.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.A24)
2004 Jul 21, South Korea pledged
to expand economic ties with North Korea while Japan said it would seek
normal relations with the communist state when a dispute over the
North's nuclear ambitions is resolved.
(AP, 7/21/04)
2004 Jul 28, The second wave in
the biggest mass defection of North Koreans to South Korea arrived on a
flight from Vietnam, bringing the total in the two-day airlift to
nearly 460.
(WSJ, 7/27/04, p.A1)(AP, 7/28/04)
2004 Sep 9, A huge explosion
rocked North Korea. The huge blast hit a mountainous area close to an
underground missile base that was listed as a possible uranium
enrichment site. North Korea later said that the huge cloud caused by
an explosion near its border with China was the planned demolition of a
mountain for a hydroelectric project.
(Reuters, 9/12/04)(AP, 9/13/04)
2004 Sep 29, Forty-four North
Korean men, women and children scaled the walls of the Canadian embassy
in Beijing in a likely bid for political asylum.
(AFP, 9/29/04)
2004 Sep 12 , North Korea opened
its Ninth Pyongyang Film Festival.
(www1.korea-np.co.jp/pk/209th_issue/2004092501.htm)
2004 Nov 1, UN nuclear agency
chief Mohamed ElBaradei urged Iran to suspend uranium enrichment and
called on North Korea to dismantle its weapons program.
(AP, 11/1/05)
2004 In North Korea the Kaesong
Industrial Complex was set up and seen as a potent symbol of
reconciliation between North and South Korea. It combined the South's
capital and technology with the North's cheap labor.
(AP, 6/11/09)
2005 Feb 2, The US said that North
Korea's nuclear initiative is a threat to world peace and urged the
secretive regime in Pyongyang to resume talks aimed at ending the
program.
(AP, 2/2/05)
2005 Feb 10, North Korea announced
for the first time that it has nuclear arms and rejected moves to
restart disarmament talks anytime soon, saying it needs the weapons as
protection against an increasingly hostile United States.
(AP, 2/10/05)
2005 Feb 11, North Korea demanded
bilateral talks with the US to defuse the tension created by its
announcement that it is a nuclear power. The White House said it was
not interested in one-on-one talks.
(AP, 2/11/05)
2005 Feb 18, The US envoy
Christopher Hill said the US and China agreed that North Korea must end
its nuclear ambitions and resolve the standoff through six-nation talks.
(AP, 2/18/05)
2005 Feb 19, China's state news
said North Korea no longer wants to negotiate with the US and 4 other
nations in an effort to ease the standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear
program.
(AP, 2/19/05)
2005 Feb 21, North Korea’s Kim
told a visiting Chinese envoy that he is willing to return to 6-country
talks if the US demonstrates its sincerity.
(WSJ, 2/22/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 21, South Korea news
reported that North Korea said it has increased its nuclear arsenal to
help prevent a US attack.
(AP, 3/21/05)
2005 Mar 22, North Korea's Premier
Pak Pong Ju began a visit to China at a time of American calls for
Beijing to use its influence to prod the North back into nuclear talks.
(AP, 3/22/05)
2005 Mar 23, Chinese President Hu
Jintao stepped up pressure on North Korea to return to nuclear talks,
telling its visiting premier that dialogue is the only way to settle
the dispute.
(AP, 3/23/05)
2005 Mar 27, Communist North Korea
for the first time confirmed an outbreak of deadly bird flu at its
poultry farms and said hundreds of thousands of chickens had been
culled to contain it.
(AP, 3/27/05)
2005 Apr 23, Leaders of the two
Koreas agreed to resume talks between their nations that broke down
last summer and to discuss the international standoff over the North's
nuclear weapons ambitions.
(AP, 4/23/05)
2005 May 1, North Korea test-fired
a short range missile.
(WSJ, 5/2/05, p.A16)
2005 May 22, A North Korean cargo
ship arrived in South Korea to pick up fertilizer, the first such
vessel from the isolated communist nation to dock here in 21 years.
(AP, 5/22/05)
2005 Jun 9, North Korea boasted it
was building more nuclear bombs and had the ability to arm them on
missiles.
(AP, 6/9/05)
2005 Jun 21, A high-level
delegation from North Korea arrived in Seoul for bilateral talks and
was immediately confronted by demonstrators who angered the visitors by
displaying posters of their leader, Kim Jong Il, tied up in ropes.
(AP, 6/21/05)
2005 Jun 22, North Korea said it
would not need nuclear weapons if the US treated it like a friend, as
the isolated nation joined South Korea for high-level reconciliation
talks.
(AP, 6/22/05)
2005 Jun 22, The US reported plans
to send 50,000 tons of food to North Korea.
(WSJ, 6/23/05, p.A1)
2005 Jun 23, The two Koreas agreed
to seek a peaceful resolution to the international standoff over the
North's nuclear program, but the rivals failed to set a date for
resuming stalled disarmament talks.
(AP, 6/23/05)
2005 Jun 28, South Korea's spy
agency said North Korea has cut most of its international phone lines
since late March over concerns that sensitive information about its
society will flow out of the isolated country.
(AP, 6/28/05)
2005 Jul 9, North Korea said it
will rejoin six-nation nuclear arms talks on July 25.
(AP, 7/9/05)
2005 Jul 22, North Korea offered
to abandon its nuclear weapons if the two sides in the Korean War sign
a peace agreement to replace the 1953 cease-fire that halted
hostilities but did not resolve the conflict.
(AP, 7/22/05)
2005 Jul 25, North Korean and US
negotiators held a rare one-on-one meeting in Beijing amid a flurry of
contacts between delegations to the six-nation talks aimed at
persuading the communist nation to relinquish its nuclear program.
(AP, 7/25/05)
2005 Jul 26, Six-party nuclear
disarmament talks opened in Beijing after a 13-month boycott by North
Korea, and the communist nation's envoy said his country was ready to
work on eliminating atomic weapons from the Korean Peninsula.
(AP, 7/26/05)
2005 Jul 27, North Korea said it
would give up its nuclear weapons only after the alleged US atomic
threat is removed from the divided peninsula and relations with the US
are normalized.
(AP, 7/27/05)
2005 Aug 2, North Korea's main
envoy said his country won't give up its nuclear weapons until an
alleged U.S. atomic threat against the communist nation is eliminated,
the first public comments from the North after eight days of six-party
negotiations.
(AP, 8/2/05)
2005 Aug 4, North Korea's envoy to
disarmament talks said that Pyongyang insists on retaining the right to
"peaceful nuclear activities," a condition that other delegates say has
deadlocked the talks.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 7, Envoys to North Korean
disarmament talks suspended their meetings for three weeks, deadlocked
over the North's insistence on retaining a peaceful nuclear program.
(AP, 8/7/05)
2005 Aug 11, A senior South Korean
official said that North Korea has the right to a peaceful nuclear
program, a view conflicting with Washington in its disagreement with
the hard-line Pyongyang regime that has snagged disarmament talks.
(AP, 8/11/05)
2005 Aug 16, North Korean
officials visited South Korea's parliament for the first time in a
symbolic gesture of reconciliation with their democratic rivals.
(AP, 8/17/05)
2005 Aug 26, The first South
Korean tourists visited historic sites in Kaesong, North Korea, set to
become only the 2nd destination in the communist nation that can be
visited by ordinary citizens of its southern neighbor.
(AP, 8/27/05)
2005 Aug 27, North Korea demanded
the US rescind its recent appointment of a special envoy on human
rights in the communist country, warning the position could hurt
international efforts to end the North's nuclear weapons program.
Washington announced last week that Jay Lefkowitz, a former adviser to
President Bush, will be in charge of promoting efforts to "improve the
human rights of the long-suffering North Korean people."
(AP, 8/27/05)
2005 Sep 7, North Korea offered to
return the USS Pueblo, captured in 1968, if a top-level official agrees
to visit.
(WSJ, 9/8/05, p.A1)
2005 Sep 13, Negotiations aimed at
ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program resumed in Beijing after a
monthlong recess, but prospects for progress were uncertain as
Pyongyang remained insistent on its right to use civilian atomic
technology.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 13, Pres. Bush met
briefly with Chinese Pres. Hu Jintao in NYC on the sidelines of the
opening session of the UN General Assembly. Bush sought China's help to
stop nuclear weapons programs in North Korea and Iran and won a pledge
from President Hu Jintao to step up pressure on Pyongyang.
(SFC, 9/14/05, p.C1)(AP, 9/13/06)
2005 Sep 15, North Korea said it
won't give up its nuclear weapons without receiving a reactor for
generating power, stalling six-nation talks on Pyongyang's atomic
programs.
(AP, 9/15/05)
2005 Sep 16, North Korea announced
the introduction of the Stalinist country's first credit card, but just
how it would work was unclear.
(AP, 9/16/05)
2005 Sep 16, South Korea and North
and South Korea pledged to work to ensure peace and reduce military
tensions on their divided peninsula.
(AP, 9/16/05)
2005 Sep 19, North Korea agreed to
stop building nuclear weapons and allow international inspections in
exchange for energy aid, economic cooperation and security assurances,
a breakthrough that marked a first step toward disarmament after two
years of six-nation talks.
(AP, 9/19/05)
2005 Sep 20, North Korea insisted
it won't dismantle its nuclear weapons program until the US gives it
civilian nuclear reactors, casting doubt on a disarmament agreement
reached a day earlier during international talks.
(AP, 9/20/05)
2005 Sep 21, North Korea accused
the US of intending to disarm the communist country and then "crush it
to death with nuclear weapons," two days after a landmark disarmament
agreement that was expected to ease tensions.
(AP, 9/21/05)
2005 Sep 23, North Korean leader
Kim Jong Il ordered his aides to arrange a meeting with a high-ranking
U.S. official, possibly with President Bush.
