ID :
192597
Mon, 07/04/2011 - 03:01
Auther :
Shortlink :
https://oananews.org//node/192597
The shortlink copeid
N. Korea's economy hopeless without leadership change: expert
By Lee Chi-dong
WASHINGTON, July 3 (Yonhap) -- North Korea's renewed push for a joint economic zone with China will again come to naught as its current leadership has no will and capability to carry out the project, a U.S. expert said Sunday.
Nicholas Eberstadt, a political economy researcher at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI), said North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's trip to China in May reflects the communist regime's gesture for the "opening" or "reform" of its economy.
He said Kim's visit was a "fundraising tour" for the 10-year State Strategy Plan for Economic Development which the North announced early this year in hopes of lifting itself into the ranks of advanced nations by 2020.
"It is a safe bet that Kim Jong-il's visit to China in May 2011 was a sort of fundraising tour aimed at securing some of the many billions of dollars envisioned by this ambitious plan," he said in a report titled "What is wrong with the North Korean economy?"
Shortly after Kim's return from China, Pyongyang unveiled a new joint economic zone project with China on two border islands - Hwanggumpyong and Wihwa.
The project was apparently meant to underscore a new direction for the North Korean economy, and to jump-start the new development campaign, according to Eberstadt.
He pointed out Kim's every trip to China so far has raised speculation over a possible shift in the North's own style of socialism, called "Urisik Sahoejuui" in Korean.
"Yet all North Korean efforts at 'opening' and 'reform' to date have been confused and half-hearted, and every one of these initiatives has ultimately ended in failure," he said.
He stressed the North's economy has no future under the current system.
"In China and other socialist countries, big changes in economic policy have typically followed, and depended upon, big changes in national leadership," he said. "But Pyongyang appears absolutely intent upon carrying the Kim family's dynastic rule into its third generation. North Korea is most likely to remain the black hole in the Northeast Asian economy."
lcd@yna.co.kr
WASHINGTON, July 3 (Yonhap) -- North Korea's renewed push for a joint economic zone with China will again come to naught as its current leadership has no will and capability to carry out the project, a U.S. expert said Sunday.
Nicholas Eberstadt, a political economy researcher at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI), said North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's trip to China in May reflects the communist regime's gesture for the "opening" or "reform" of its economy.
He said Kim's visit was a "fundraising tour" for the 10-year State Strategy Plan for Economic Development which the North announced early this year in hopes of lifting itself into the ranks of advanced nations by 2020.
"It is a safe bet that Kim Jong-il's visit to China in May 2011 was a sort of fundraising tour aimed at securing some of the many billions of dollars envisioned by this ambitious plan," he said in a report titled "What is wrong with the North Korean economy?"
Shortly after Kim's return from China, Pyongyang unveiled a new joint economic zone project with China on two border islands - Hwanggumpyong and Wihwa.
The project was apparently meant to underscore a new direction for the North Korean economy, and to jump-start the new development campaign, according to Eberstadt.
He pointed out Kim's every trip to China so far has raised speculation over a possible shift in the North's own style of socialism, called "Urisik Sahoejuui" in Korean.
"Yet all North Korean efforts at 'opening' and 'reform' to date have been confused and half-hearted, and every one of these initiatives has ultimately ended in failure," he said.
He stressed the North's economy has no future under the current system.
"In China and other socialist countries, big changes in economic policy have typically followed, and depended upon, big changes in national leadership," he said. "But Pyongyang appears absolutely intent upon carrying the Kim family's dynastic rule into its third generation. North Korea is most likely to remain the black hole in the Northeast Asian economy."
lcd@yna.co.kr
