Suddenly, everyone's an expert on North Korea and Kim Jong Il. Frankly, no one can crystal-ball how the Korean peninsular situation will pan out. For sure, we all mocked the "Dear Leader" while he was alive, but he alone knew how to take his hermit kingdom to the brink of an international crisis, then pull back. He epitomised reason in madness.
China is the key player to watch, and I recommend Victor Cha's commentary piece "North Korea: China's newest province?" which first appeared in the New York Times and which both TODAY and ST have re-published (21 Dec). Here's the TODAY link:
http://www.todayonline.com/World/EDC111221-0000046/North-Korea--Chinas-newest-province
I've extracted a key segment of Cha's article here:
The allies' best move, then, is to wait and see what China does.
Among China's core foreign-policy principles is the maintenance of a divided Korean Peninsula, and so Beijing's statements about preserving continuity of North Korea's leadership should come as no surprise. Since 2008, it has drawn closer to the regime, publicly defending its leaders and investing heavily in the mineral mines on the Chinese-North Korean border.
But even as Beijing sticks close to its little Communist brother, there are intense debates within its leadership about whether the North is a strategic liability. It was one thing to back a hermetic but stable regime under Kim Jong Il; it will be harder to underwrite an untested leadership.
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OK, I'm done with the serious part of today's posting. Did you know that there are at least 13 interesting tidbits about Kim Jong Il? As claimed by media reports, these are:
* He had over 50 titles
* He had a "divine" birth
* He ate donkeys and giant rabbits
* He could control the weather
* He was afraid of flying
* He liked fine wines and cognacs
* He never needed to pee or shit (despite quaffing all those wines and cognac)
* He liked waterslides
* He was such a movie buff that he kidnapped a South Korean film industry couple
* He was fastidious about the rice he took (each grain had to be inspected by staff)
* He was the world's greatest golfer
* Afraid of becoming addicted to painkillers after a fall, he had his staff pop the pills too
* He invented the hamburger
So there, all 13 "strangest facts" about the man... Read more in this xinmsn link:
http://news.xin.msn.com/en/silverlight-gallery.aspx?cp-documentid=5674781
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Finally, what were Singaporeans' three favourite YouTube videos this year? Check them out here:
http://news.insing.com/tabloid/top-youtube-videos-for-2011/id-5d223f00
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