(AP, 9/23/05)
2005 Oct 19, US envoy Bill
Richardson toured a North Korean nuclear facility and held a second day
of talks with government officials as part of his efforts to encourage
Pyongyang to dismantle its atomic weapons program.
(AP, 10/19/05)
2005 Oct 28, China's President Hu
Jintao flew to North Korea to meet with reclusive leader Kim Jong Il
ahead of new nuclear talks and was greeted by cheering crowds of
thousands on a rare visit by a leader of the North's last major ally.
(AP, 10/28/05)
2005 Oct 28, North and South Korea
opened their first joint office to promote trade across the heavily
militarized border, just as Pyongyang is feuding with a South Korean
company about business in the North.
(AP, 10/28/05)
2005 Nov 1, Officials from North
and South Korea agreed to meet next month to work out details on
competing as a unified team for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
(AP, 11/1/05)
2005 Nov 3, North Korea's
abduction of Japanese citizens decades ago took center stage at the
opening of talks in Beijing between the former bitter enemies.
(Reuters, 11/3/05)
2005 Nov 8, The US State
Department issued its 7th annual report to Congress on religious
freedom. It cited Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi
Arabia, Sudan and Vietnam as restricting religious freedom.
(AP, 11/8/05)
2005 Nov 9, Negotiators trying to
persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions focused on the
contentious details of how the North will disarm and what it will get
in exchange, with the U.S. and North Korean delegations holding a
separate meeting.
(AP, 11/9/05)
2005 Nov 10, Talks on North
Korea's nuclear programs turned sour as Pyongyang demanded that
Washington lift sanctions against firms suspected of weapons
proliferation and stop accusing the North of counterfeiting U.S. money.
(AP, 11/10/05)
2005 Nov 11, In Beijing the US and
North Korea urged each other to make concessions as a round of
six-nation talks aimed at ending the North's nuclear programs concluded
with no sign of progress or a date to meet again.
(AP, 11/11/05)
2005 Nov 12, North Korea stood by
its demand for aid in exchange for shutting down a plutonium-producing
nuclear reactor, saying it won't act until Washington offers
concessions.
(AP, 11/12/05)
2005 Nov 17, President Bush in
South Korea took a hardline stance against North Korea, saying the US
won't help the communist nation build a civilian nuclear reactor to
produce electricity until it dismantles its nuclear weapons programs.
(AP, 11/17/05)
2005 Nov 22, The United States and
its partners in an energy consortium terminated a project to build two
light-water atomic reactors for North Korea as an incentive to convince
Pyongyang to dismantle its nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 11/23/05)
2005 Nov 28, North Korea demanded
compensation from the United States over a scuttled project to build
two nuclear reactors in the communist nation under a 1994 agreement.
(AP, 11/28/05)
2005 Nov, In North Korea 21
members of cheering squads who traveled to South Korea for
international sports events were detained in a prison camp for talking
about what they saw in the South. South Korea, citing a defector,
reported their arrest in Feb of 2006.
(AP, 2/17/06)
2005 Dec 8, In South Korea
international activists kicked off a conference on human rights abuses
in North Korea by calling for the overthrow of Kim Jong Il's regime and
accusing Pyongyang of enslaving its people.
(AP, 12/08/05)
2005 Dec 24, China and North Korea
signed an agreement to jointly develop offshore oil reserves.
(AP, 12/24/05)
2005 Dec, North Korea moved to ban
international assistance as part of a campaign to regain control over
food distribution, limit outside contacts and avert possible urban
unrest.
(WSJ, 12/27/05, p.A1)
2005 Jasper Becker authored “Rogue
Regime: Kim Jong Il and the Looming Threat of North Korea,” a look at
North Korea under Kim Jong Il.
(WSJ, 4/27/05, p.D10)(Econ, 6/11/05, p.81)
2005 Bradley K. Martin authored
“Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader,” a look at North Korea
under Kim Jong Il.
(WSJ, 4/27/05, p.D10)
2005 North Korea delivered over a
dozen intermediate-range ballistic missiles to Iran. [see April 27,
2006]
(WSJ, 7/6/06, p.A4)
2006 Jan 6, Stalinist North Korea
demanded billions of dollars in compensation for alleged atrocities
against its prisoners of war and spies formerly held in South Korea.
The demand sparked outrage among politicians in Seoul.
(AFP, 1/8/06)
2006 Jan 8, The US and South Korea
withdrew their last remaining staff from the site of two North Korean
nuclear reactors, ending a decade-old construction project amid
rekindled tension over the North's nuclear ambitions.
(AP, 1/8/06)
2006 Jan 10, North Korean leader
Kim Jong-il passed through China on the way to Russia, a source with
knowledge of the stopover said. South Korean and Japanese media said
Kim was making a secret visit to China.
(Reuters, 1/10/06)
2006 Jan 13, A Hong Kong newspaper
reported that North Korea's secretive leader Kim Jong Il is on a
two-day visit to the southern Chinese province of Guangdong.
(AP, 1/13/06)
2006 Jan 15, North Korea news
reported that North Korea has awarded a medal for the first time to an
American, Ellsworth Culver (1927-2005), the late leader of Mercy Corps,
a U.S.-based aid group, for his efforts to help the communist state
fight hunger and poverty.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006 Jan 17, North Korean leader
Kim Jong-il appeared to have left China after meeting Chinese leaders
in Beijing to discuss six-party talks aimed at ending Pyongyang's
nuclear weapons program.
(Reuters, 1/17/06)
2006 Jan 18, North Korean leader
Kim Jong Il said he is committed to a peaceful resolution of the
standoff over his country's nuclear ambitions, as Pyongyang confirmed
that the reclusive Kim had visited China over the past week.
(AP, 1/18/06)
2006 Jan 18, In China senior
envoys from the United States, North Korea and China held a
"beneficial" meeting on the stalled six-party talks on Pyongyang's
nuclear program.
(AFP, 1/19/06)
2006 Jan 23, The US Treasury
Department briefed South Korean officials on its investigations into
suspected illegal financial activities by North Korea that Washington
says helped fund Pyongyang's nuclear arms program.
(AP, 1/23/06)
2006 Jan 28, North Korea warned of
nuclear war and vowed to strengthen its deterrent forces as it demanded
that Washington show evidence backing its allegation that the communist
regime is counterfeiting US money.
(AP, 1/28/06)
2006 Jan 31, North Korea renewed
its commitment to stalled nuclear disarmament talks, while at the same
time vowing to strengthen its stockpile of atomic weapons to counter
what it called extreme US hostility.
(AP, 1/31/06)
2006 Feb 2, South Korea's spy
agency said that North Korea was not currently producing counterfeit
currency, apparently contradicting US allegations that have become the
latest obstacle in nuclear disarmament talks with the communist country.
(AP, 2/2/06)
2006 Feb 3, North and South Korea
agreed to hold military talks on the level of generals for the first
time in nearly two years and the South said they would focus on
preventing naval clashes.
(AP, 2/3/06)
2006 Feb 7, A ship with 2,000 tons
of donated rice from India arrived in North Korea. The Indian
government has donated humanitarian aid, including food and medicine,
to North Korea on nine occasions since 1995.
(AFP, 2/7/06)
2006 Feb 8, Japan and North Korea
ended five days of high-level talks aimed at establishing diplomatic
relations without any agreements, citing major differences on the
North's abduction of Japanese nationals and its nuclear program.
(AP, 2/8/06)
2006 Feb 9, North Korea has
requested 150,000 tons of fertilizer from South Korea, months after it
demanded that the UN World Food Program halt emergency food shipments.
(AP, 2/10/06)
2006 Feb 23, The US State
Department said that North Korea has agreed to hold talks with the US
on its alleged counterfeiting and money laundering activities that led
to US sanctions and a breakdown in six-nation nuclear negotiations.
(AP, 2/23/06)
2006 Mar 2, North and South Korea
opened high-level military talks for the first time in almost two
years, aiming to reduce tension along the world's most heavily
fortified border and prevent accidental naval skirmishes.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 3, South Korea rejected
North Korea's demand that the countries redraw their western sea
border, ending two days of high-level military talks without agreement.
(AP, 3/3/06)
2006 Mar 15, South Korea formally
opened new immigration checkpoints for travelers crossing the heavily
fortified border with North Korea, symbolizing Seoul's hopes for
boosting exchanges with its longtime communist foe.
(AP, 3/15/06)
2006 Mar 23, The Australian air
force sank a North Korean cargo ship for target practice. It had been
seized in 2003 after being used to smuggle heroin into Australia.
(AP, 3/23/06)
2006 Apr 8, North Korea's top
negotiator to stalled six-way talks on Pyongyang's nuclear arms program
began discussions with other envoys involved in the negotiations in an
effort to put the process back on track.
(Reuters, 4/8/06)
2006 Apr 23, In North Korea 2
troop trains packed with soldiers collided head-on leaving more than
1,000 dead. A Buddhist humanitarian aid group reported the tragedy
June1.
(AFP, 6/1/06)
2006 Apr 27, Israel's military
intelligence chief said in a published interview that Iran has received
its first batch of North Korean-made surface-to-surface missiles that
put European countries within firing range.
(AP, 4/27/06)
2006 Apr 29, North Korea claimed
that the US conducted about 160 spy flights against the communist state
this month.
(AP, 4/29/06)
2006 May 11, The UN’s World Food
Program said it has reached agreement with North Korea to resume food
aid to the hunger-stricken country, but the operation will be smaller
than it was before its suspension in December.
(AP, 5/11/06)
2006 May 20, South Korean media
reported that 4 North Koreans had overpowered a security guard and
scaled the wall of a US consulate in China in hopes of gaining asylum
from their impoverished, communist country.
(AP, 5/20/06)
2006 May 22, AP Television News
opened a full-time office in North Korea, becoming the first Western
news organization to provide regular coverage of that nation.
