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Global Pulse: Diplomacy between South and North Korea is being driven by K-pop

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On Sunday, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un watched a K-pop performance in Pyongyand — and visibly enjoyed it. Fears about Donald Trump starting a war now that he has a fully formed “war cabinet” abound, while Pope Francis appealed for peace in his Sunday Easter Mass.

Dance diplomacy

“K-pop is a serious business, especially when put to the service of peace, mutual understanding and denuclearisation,” writes The Economist. South Korean musicians are touring in North Korea for three days, and their plans include playing a joint concert with the counterparts in the North.

Kim Jong-un, in a surprise appearance, clapped, smiled and even posed for a group photo with a K-pop band on Sunday. Videos of him enjoying the band, Red Velvet’s, performance surfaced. The entire scenario was highly unusual, as his government has been trying to stop the “infiltration” of the South’s pop culture into the North. It was the first time a North Korean leader watched a South Korean musical performance in the North’s capital.

“If mutual understanding is the basis for reconciliation, music and lyrics may provide an insight. The 160-strong southern delegation will include Red Velvet, a girl group, as well as K-pop veterans such as Lee Sun-hee, a purveyor of cheesy ballads, and Cho Yong-pil, a Korean pop legend. Their records sell well on the black market and are popular with elites in the North, though banned there on pain of imprisonment,” writes The Economist. The tour is entitled “Spring is Coming”.

“South Koreans joke that the hits of Red Velvet and Ms Lee will be directly addressed to Mr Kim, if played in Pyongyang. Ms Lee’s ode “To J” may be going slightly too far in the reconciliation stakes: “J, my love has remained unchanged.” But Red Velvet’s “Bad Boy” could be an unorthodox injunction to nuclear diplomacy: “Oh your edgy style is a bonus/ I love the boring way you talk/ let’s push and pull.””

“Where the South likes gooey sentimentality, northern pop extols rather different virtues. In her song “Excellent horse-like lady”, Hyon Song Wol, leader of the northern delegation (and a member of the central committee of the North Korean Workers’ Party) sings the praises of a woman working in a factory: “They say I’m a virgin on a stallion. Yet again today I was the first at work.” A video of the song shows her swooshing around a textile factory at high speed, smiling brightly at the camera.”

An accidental war?

“So now that he has assembled what some are calling his war cabinet, will President Trump actually start a war,” asks Jackson Diehl in the Washington Post. “That has been the subject of a lot of worried conversation inside Washington’s foreign policy establishment since Trump appointed John Bolton — known for his frequent advocacy of preemptive bombing — as his national security adviser. Bolton and Secretary of State-designate Mike Pompeo agree with Trump that the nuclear deal with Iran was a disaster, and they have both suggested that regime change is the only solution to the standoff with North Korea. The question is, is Trump himself really capable of initiating war with one of those countries? With both?”

Diehl writes that Trump isn’t capable. While he might have extended U.S. military action in Syria and Iraq, Trump has been a skeptic of military ventures in general. He now wants to pull out of Syria, and was recently talked out of pulling out of Afghanistan as well.

“War would also be a break from the emerging diplomatic model of this president, which is to bluster and bluff, then cut a deal. That’s what happened last week with South Korea, which saw the free-trade agreement Trump called “horrible” not torn up but slightly amended. Trump has been trying to do the same with the Iran pact, denouncing it while his diplomats quietly pressure European governments to agree to fixes — a process that, at least until the ouster of Rex Tillerson from the State Department, looked as though it might succeed.”

“The main danger, then, is not that Trump will choose war. It is that he will stumble into it, through impulsive acts unattached to any coherent strategy. He has set up two big, high-risk decision points for this spring: on whether to renew sanctions on Iran in mid-May and whether to deal with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un at a summit by the end of that month,” writes Diehl.

“If, on the other hand, Trump takes the counsel his new aide has already offered on television and scraps the Iran accord while stiffing or rebuking Kim, he will create two crises — and hand the initiative in both to America’s enemies.”

“Trump may manage to avoid these crises while still achieving his underlying aim of monopolizing the world’s attention. He could accept Europe’s offer on Iran, or give the deal another extension to leave time for more negotiations. He could announce a grand-sounding but vague accord with Kim, delegating the substance to years of tedious but time-buying negotiations,” Diehl concludes. “Trump is in charge of this reality show.”

An impassioned plea

Tens of thousands of worshipers from around the world thronged to Easter Mass in St. Peter’s Square in Rome, writes the New York Times. 

“In his message on Sunday, the pope called for peace in a world marked by war and conflict. He cited a need to end the “carnage” in “the beloved and long-suffering land of Syria.””

“He urged “reconciliation” in the Middle East and pressed for “the fruits of dialogue” to defuse tensions on the Korean Peninsula.” He also called attention to the “hunger, endemic conflicts and terrorism” in Africa.

The Pope also talked about Venezuela, and expressed hope that the country will be able to “find a just, peaceful and humane way to surmount quickly the political and humanitarian crises that grip it.”

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