(AP, 5/22/06)
2006 May 24, North Korea abruptly
canceled groundbreaking test runs of trains across its highly guarded
border with South Korea, citing an atmosphere of confrontation.
(AP, 5/24/06)
2006 Jun 16, Japan's parliament
enacted a bill that would impose sanctions on North Korea if it fails
to cooperate in clearing up details of its past abductions of Japanese
citizens.
(AP, 6/16/06)
2006 Jul 4, The US space shuttle
Discovery took off at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral,
Florida, with 7 astronauts. Up to six pieces of debris that could be
foam insulation fell off Discovery's troublesome external fuel tank
minutes after liftoff. News arrived that North Korea had launched test
missiles [see July 5].
(AFP, 7/5/06)(SFC, 7/5/06, p.A3)
2006 Jul 5, North Korea
test-fired a long-range missile that may be capable of reaching
America, but it failed seconds after launch. North Korea also tested
shorter range missiles in an exercise the White House termed "a
provocation" but not an immediate threat. The early morning tests came
as the US celebrated the Fourth of July and just minutes ahead of the
US launch of the space shuttle Discovery.
(AP, 7/4/06)(AP, 7/5/06)(SFC, 7/5/06, p.A1)
2006 Jul 5, Japan, the United
States and Britain readied a UN Security Council resolution demanding
that nations withhold all funds, goods and technology that could be
used for North Korea's missile program.
(AP, 7/5/06)
2006 Jul 6, A defiant North Korea
threatened to test-fire more missiles and warned of even stronger
action if opponents of the tests put pressure on the country.
(AP, 7/6/06)
2006 Jul 7, North Korea announced
a scientific breakthrough. State-run media boasted that
researchers developed a new cosmetic agent to make skin supple.
(AP, 7/7/06)
2006 Jul 7, The UN General
Assembly unanimously approved a series of reforms that were welcomed by
the US as a long overdue step toward greater efficiency and
accountability. A two-week UN conference reviewing efforts to fight the
illegal weapons trade ended in failure, with nations too divided on too
many contentious issues to agree on the best way to combat a scourge
that fuels conflict worldwide. Japan introduced a draft UN Security
Council resolution to sanction North Korea for test-launching a series
of missiles. The Council unanimously adopted a compromise resolution on
July 15.
(AP, 7/8/06)(AP, 7/7/07)
2006 Jul 11, China's president
issued an unusual public appeal to a visiting North Korean official to
avoid aggravating tensions with its missile test program, as the US and
Japan urged Beijing to press its ally Pyongyang for concessions.
(AP, 7/11/06)
2006 Jul 15, The UN Security
Council unanimously passed resolution 1718 condemning North Korea's
multiple missile launches on July 5 and imposed limited sanctions; a
defiant North said it would launch more missiles.
(AP, 7/16/07)(Econ, 2/28/09, p.63)
2006 Jul 16, North Korea rejected
a UN Security Council resolution sanctioning the communist nation for
recent missile tests and warned the measure was a prelude to a renewed
Korean War.
(AP, 7/16/06)
2006 Jul 17, G8 leaders called on
North Korea to stop its missile tests and to abandon its nuclear
weapons program.
(AP, 7/17/06)
2006 Jul 19, South Korea's
president condemned North Korea for potentially sparking an arms race
with its recent missile launches, while the North said it was ending
reunions between relatives separated by the Korean Peninsula divide. An
aid group in North Korea said floods and landslides have left more than
100 people dead or missing.
(AP, 7/19/06)
2006 Jul 26, A UN report said the
death toll from floods and landslides in North Korea this month has
risen to at least 154 people, with 127 others missing.
(AP, 7/27/06)
2006 Jul 31, In South Korea Jeong
Kyung-hak (48) was arrested on charges of being a spy for North Korea
and having illegally arrived on Jul 27 with forged Philippines identity
documents.
(AP, 8/21/06)
2006 Jul, Interpol, at the request
of the Bush administration, assembled central bankers, police agencies
and banknote industry officials to make the US case against
counterfeiting by North Korea. In 2008 a 10-month investigation by the
McClatchy newspapers found that evidence supporting charges was
uncertain at best.
(SFC, 1/10/08, p.A13)
2006 Aug 7, A pro-North Korean
newspaper in Japan said floods last month in North Korea killed at
least 549 people and left 295 others still missing.
(AP, 8/7/06)
2006 Aug 9, A South Korean
citizens' group said North Korea has requested help from South Korea to
cope with devastating floods.
(AP, 8/9/06)
2006 Aug 16, A South Korean aid
group claimed that massive floods in North Korea last month left about
54,700 people dead or missing and some 2.5 million homeless.
(AP, 8/16/06)
2006 Aug 22, Thailand police
arrested 175 North Koreans, mostly women and children, who illegally
entered the country and were found hiding in an abandoned home in
Bangkok.
(AFP, 8/23/06)
2006 Sep 7, Cyprus impounded a
Panama-flagged vessel on arms smuggling suspicion. It carried 18 North
Korean mobile radar units and 3 command vehicles due for delivery to
Syria.
(WSJ, 9/8/06, p.A1)(Reuters, 9/11/06)
2006 Sep 19, Australia and Japan
imposed financial sanctions on 11 North Korean companies, a Swiss
company and its president, based on allegations they helped the
communist nation's weapons programs.
(AP, 9/19/06)
2006 Sep, Japan’s government
approved measures to block the transfer of funds to North Korea. The
rules went into effect on Jan 4, 2007.
(Econ, 1/13/07, p.39)
2006 Oct 3, North Korea said it
will conduct a nuclear test in the face of what it claimed was "the
U.S. extreme threat of a nuclear war," ratcheting up tensions amid
international pressure to return to negotiations on its atomic program.
(AP, 10/3/06)
2006 Oct 6, A unanimous UN
Security Council urged North Korea to abandon all atomic weapons, as it
promised last year, and cancel plans to detonate a device. Japan hinted
the North could face sanctions or possible military action.
(AP, 10/6/06)
2006 Oct 8, North Korea performed
its first-ever nuclear weapons test, setting off an underground blast
in defiance of international warnings and intense diplomatic activity
aimed at heading off such a move. Because of the time difference, it
was Oct. 9 in North Korea.
(AP, 10/9/06)(AP, 10/8/07)
2006 Oct 9, North Korea faced
united global condemnation and calls for harsh sanctions after it
announced it had detonated an atomic weapon in an underground test.
Russia's defense minister said the nuclear test was equivalent to 5,000
tons to 15,000 tons of TNT. The US pushed for sanctions on North Korea
following its nuclear test.
(AP, 10/9/06)(SFC, 10/10/06, p.A1)
2006 Oct 10, The Bush
administration rejected anew direct talks with North Korea in the wake
of the communist country's nuclear test, and suggested it was possible
the test was something less than it appeared.
(AP, 10/10/07)
2006 Oct 10, China, which holds
the key to whether tough UN sanctions will be imposed for North Korea's
nuclear test, warned its ally that the detonation would harm relations,
but called on the UN to use "positive and appropriate measures."
(AP, 10/10/06)
2006 Oct 11, North Korea
threatened more nuclear tests saying additional sanctions imposed on it
would be considered an act of war. Japan imposed a total ban on North
Korean imports and said ships from the impoverished nation were
prohibited from entering Japanese ports as punishment for its apparent
nuclear test.
(AP, 10/11/06)
2006 Oct 12, The United States
introduced a draft resolution in the UN Security Council to punish
North Korea for its nuclear test.
(AP, 10/12/07)
2006 Oct 14, The UN Security
Council gave unanimous approval to sanctions against North Korea for
its purported nuclear test. The US-sponsored resolution demanded that
North Korea eliminate nuclear weapons, but expressly rules out military
action against the country.
(AP, 10/15/06)
2006 Oct 16, Australia said it
will ban North Korean ships from entering its ports, toughening its
response to the North's reported nuclear test.
(AP, 10/16/06)
2006 Oct 17, North Korea said it
considered UN sanctions aimed at punishing the country for its nuclear
test "a declaration of war," as Japan and South Korea reported the
communist nation might be preparing a second explosion.
(AP, 10/17/06)
2006 Oct 19, China stepped up its
diplomatic efforts with North Korea, sending a personal message and a
gift from the Chinese president to the North's leader Kim Jong Il as
Washington appealed for cooperation by Asian powers on U.N. sanctions
for Pyongyang's nuclear test.
(AP, 10/19/06)
2006 Oct 19, A UN report said The
North Korean government rounds up disabled people and sends them away
from the capital Pyongyang to special camps, where they are sorted by
their handicap and subjected to "subhuman conditions."
(AP, 10/19/06)
2006 Oct 20, In North Korea tens
of thousands gathered in Pyongyang to laud the country's first atomic
test. A South Korean news agency reported that North Korean leader Kim
Jong Il said Pyongyang didn't plan to carry out any more nuclear tests
and expressed regret about the country's first-ever atomic detonation
last week [see Oct 24].
(AP, 10/20/06)(AP, 10/21/06)
2006 Oct 21, Foreign Minister
Sergey Lavrov said that Russia was ready to discuss ways to pressure
Iran into accepting a broader international oversight of its nuclear
program, but added that "any measures of influence should encourage
creating conditions for talks." He said Russia will not allow the UN
Security Council to be used to punish Iran over its nuclear program.
Russia indicated it would strictly enforce sanctions on North Korea as
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met top leaders in Moscow at the
end of a tour to push for full implementation of the UN penalties in
response to Pyongyang’s nuclear test.
(AP, 10/21/06)(AFP, 10/21/06)
2006 Oct 24, Liu Jianchao, Chinese
Foreign Ministry spokesman, said North Korean leader Kim Jong Il did
not apologize for his regime's nuclear test, as some South Korean media
had reported [see Oct 20], but is willing to return to six-party talks
under certain conditions.
(AP, 10/24/06)
2006 Oct 26, South Korea said it
will ban the entry of North Korean officials who fall under a UN travel
restriction.
(AP, 10/26/06)
2006 Oct 31, North Korea agreed to
rejoin six-nation nuclear disarmament talks in a surprise diplomatic
breakthrough.
(AP, 10/31/06)
2006 Nov 1, North Korea said it
was returning to nuclear disarmament talks to get access to its frozen
overseas bank accounts, a vital source of hard currency.
(AP, 11/1/06)
2006 Nov 1, The UN Security
Council agreed on a list of banned items that could be used to make
nuclear, chemical and biological weapons or ballistic missiles and
ordered all countries to prevent North Korea from importing or
exporting the items.
(AP, 11/1/06)
2006 Nov 16, Pres. Bush in
Singapore voiced tentative support for a free trade agreement covering
all 21 members of APEC and warned North Korea against trying to sell
nuclear arms
(SFC, 11/17/06, p.A4)(WSJ, 11/17/06, p.A1)
2006 Nov 19, President Bush in
Vietnam sought Chinese President Hu Jintao's help on dual fronts,
aiming to rein in North Korea's nuclear ambitions and encourage the
Chinese people to buy more US goods. Pacific Rim leaders urged North
Korea to take concrete steps to live up to its commitments to stop
developing nuclear weapons.
(AP, 11/19/06)
2006 Nov 19, Iran’s official
Islamic Republic News Agency reported that President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad has demanded more ties with North Korea and urged for
nuclear disarmament in Korean peninsula.
(AP, 11/19/06)
2006 Nov 28, North Korea's nuclear
envoy sat down with top negotiators for the US and China, an
unannounced meeting aimed at reactivating stalled six-nation talks on
persuading North Korea to abandon nuclear weapons.
(AP, 11/28/06)
2006 Nov 29, North Korean envoys
left China after meeting with US negotiators with no agreement reached
on a resumption of 6-nation nuclear talks.
(WSJ, 11/30/06, p.A1)
2006 Nov 29, Commerce Secretary
Carlos Gutierrez said the US is banning exports of luxury items to
North Korea, arguing that the Stalinist state's ruling elite is
"splurging" while its population suffers. According to reports, the
list of items specifically targeting North Korea's bon vivant leader
Kim Jong-Il includes iPods, jet skis and plasma televisions.
(AFP, 11/30/06)
2006 Dec 4, Russia's atomic energy
agency declined to comment on Japanese news reports that North Korea
had offered Russia exclusive rights to its natural uranium deposits in
exchange for support at six-way talks on Pyongyang's nuclear weapons.
(AP, 12/4/06)
2006 Dec 18, North Korea defiantly
declared itself a nuclear power at the start of the first full
international arms talks since its atomic test and threatened to
increase its arsenal if its demands were not met.
(AP, 12/18/06)
2006 Dec 19, US and North Korean
financial experts met over Washington's campaign to isolate the
communist country from the international banking system, the key
stumbling block in negotiations over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 12/19/06)
2006 Dec 21, Japan said it saw no
hope of a breakthrough in talks on scrapping North Korea's nuclear
weapons, accusing Pyongyang of using a financial dispute with the
United States to drive a stake into a proposed deal.
(AP, 12/21/06)
2006 Dec 22, In China the first
talks on North Korea's nuclear program since the communist nation
tested an atomic device ended without an agreement on disarmament or a
date for further negotiations.
(AP, 12/22/06)
2006 Dec 23, The North Korean
army's chief of staff vowed to take strong countermeasures against US
sanctions.
(AP, 12/23/06)
2007 Jan 3, South Korea’s official
media reported that Paek Nam Sun, North Korea's foreign minister and
the country's top diplomat for nearly 10 years, has died at the age of
78.
(AP, 1/3/07)
2007 Jan 19, North Korea said it
reached an agreement with the US during talks this week on its nuclear
program, and the top US nuclear envoy expressed optimism that progress
could be made when wider arms negotiations reconvene.
(AP, 1/19/07)
2007 Jan 26, The United States
issued a formal rule banning exports of luxury items to North Korea,
including jet skis, I-pods, jewelry and fancy cars, in an effort to put
pressure on the communist leadership in Pyongyang.
(AP, 1/26/07)
2007 Feb 8, North Korea agreed in
principle to take initial steps toward dismantling its nuclear programs
at the start of international talks seeking the first concrete progress
on disarming Pyongyang.
(AP, 2/8/07)
2007 Feb 9, In China envoys to
international talks on ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program
struggled to find a compromise as differences emerged over a Chinese
proposal on how to begin the disarmament process.
(AP, 2/9/07)
2007 Feb 13, North Korea agreed to
shut down its main nuclear reactor and eventually dismantle its atomic
weapons program in exchange for millions of dollars in aid. The
agreement reached in Beijing said North Korea would close its nuclear
plants within 60 days in return for aid and other inducements. North
Korean state media said the pact required only a temporary suspension
of the country's nuclear facilities.
(AP, 2/13/07)(Econ, 2/17/07, p.28)
2007 Feb 23, North Korea asked the
chief UN atomic inspector to visit four years after expelling his
experts and dropping out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
(AP, 2/23/07)
2007 Feb 28, A group of 12 North
Korean refugees has arrived in the United States to seek asylum, the
largest group from the communist nation to have recently defected there.
(AP, 3/1/07)
2007 Mar 1, North Korea's No. 2
leader pledged his country's commitment to giving up its nuclear
program amid intensifying diplomacy aimed at implementing Pyongyang's
pledge to disarm.
(AP, 3/1/07)
2007 Mar 2, South Korea delayed a
full resumption of aid shipments to North Korea until the communist
regime shuts down its main atomic reactor under an international
agreement to take steps toward abandoning its nuclear weapons program.
A South Korean activist said 80 North Korean refugees are hiding in
various Asian countries and preparing to seek asylum in the United
States. North and South Korea agreed to resume reunions of families
that have been separated by their divided border.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 7, North Korea reported
that it has slaughtered hundreds of cows and pigs after an outbreak of
foot and mouth disease. The report said the sickened cows had been
imported from Tieling, China.
(AP, 3/8/07)
2007 Mar 14, The chief UN nuclear
inspector returned from a one-day trip to Pyongyang saying that North
Korea was "fully committed" to an agreement that requires it to shutter
its main nuclear reactor and let in inspectors as soon as the U.S.
drops financial sanctions.
(AP, 3/14/07)
2007 Mar 14, The US Treasury
Department said it would order US banks to sever ties with Banco Delta
Asia in Macao for allegedly helping North Korea launder money. This was
a move to unfreeze North Korean assets in the Macao bank.
(AP, 3/15/07)(WSJ, 3/15/07, p.A1)
2007 Mar 16, Assistant Secretary
of State Christopher Hill, the top US nuclear envoy, said a dispute on
North Korean funds held in a Macau bank has been resolved, potentially
removing a key stumbling block that has bedeviled progress on
dismantling Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 3/16/07)
2007 Mar 17, North Korea warned it
would not shut a nuclear plant until the United States lifted banking
curbs, while Washington's envoy maintained the bank issue would not
kill a budding disarmament deal.
(Reuters, 3/17/07)
2007 Mar 19, US officials said
that the United States and North Korea have resolved a dispute over $25
million in frozen North Korean funds, clearing the way for progress in
dismantling the North's nuclear programs.
(AP, 3/19/07)
2007 Mar 19, The Macau Monetary
Authority said it would release 25 million dollars in North Korean
funds frozen at a bank under US financial sanctions.
(AP, 3/19/07)
2007 Mar 22, Talks on halting
North Korea's nuclear program broke down abruptly on with the country's
chief nuclear envoy flying home after a dispute over money frozen in a
Macau bank could not be resolved.
(AP, 3/22/07)
2007 Apr 7, The New York Times
reported in its Sunday edition that the Bush administration in January
allowed Ethiopia to complete a secret arms purchase from North Korea in
an apparent violation of a UN Security Council sanctions resolution
passed months earlier over its nuclear test.
(Reuters, 4/7/07)
2007 Apr 8, Bill Richardson, the
New Mexico governor who has undertaken diplomatic missions to countries
at odds with the United States, began a rare visit to isolated North
Korea to recover remains of American servicemen killed in the Korean
War.
(AP, 4/9/07)
2007 Apr 10, Officials from North
and South Korea's Red Cross societies resumed talks on resolving the
issue of South Korean prisoners of war and civilian abductees believed
held in the communist country.
(AP, 4/10/07)
2007 Apr 10, The US Treasury
Department said authorities in Macau are ready to release frozen North
Korean funds that have impeded disarmament talks.
(AP, 4/10/07)
2007 Apr 10, Japan's Cabinet
approved a six-month extension on trade sanctions against North Korea,
which were imposed in the wake of the communist state's nuclear test
last year.
(AP, 4/10/07)
2007 Apr 11, North Korea replaced
its prime minister during a session of its rubber-stamp parliament. US
envoys entered South Korea from North Korea in a rare border crossing
after securing the remains of six American soldiers from the Korean War
and pushing for action on the North's nuclear disarmament.
(AP, 4/11/07)
2007 Apr 14, North Korea missed a
deadline for shutting down its main nuclear reactor, and a key US
negotiator said the country must keep the disarmament program from
foundering.
(AP, 4/14/07)
2007 Apr 19, North and South Korea
formally opened economic aid talks, after a delay caused by Pyongyang's
insistence that Seoul pledge food assistance to the impoverished nation
despite its failure to live up to a pact on nuclear disarmament.
(AP, 4/19/07)
2007 Apr 20, North Korea restated
its commitment to a landmark nuclear disarmament deal, saying it would
invite UN atomic inspectors and discuss shutting down its bomb-making
atomic reactor as soon as it confirmed the release of its funds frozen
in a banking dispute.
(AP, 4/20/07)
2007 Apr 22, South Korea agreed to
send 400,000 tons of rice to impoverished North Korea despite the
communist government's failure to meet a deadline to shut down its
nuclear reactor.
(AP, 4/22/07)
2007 Apr 26, Myanmar and North
Korea signed an agreement to resume diplomatic ties during a visit to
Myanmar by the North Korean vice foreign minister.
(AP, 4/26/07)
2007 Apr 27, President Bush and
visiting Japanese PM Shinzo Abe threatened stronger punitive actions
against North Korea if it reneged on a promise to padlock its sole
nuclear reactor.
(AP, 4/27/08)
2007 May 2, The South Korean
government announced its first-ever plan to seize assets gained by
alleged Korean collaborators during Japanese colonial rule as part of
efforts to reconcile with its past more than 60 years after the end of
the peninsula's occupation. 2 defectors to South Korea described how
they had been tortured in a North Korean prison camp, as a South Korean
rights group issued a report on abuses of detainees in the communist
state.
(AP, 5/2/07)
2007 May 4, The divided Koreas
agreed to discuss historic trial runs of cross-border railways, as
Washington cautioned Seoul against rushing to embrace Pyongyang before
it takes steps to dismantle its nuclear program.
(AP, 5/4/07)
2007 May 9, Military officials
from North and South Korea reached an agreement clearing the way for
the first railway journeys across their heavily fortified border for
half a century.
(AP, 5/9/07)
2007 May 11, North and South Korea
adopted a military agreement enabling the first train crossing of their
heavily armed border in more than half a century.
(AP, 5/11/07)
2007 May 17, The first trains
since 1953 traversed the Korean DMZ in a peace gesture.
(WSJ, 5/18/07, p.A1)
2007 Jun 2, Four people believed
to have fled North Korea arrived at a port in northern Japan in a small
boat and told police they want to go to South Korea.
(Reuters, 6/2/07)
2007 Jun 14, More than $20 million
in disputed North Korean funds was transferred from a blacklisted Macau
bank, signaling a breakthrough in a dispute that has held up the
North's pledge to shut down its nuclear reactor.
(AP, 6/14/07)
2007 Jun 16, North Korea sent a
letter to the UN nuclear watchdog, inviting inspectors to the country
to discuss procedures for shutting down its main nuclear reactor. Top
US nuclear negotiator Christopher Hill said technical problems in
Russia are holding up the transfer of North Korean funds linked to a
nuclear disarmament deal.
(AP, 6/16/07)
2007 Jun 19, A US envoy said North
Korea has finally received millions of dollars at the heart of a
dispute that stalled nuclear disarmament negotiations, and must quickly
shut down its only reactor.
(AP, 6/19/07)
2007 Jun 21, Assistant Secretary
of State Christopher Hill, the chief US nuclear envoy, made a rare trip
to North Korea in a surprise bid to accelerate international efforts to
press the communist government to abandon its nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 6/21/08)
2007 Jun 26, UN nuclear monitors
arrived in North Korea to discuss the communist nation's plans to
fulfill its long-delayed pledge to shut down its main nuclear reactor.
(AP, 6/26/07)
2007 Jun 29, A top official said
the UN nuclear watchdog and North Korea have reached an agreement on
how the agency will monitor and verify shutdown of the country's main
nuclear reactor.
(AP, 6/29/07)
2007 Jul 14, UN inspectors arrived
in North Korea to monitor the communist country's long-anticipated
promise to scale back its nuclear weapons program. North Korea said it
had shut down its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, hours after a ship
cruised into port loaded with oil promised in return for the country's
pledge to disarm.
(SSFC, 7/15/07, p.A4)(AP, 7/14/08)
2007 Jul 15, North Korea confirmed
it has shut its nuclear reactor that provides the secretive state with
material to make weapons-grade plutonium.
(Reuters, 7/15/07)
2007 Jul 16, Orascom Construction
Industries S.A.E. of Cairo said it is investing $115 million to acquire
a 50% stake in a North Korean cement plant.
(WSJ, 1/16/07, p.A6)
2007 Jul 25, A South Korean aid
group said some 430 North Koreans have died of hunger in a northern
region in the past month because of chronic food shortages.
(AP, 7/25/07)
2007 Jul 26, North Korea walked
out of military talks with South Korea, ending 3 days of high-level
negotiations with no agreement amid a lingering dispute over their
shared sea border.
(AP, 7/26/07)
2007 Aug 14, North Korean
officials said that 200 people were dead or missing across the country
due to floods caused by days of heavy rains. On Aug 17 an international
aid group said over 300 were dead or missing from the floods. The toll
was later raised to 600.
(AP, 8/14/07)(AP, 8/17/07)(AP, 8/25/07)
2007 Aug 15, Official media said
severe floods have destroyed more than a tenth of North Korea's
farmland at the height of the growing season.
(AP, 8/15/07)
2007 Sep 1, North Korea and the US
began face-to-face talks in Geneva aimed at reaching an agreement on
how to proceed with Pyongyang's denuclearization pledge.
(AP, 9/1/07)
2007 Sep 2, Following two days of
talks in Geneva, Christopher Hill, the chief US negotiator, said
North Korea had agreed to account for and disable its atomic programs
by the end of the year; the head of the North Korean delegation said
his country's willingness to cooperate was clear, but he did not cite
any dates.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2007 Sep 3, A spokesman for North
Korea's Foreign Ministry said the US has decided to remove North Korea
from a list of terrorism-sponsoring states and lift sanctions against
it.
(AP, 9/3/07)
2007 Sep 4, A senior US diplomat
said North Korea remains on a list of states that sponsor terrorism,
dismissing North Korean claims that Washington decided to remove the
designation.
(AP, 9/4/07)
2007 Sep 5, North Korea said it
had arrested spies working for an unspecified foreign country who were
collecting intelligence on the communist state's military and state
secrets.
(AP, 9/5/07)
2007 Sep 5, Japan and North Korea
held talks for the first time in six months in a bid to ease tensions
amid signs of cautious optimism for progress from the arch-foes. The
meeting in the Mongolian capital of Ulan Bator is part of a working
group set up by six-nation talks designed to stop North Korea's nuclear
weapons programs.
(AFP, 9/5/07)
2007 Sep 6, Japan and North Korea
wrapped up a rare meeting without a breakthrough in an emotional row
over kidnappings, but they pledged to keep talking amid small signs of
hope between the arch-rivals.
(AP, 9/6/07)
2007 Sep 11, American, Russian and
Chinese nuclear experts began a rare visit to North Korea to examine
ways of disabling the country's main nuclear facilities so they can no
longer produce bombs.
(AP, 9/11/07)
2007 Sep 21, North Korea and Syria
held high-level talks in Pyongyang, amid suspicions that the two
countries might be cooperating on a nuclear weapons program.
(AP, 9/21/07)
2007 Sep 22, North Korea's No. 2
leader met with a Syrian delegation in Pyongyang, amid suspicions of a
secret nuclear connection between the two countries.
(AP, 9/22/07)
2007 Sep 22, To date 144 countries
had ratified the UN Convention Against Torture. Holdouts included
Sudan, North Korea, Myanmar, Zimbabwe and India.
(Econ, 9/22/07, p.72)
2007 Sep 28, The United States
announced it would spend up to $25 million to pay for 50,000 tons of
heavy fuel oil for North Korea as part of an agreement to dismantle the
North’s nuclear program.
(AP, 9/28/08)
2007 Sep 30, Negotiators at North
Korea's disarmament talks tentatively agreed to a draft plan on
disabling the country's nuclear facilities by year's end.
(AP, 9/30/07)
2007 Oct 2, North Korean leader
Kim Jong Il showed scant enthusiasm for the visiting South Korean
president, while orchestrated crowds of thousands cheered the start of
the second summit between the divided Koreas since World War II.
(AP, 10/2/07)
2007 Oct 3, The six nations
involved in disarmament talks said North Korea will provide a complete
list of its nuclear programs and disable its facilities at its main
reactor complex by Dec. 31, actions that will be overseen by a US-led
team.
(AP, 10/3/07)
2007 Oct 4, The leaders of North
and South Korea pledged to seek a peace treaty to replace the Korean
War's 1953 cease-fire and expand projects to reduce tension across the
world's last Cold War frontier.
(AP, 10/4/07)
2007 Oct 9, Japan's Cabinet
approved plans to extend economic sanctions against North Korea,
despite the communist state's agreement to disable its main nuclear
complex by year's end.
(AP, 10/9/07)
2007 Apr 23, David Halberstam
(73), Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and writer, died in a car crash
in San Mateo, Ca. His books included “The Best and the Brightest”
(1972) and “The Powers That Be” (1979). He had just finished his 21st
book “The Coldest Winter,” a history of the Korean War, which was
published later this year.
(SFC, 4/24/07, p.A1)(Econ, 5/5/07, p.108)(Econ,
10/6/07, p.98)
2007 Oct 21, In Syria a high-level
North Korean official held talks with PM Naji Otari on ways to improve
cooperation between the two countries.
(AP, 10/21/07)
2007 Oct 30, The US Navy boarded a
North Korean flagged ship at its invitation with a small team of
medics, security personnel and an interpreter. The 22-person North
Korean crew already had regained control of the ship and detained all
the Somali pirates.
(AP, 11/1/07)
2007 Nov 3, Je Yell Kim, a
Canadian Christian aid worker who provided dental care for North
Koreans in the northeast part of the country, was taken into custody by
authorities on charges of violating national security. Kim was released
in late Jan 2008.
(Reuters, 1/28/08)
2007 Nov 5, In North Korea a team
of experts led by the US started work to disable 3 nuclear facilities
at Yongbyon.
(Econ, 11/10/07, p.55)
2007 Nov 6, A US diplomat said the
disablement of North Korea's nuclear weapons-making facilities has
started smoothly and the communist nation should be able to complete
the process by the end of the year.
(AP, 11/6/07)
2007 Nov 14, The prime ministers
of North and South Korea met for the first time in 15 years, hoping to
extend the detente fostered by the second-ever summit of their leaders
last month with new South Korean investment in the impoverished North.
(AP, 11/14/07)
2007 Nov 16, North and South Korea
agreed to launch rail service across their heavily armed border for the
first time in more than half a century, a move symbolizing the growing
reconciliation between the two sides.
(AP, 11/16/07)
2007 Nov 26, A South Korean aid
group said North Korea has resumed frequent public executions, among
them a factory chief accused of making international phone calls who
was shot in a stadium before 150,000 spectators.
(AP, 11/26/07)
2007 Nov 27, The defense chiefs of
North and South Korea began a rare meeting to discuss easing tension
across their disputed sea border on a harmonious note, pledging to end
the peninsula's division.
(AP, 11/27/07)
2007 Nov 28, North and South Korea
struggled to resolve differences over creating a joint fishing zone
around their disputed sea border at a second day of rare defense talks
in Pyongyang.
(AP, 11/28/07)
2007 Nov 29, The top defense
officials from North and South Korea agreed on security arrangements
for the first-ever regular train service across their heavily fortified
border.
(AP, 11/29/07)
2007 Dec 1, Pres. Bush sent a
letter, his first, to North Korean leader Kim Jong Il urging him to
fully disclose his nuclear programs by the end of the year.
(SFC, 12/7/07, p.A16)
2007 Dec 11, North and South Korea
began regular freight train service across their heavily armed border
for the first time in more than a half century, in another symbolic
step in their reconciliation.
(AP, 12/11/07)
2007 Dec 13, North Korea verbally
responded through a diplomatic channel to a letter Bush sent to Kim
earlier this month. A senior US official with knowledge of the contents
said it was delivered through a diplomatic channel in New York and
contained what appeared to be a pledge from Pyongyang to follow through
on its denuclearization deal as long as the United States held to its
end of the bargain.
(AP, 12/14/07)
2007 Dec 14, North and South Korea
ended three days of talks without an agreement on creating a shared
fishing zone to defuse tensions along their disputed sea border.
(AP, 12/14/07)
2007 Dec 31, North Korea failed to
meet a year-end deadline to declare all its nuclear programs under an
aid-for-disarmament deal, prompting disappointed reactions from South
Korea, the United States and Japan.
(AP, 12/31/07)
2008 Jan 6, North Korea stepped up
anti-US propaganda with a six-nation nuclear disarmament process bogged
down and Pyongyang and Washington in dispute over the delay.
(AP, 1/6/08)
2008 Jan 22, North Korea accused
the US of failing to meet its commitments toward the communist nation,
blaming Washington for the slow progress in a nuclear disarmament deal.
(AP, 1/22/08)
2008 Jan 22, North Korea said it
will close its embassy in Australia because it can no longer afford it.
(AP, 1/22/08)
2008 Jan 25, North and South Korea
held working-level military talks, the first dialogue between the two
countries this year, as Seoul's conservative president-elect prepared
to take office with calls for a tougher stance toward Pyongyang.
(AP, 1/25/08)
2008 Feb 22, North Korea opened
its main nuclear reactor to foreign media for the first time in a bid
to show that it is complying with a disarmament accord to disable the
facility.
(AP, 2/22/08)
2008 Feb 25, The New York
Philharmonic arrived in a snowy Pyongyang to play the symphony "From
the New World" in an overture to thaw still frozen ties from the Cold
War era between the United States and North Korea.
(AP, 2/25/08)
2008 Feb 26, An audience of North
Korea's communist elite gave America's oldest orchestra a standing
ovation after a rousing set that took in Dvorak, Gershwin and a Korean
folk song. Some Philharmonic members were so overcome they left the
stage in tears.
(Reuters, 2/26/08)
2008 Mar 5, An aid group said
North Korea executed 15 people trying to flee of helping others escape.
(WSJ, 3/6/08, p.A1)
2008 Mar 8, North Korea’s official
news agency reported that leader Kim Jong Il hopes for stronger
friendship with Syria, amid lingering suspicions of a secret nuclear
connection between the two countries.
(AP, 3/8/08)
2008 Mar 20, Kim Yong-Nam, North
Korea's de facto head of state, arrived in Namibia as part of his
goodwill visit to three African nations, which also includes Angola and
Uganda. Namibia and North Korea hoped to strengthen their economic
ties. Kim Yong-Nam warned against countries plundering resources from
poor African countries.
(AFP, 3/20/08)
2008 Mar 24, South Korea's
president asked North Korea to consider sending home prisoners of war
and captured civilians in return for receiving humanitarian aid from
Seoul.
(AP, 3/24/08)
2008 Mar 27, North Korea expelled
all 11 South Korean officials from a joint industrial estate just north
of the border in retaliation for Seoul's new tougher line towards the
communist state.
(AP, 3/27/08)
2008 Mar 28, North Korea
test-fired a barrage of short-range missiles in apparent response to
the new South Korean government's tougher stance on Pyongyang.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Apr 27, A North Korean
defector tried to set himself on fire to halt the Olympic torch relay
through Seoul, while thousands of police guarded the flame from
protesters blasting China's treatment of North Korean refugees. A North
Korean soldier defected to South Korea for the first time in a decade
across the heavily fortified border dividing the countries.
(AP, 4/27/08)(AP, 4/28/08)
2008 May 8, North Korea handed
over thousands of pages of nuclear weapons documents to a US diplomat,
that will help verify the North’s plutonium holdings.
(WSJ, 5/9/08, p.A1)
2008 May 9, A South Korean aid
group said North Koreans are dying because of food shortages in rural
areas, and a massive famine is just a matter of time.
(AP, 5/9/08)
2008 May, A South Korean abductee
escaped from North Korea after more than 30 years and was under Seoul’s
protection in China. Yoon Jong-soo, 65, ended up in the North when his
fishing boat and 32 other crew members were seized off South Korea's
east coast in 1975.
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080609/ap_on_re_as/koreas_abductee_escape)
2008 Jun 3, The Good Friends, a
Seoul-based humanitarian group, said that a highly contagious disease
has sparked a health alert with an estimated five or six children dying
every day since April 27 in North Korea’s city of Hoeryong. A doctor
said hand-foot-mouth disease could be spreading from China, where it
has killed several dozen children.
(AFP, 6/3/08)
2008 Jun 26, North Korea handed
over details of its nuclear programs, paving the way to be removed from
the US terrorism blacklist amid years of efforts to persuade the North
to abandon the atom bomb.
(AFP, 6/26/08)
2008 Jun 26, President Bush said
he will lift key trade sanctions against North Korea and remove it from
the US terrorism blacklist, a remarkable turnaround in policy toward
the communist regime he once branded as part of an "axis of evil."
(AP, 6/26/08)
2008 Jun 27, North Korea destroyed
the most visible symbol of its nuclear weapons program, blasting apart
the cooling tower at its main atomic reactor in a sign of its
commitment to stop making plutonium for atomic bombs.
(AP, 6/27/08)
2008 Jun 30, The UN said thousands
of tons of food from the US has started flowing into North Korea.
(SFC, 7/1/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 4, North Korea said it
will not take further steps to dismantle its nuclear program until the
US and its other negotiating partners award fuel oil and political
benefits promised under an aid-for-disarmament deal.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 10, North Korea returned
to international talks on its nuclear activities after a nine-month
break, in what host China hailed as a potential turning point in the
disarmament process.
(AFP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 11, A North Korean
soldier fatally shot a South Korean woman tourist (53) at a mountain
resort in the communist North, prompting the South to suspend the
high-profile tour program. Park Wang-ja had strayed a half-mile
into a fenced off military area and was shot twice from behind.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 12, North Korea agreed to
completely disable its main nuclear facilities by the end of October
and to allow thorough site inspections to verify that all necessary
steps had been taken as the latest round of six-nation disarmament
talks concluded in Beijing.
(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 15, In South Korea Won
Jeong-hwa (34) was arrested and later confessed that she was a spy
trained and commissioned by North Korea's intelligence agency.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Singapore North
Korea's reclusive communist regime, long seen as a nuclear threat to
the region, signed a nonaggression pact with Southeast Asia, in a
largely symbolic move. The Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC) with
the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) came into force
in 1976, requires signatories to renounce the use or threat of force
and calls for the peaceful settlement of conflicts.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 30, The UN said hunger in
North Korea is at its worst since the 1990s, prompting the resumption
of emergency UN food shipments after a two-year hiatus.
(AFP, 7/30/08)
2008 Aug 15, In Beijing 2 positive
dope tests by Asian athletes overshadowed Singapore's first medal in 48
years and a podium for Malaysia with a North Korean shooter and a
Vietnamese gymnast exposed as cheats.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 26, North Korea said it
has suspended work on disabling its nuclear facilities as of August 14
and is considering restoration of the Yongbyon reactor that can make
material for atomic bombs, accusing the US of violating a disarmament
deal by failing to delist North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Sep 1, North Korea began
reassembling its Yongbyon reactor that can make material for atomic
bombs in violation of US conditions for improved diplomatic relations.
Japan's Kyodo news agency reported the restart on Sep 3 citing sources
in Beijing close to six-party nuclear talks on North Korean.
(Reuters, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 9, North Korea held a
military parade to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the country’s
founding, but leader Kim Jong Il (66) was missing. Media later reported
that Kim Jong Il had brain surgery after a stroke last month and could
have partial paralysis on one side.
(SFC, 9/10/08, p.A3)(AP, 9/11/08)
2008 Sep 19, North Korea said it
is making "thorough preparations" to restart its nuclear reactor,
accusing the United States of failing to fulfill its obligations under
an international disarmament-for-aid agreement.
(AP, 9/19/08)
2008 Sep 22, North Korea asked the
UN nuclear watchdog (IAEA) to remove seals and surveillance equipment
from the Yongbyon nuclear reactor.
(AP, 9/22/08)
2008 Sep 24, North Korea barred UN
nuclear inspectors from its main nuclear reactor and within a week
plans to reactivate the plant that once provided the plutonium for its
atomic test explosion.
(AP, 9/24/08)
2008 Oct 8, South Korea's top
military officer said North Korea is working to develop a nuclear
warhead for a long-range missile, a day after the communist state
tested its short-range weaponry.
(AP, 10/8/08)
2008 Oct 9, The International
Atomic Energy Agency said North Korea has told it that the government
is placing all its main nuclear complex off-limits to inspectors and
will stop its program of dismantling the site.
(AP, 10/9/08)
2008 Oct 11, The Bush
administration removed North Korea from a terrorism blacklist as North
Korea agreed to all US nuclear inspection demands. The breakthrough is
intended to salvage a faltering disarmament accord before President
Bush leaves office in January.
(AP, 10/11/08)
2008 Oct 12, North Korea said it
will resume dismantling its main nuclear facilities, hours after the US
removed the communist country from a list of states Washington says
sponsor terrorism.
(AP, 10/12/08)
2008 Oct 14, North Korea resumed
steps to disable its nuclear reactor under renewed monitoring, after a
deal with Washington to save the disarmament process from collapse.
(AP, 10/14/08)
2008 Oct 28, South Korean
officials said a North Korean soldier has defected for the 2nd time in
a decade.
(WSJ, 10/29/08,
p.A1)(www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/28/asia/korea.php)
2008 Oct 29, South Korea reported
that Kim Jong Il has suffered a serious setback in his recovery from a
stroke.
(WSJ, 10/30/08, p.A1)
2008 Nov 12, The United States
says it has shipped 50,000 metric tons of heavy fuel oil to North Korea
as part of a nuclear disarmament deal. The fuel is scheduled to arrive
in the North in late November and early December. North Korea said that
it won't allow outside inspectors to take samples from its main nuclear
complex to verify the communist regime's accounting of past nuclear
activities.
(AP, 11/12/08)
2008 Nov 12, North Korea's
powerful military announced it will shut the country's border with the
South on Dec. 1, a marked escalation of threats against Seoul's new
conservative government at a time of heightened tension on the
peninsula.
(AP, 11/12/08)
2008 Nov 20, South Korean
activists sent propaganda leaflets over the border into North Korea,
ignoring their own government's pleas to stop the practice and threats
from the North to sever relations if it continues.
(AP, 11/20/08)
2008 Nov 24, North Korea detailed
plans to radically curtail ties with South Korea, announcing the end of
daily cross-border train service and tours of a historic city in
response to what it called Seoul's "confrontational" policy.
(AP, 11/24/08)
2008 Dec 9, In Beijing delegates
from six nations focused on a Chinese proposal on how to verify North
Korea's claims about its atomic program in talks aimed at ending the
secretive regime's nuclear activities.
(AFP, 12/9/08)
2008 Dec 11, Multilateral talks
with North Korea failed to break an impasse on checking Pyongyang’s
nuclear declarations. This led the US to halt fuel oil shipments until
specific steps are taken to verify nuclear activities.
(WSJ, 12/13/08, p.A10)
2008 Dec 13, North Korea warned
that it will slow down work on ending its nuclear drive after six-party
talks collapsed, but South Korea predicted a fresh start for diplomacy
under US president-elect Barack Obama.
(AFP, 12/13/08)
2008 Dec 13, Japan, China and
South Korea moved to ward off the effects of the global financial
crunch at a trilateral summit in Japan, while Tokyo and Seoul
criticized North Korea for stalling denuclearization talks.
(AP, 12/13/08)
2008 Dec 14, Orascom Telecom, an
Egyptian company, said it will launch 3G mobile telephone service in
North Korea on Dec 15, after winning the contract to build the advanced
network in a country where private cell phones are banned.
(AP, 12/14/08)
2009 Jan 14, South Korea's Chosun
Ilbo newspaper said North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has reportedly
ordered a crackdown on street markets in an apparent move to reassert
control over the economy amid an influx of foreign goods into the
isolated country.
(AP, 1/14/09)
2009 Jan 17, A US researcher who
visited the North said North Korea has hardened its stance on
disarmament, saying it has "weaponized" plutonium into warheads, but
hopes for better ties with President-elect Barack Obama.
(AP, 1/17/09)
2009 Jan 21, North Korea and Iran,
two nations with nuclear aspirations the US wants to thwart, both
signaled that they were open to new initiatives from President Barack
Obama that could defuse tensions.
(AP, 1/21/09)
2009 Jan 30, North Korea announced
that it is scrapping agreements with South Korea on easing military
tensions, accusing Seoul of pushing relations to the brink of war.
(AP, 1/30/09)
2009 Feb 17, In Japan US Secretary
of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned North Korea against following
through on a threatened missile launch, saying it would damage its
prospects for improved relations with the United States and the world.
Clinton also signed an agreement with Japan that will move 8,000
Marines off the southern Japanese island of Okinawa to the US territory
of Guam.
(AP, 2/17/09)
2009 Feb 23, South Korea's Defense
Ministry said North Korea recently deployed a new type of medium-range
ballistic missile capable of reaching northern Australia and the US
territory of Guam.
(AP, 2/23/09)
2009 Feb 24, North Korea said it
is preparing to shoot a satellite into orbit, its clearest reference
yet to an impending launch that neighbors and the US suspect will be a
provocative test of a long-range missile.
(AP, 2/24/09)
2009 Mar 8, Kim Jong Il was
unanimously re-elected to North Korea's rubber-stamp parliament.
Outside observers watched closely for hints leader Kim Jong Il may be
grooming a successor.
(AP, 3/8/09)(AP, 3/9/09)
2009 Mar 9, The US and South Korea
began annual war games prompting North Korea to call its military into
full combat readiness.
(SFC, 3/10/09, p.A2)
2009 Mar 13, Japan said it could
shoot down any threatening object falling toward its territory, after
North Korea said a planned rocket launch would send it across Japanese
territory.
(AP, 3/13/09)
2009 Mar 16, A UN human rights
investigator accused North Korean authorities of committing widespread
torture in prisons that he called "death traps." Life in the reclusive
communist-ruled country is "dire and desperate," said Vitit
Muntarbhorn, adding that people are denied enough food to survive.
(AP, 3/16/09)
2009 Mar 17, North Korea fully
reopened its border to South Koreans commuting to jobs at factories in
a northern economic zone after four days of restrictions. North Korean
soldiers detained two American journalists near the country's border
with China. Laura Ling and Euna Lee, reporters for former Vice
President Al Gore's San Francisco-based online media outlet Current TV,
were taken into custody near the Tumen River in northeastern North
Korea. Both journalists were formally indicted in April.
(AP, 3/17/09)(AP, 3/19/09)(SFC, 4/24/09, p.A2)
2009 Mar 18, The prime ministers
of China and North Korea discussed the nuclear situation on the Korean
peninsula as they met in Beijing amid rising tensions over Pyongyang's
atomic and missile programs.
(AFP, 3/18/09)
2009 Mar 20, North Korea closed
its southern border for the third time in recent days, even as it told
Seoul it would restore a military communications hot line severed last
week.
(AP, 3/20/09)
2009 Apr 5, North Korea defied
international warnings and sent a rocket hurtling over the Pacific, a
launch President Barack Obama called an illicit test of the regime's
long-range missile technology that threatened the security of nations
"near and far." North Korea said it successfully sent its
"Kwangmyongsong-2" satellite into orbit as part of its peaceful bid to
develop its space program. South Korea and the US military disputed
North Korea's claim of a successful launch into space, saying the
rocket fell into the ocean in stages.
(AP, 4/5/09)
2009 Apr 9, Kim Jong Il laid to
rest speculation about his health with a triumphant return to
parliament for his appointment to a third term as North Korea's supreme
leader. Legislators unanimously adopted a law "on revising and
supplementing the Socialist Constitution of the DPRK (North Korea)" but
gave no details.
(AP, 4/9/09)(AFP, 4/9/09)
2009 Apr 10, Japan renewed and
strengthened sanctions against North Korea, but disagreed with the US
over how the UN Security Council should censure Pyongyang for its
rocket launch.
(AP, 4/10/09)
2009 Apr 13, The UN Security
Council unanimously condemned North Korea's April 5 rocket launch,
demanded an end to missile tests and said it will expand sanctions
against the reclusive communist nation.
(AP, 4/14/09)
2009 Apr 14, North Korea vowed to
restart its nuclear reactor and to boycott international disarmament
talks for good in retaliation for the UN Security Council's
condemnation of its rocket launch.
(AP, 4/14/09)
2009 Apr 16, UN nuclear inspectors
left North Korea after the hardline communist state ordered them out
and announced plans to restart production of weapons-grade plutonium.
(AFP, 4/16/09)
2009 Apr 21, North and South Korea
held their first formal talks for more than a year but discussions
ended without agreement after just 22 minutes.
(AFP, 4/21/09)
2009 Apr 25, North Korea said it
has restarted its nuclear facilities to harvest plutonium for atomic
weapons, just hours after the UN imposed new sanctions on the communist
state for its recent rocket launch.
(AP, 4/25/09)
2009 Apr 30, Chinese state media
reported that China has reopened its land border to tourists traveling
to North Korea after a three-year break, with a group of 71 tourists
visiting the isolated country earlier this week on a one day tour of
Sinuiju.
(AP, 4/30/09)
2009 May 4, South Korean snipers
hovering in a helicopter chased away pirates pursuing a North Korean
freighter, while a Russian warship freed eight Iranian citizens held
hostage for more than three months.
(AP, 5/4/09)
2009 May 4, South Korean news
reported that North Korea runs a cyber warfare unit that tries to hack
into US and South Korean military networks to gather confidential
information and disrupt service.
(AP, 5/5/09)
2009 May 15, North Korea said it
has scrapped all wage and rent agreements with South Korea at a joint
industrial estate and told some 100 South Korean companies to leave if
they cannot accept it.
(AFP, 5/15/09)
2009 May 25, North Korea claimed
it carried out a powerful underground nuclear test, much larger than
one conducted in 2006. Russia's Defense Ministry confirmed an atomic
explosion at 9:54 a.m. (0054 GMT) in northeastern North Korea,
estimating the blast's yield at 10 to 20 kilotons, comparable to the
bombs that flattened Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
(AP, 5/25/09)
2009 May 26, North Korea
reportedly tested two more short-range missiles, a day after detonating
a nuclear bomb underground, pushing the regime further into a
confrontation with world powers despite the threat of UN action.
(AP, 5/26/09)
2009 May 27, North Korea renounced
its 1953 truce with the allied forces and threatened to strike any
ships trying to intercept its vessels. Facing international censure for
this week's nuclear test, it threatened to attack the South after it
joined a US-led plan to check vessels suspected of carrying equipment
for weapons of mass destruction.
(Reuters, 5/27/09)
2009 May 28, South Korean and US
troops raised their alert to the highest level since 2006 after North
Korea renounced its truce with the allied forces and threatened to
strike any ships trying to intercept its vessels.
(AP, 5/28/09)
2009 May 29, North Korea warned it
would act in "self-defense" if provoked by the UN Security Council,
which is considering tough sanctions over the communist country's
nuclear test, and followed the threat with the test launch of another
short-range missile.
(AP, 5/29/09)
2009 Jun 2, Two major South Korean
newspapers said that North Korea's military, party and government
officials were informed that Kim Jong Un (26), the youngest of three,
is in line to take the world's first communist dynasty into a third
generation.
(AP, 6/2/09)
2009 Jun 8, North Korea convicted
Laura Ling and Euna Lee, American journalists for former Vice President
Al Gore's San Francisco-based Current TV media venture, and sentenced
them to 12 years of hard labor for crossing into its territory,
intensifying the reclusive nation's confrontation with the United
States.
(AP, 6/8/09)
2009 Jun 10, Western powers
reached agreement with North Korea's key allies on a UN draft proposal
that would impose tough new sanctions on the communist nation's weapons
exports and financial dealings, and allow inspections of suspect cargo
in ports and on the high seas.
(AP, 6/10/09)(SFC, 6/11/09, p.A3)
2009 Jun 11, North Korea demanded
a 3,000 percent hike in rent from South Korea for the site of a joint
industrial park at the center of a dispute roiling their relations. It
also sought a more than fourfold increase in wages for North Korean
workers employed by South Korean companies at the park. More than 100
South Korean companies have factories in the park, employing some
40,000 North Koreans. They are paid about $70 a month on average.
(AP, 6/11/09)
2009 Jun 12, A South Korean
newspaper reported that the youngest son of North Korea's authoritarian
leader has been given the title of "Brilliant Comrade," a sign the
communist regime is preparing to name him as successor to the ailing
Kim Jong Il.
(AP, 6/12/09)
2009 Jun 12, The UN Security
Council agreed to expand an arms embargo against North Korea with the
goal of derailing the isolated nation's nuclear and missile programs.
It passed Resolution 1874 authorizing the search of North Korean ship
suspected of carrying illegal arms.
(AP, 6/13/09)(Econ, 6/27/09, p.50)
2009 Jun 13, North Korea vowed to
step up its atomic bomb-making program and threatened war if its ships
are stopped as part of new UN sanctions aimed at punishing the nation
for its latest nuclear test.
(AP, 6/13/09)
2009 Jun 15, In North Korea tens
of thousands rallied in Pyongyang to condemn the UN rebuke of the
country's latest nuclear test amid concern the communist regime could
conduct another one.
(AP, 6/15/09)
2009 Jun 16, North Korea said that
two female US journalists whom it jailed last week for 12 years had
admitted a politically motivated smear campaign against the communist
state. Ri Hyon Ok (33) was executed in Ryongchon for distributing the
Bible. She was also accused of spying for South Korea and the US and
organizing dissidents according to later reports by South Korean
activists.
(AFP, 6/16/09)(AP, 7/24/09)
2009 Jun 17, China and Russia
expressed serious concern about tension on the Korean peninsula and, in
the face of North Korea's rhetoric, joined international pressure for
it to return to nuclear talks.
(AP, 6/17/09)
2009 Jun 19, South Korea rejected
North Korea's demand for a massive increase in wages and rent at a
joint industrial park struggling to stay afloat, leaving the fate of
more than 100 companies and 40,000 workers there hanging in balance.
(AP, 6/19/09)
2009 Jun 24, North Korea
threatened to wipe the United States off the map as Washington and its
allies watched for signs the regime will launch a series of missiles in
the coming days. Meanwhile a US destroyer tailed a North Korean ship
suspected of transporting illicit weapons to Myanmar in what could be
the first test of UN sanctions passed to punish the nation for an
underground nuclear test last month.
(AP, 6/24/09)
2009 Jun 25, Tens of thousands of
North Koreans shouted slogans to denounce international sanctions at a
rally in central Pyongyang, as the communist country vowed to enlarge
its atomic arsenal and warned of a "fire shower of nuclear retaliation"
in the event of a US attack.
(AP, 6/25/09)
2009 Jun 26, Group of Eight
foreign ministers, meeting in Trieste, Italy, criticized Iran's
postelection violence, and urged its ruling clergy to ensure the
outcome of the disputed ballot reflects the will of the Iranian people.
The G8 countries also condemned North Korea's nuclear and missile tests
and called on the country to return to the negotiating table.
(AP, 6/26/09)
2009 Jul 2, North Korea test-fired
four short-range missiles, further stoking tension in the region that
was already high due to Pyongyang's nuclear test and threats to boost
its nuclear arsenal in response to UN sanctions.
(Reuters, 7/2/09)
2009 Jul 4, North Korea fired
seven ballistic missiles off its eastern coast, in a violation of UN
resolutions and an apparent message of defiance to the US on its
Independence Day.
(AP, 7/4/09)
2009 Jul 4, Attacks began on more
than two dozen Internet sites in the United States and South Korea and
some were disabled by hackers. South Korea's spy agency later said the
attacks were possibly linked to North Korea. Some of the affected US
government Web sites, such as the Treasury Department, Federal Trade
Commission and Secret Service, were still reporting problems days after
it started during the July 4 holiday.
(Reuters, 7/8/09)(AP, 7/8/09)
2009 Jul 9, South Korean Web sites
were attacked again after a wave of Web site outages in the US and
South Korea that several officials suspect North Korea was behind.
(AP, 7/9/09)
2009 Jul 10, South Korea’s spy
agency told lawmakers that a research institute affiliated with the
North's Ministry of People's Armed Forces received an order on June 7
to "destroy the South Korean puppet communications networks in an
instant." The Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that the North has between
500-1,000 hacking specialists.
(AP, 7/11/09)
2009 Jul 13, South Korea reported
that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il (67) has life-threatening
pancreatic cancer, days after fresh images of him looking gaunt spurred
speculation that his health was worsening following a reported stroke
last year.
(AP, 7/13/09)
2009 Jul 14, South Korean police
said hackers extracted files from computers they contaminated with the
virus that triggered cyberattacks last week in the United States and
South Korea, a sign that they tried to steal information from the
victims. North Korea has supposedly trained an elite group of hackers
at Mirim College, its military school.
(AP, 7/14/09)(Econ, 7/11/09, p.62)
2009 Jul 16, The UN Security
Council banned travel and froze assets of 10 North Korean individuals
and businesses linked to the country’s nuclear and ballistic missile
programs.
(SFC, 7/17/09, p.A2)
2009 Jul 30, North Korea's
military seized four South Korean fishermen after their boat strayed
into North Korean waters.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Aug 1, The Sydney Morning
Herald reported that North Korea is helping Myanmar build a secret
nuclear reactor and plutonium extraction plant to build an atomic bomb
within five years, citing the evidence of defectors. "In the event that
the testimony of the defectors is proved, the alleged secret reactor
could be capable of being operational and producing one bomb a year,
every year, after 2014."
(AFP, 8/1/09)
2009 Aug 4, In North Korea former
US Pres. Bill Clinton met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il on the
first day of a surprise visit to Pyongyang, with the "exhaustive" talks
covering a wide range of topics. Clinton was in communist North Korea
on a mission to secure the release of Americans Euna Lee (36) and Laura
Ling (32), who were arrested along the Chinese-North Korean border in
March and sentenced in June to 12 years of hard labor for illegal entry
and engaging in "hostile acts." After 140 days in custody, the
reporters were granted a pardon by North Korea.
(AP, 8/4/09)(AP, 8/5/09)
2009 Aug 6, In South Korea
unionists who occupied a car plant in protest at mass layoffs agreed to
end a 77-day sit-in which halted production and sparked violent clashes
with police.
(AFP, 8/6/09)
2009 Aug 13, North Korea freed Yu
Seong-Jin (44), a South Korean worker it had detained since March,
raising hopes of better cross-border relations after 18 months of
bitter hostility from the communist state.
(AFP, 8/13/09)
2009 Aug 15, South Korea's
president renewed his offer of aid for impoverished North Korea if it
abandons its nuclear weapons and called for talks on the reduction of
conventional weapons along their heavily fortified border.
(AP, 8/15/09)
Go to http://www.timelinesdb.com
Subject = North Korea
Korea South
End of file.