Bloomberg: N. Korea Missile Test May Bring End to Nuclear Talks, Hill Says
U.S. DoS: North Korea Must Disclose Missile Test Intentions, Bush Says
NYT: Koizumi Joins Bush in Warning North Korea Not to Fire Missile
Khaleej Times: Iran and North Korea appear to learn from each other in nuclear disputes
Hankyoreh: Why N.K.’s ‘missile card’ will not succeed
Reuters: [...]

The Musudan-ri Missile Test Site, where Nodong and Taepodong missiles have been launched from and where the current Taepodong 2 in question is sitting, is in Hamgyong Bukdo, the northern most province on the East Sea. Weather for the closest major city, Ch’ongjin, is rain all week, and most of next week:

But even after the [...]

A sweep of the headlines reveals that just about everyone is “urging” North Korea not to do something foolish with its missile collection. Japan is teaming up with France, Canada, and the U.S., while South Korea is standing beside China. Playing with missiles seems to be backfiring on North Korea, and the U.S. hardline is [...]

News aggregation will be posted every ~1-3 days, and more reliably in the future.
Asia Times: North Koreans turned on but tuned out (Andrei Lankov)
Korea Times: US Rights Envoy to Visit Kaesong Complex in July
Hankyoreh: More North Koreans seek refuge in U.S.
Yonhap: N. Korea calls U.S. secretary of state ‘insane’ for ‘axis of evil’ remarks
Industry [...]

Not the usual TKL fare, but this article about traveling to Tokyo on the cheap (under $1,000 for one whole week, including airfare!) is cute.
Before you start decrying the excesses of the leisure class, allow me to add a few details: My lunch costs less than $6, the flowers are fake, the sashimi could be [...]

My latest Seattle Times op-ed is online. I wrote it late last week in response to the North Korean missile test-launch hubub.
Two words, then one: “Go ahead” followed by “quarantine.”

Image Source: The Seattle Times

WaPo reports:
The Chinese government’s disclosure this week of $1.1 billion worth of fraud at one of the country’s largest state-owned banks underscores the risks confronting foreign investors and the precarious nature of China’s corruption-ridden financial system.
China’s National Audit Office on Monday announced that an examination of records at the Agricultural Bank of China — one [...]

Offspring of Empire: The Koch’ang Kims and the Origins of Korean Capitalism 1876-1945. Carter J. Eckert. University of Washington Press, 1991, revised 1997.
Offspring of Empire uses the Koch’ang Kim family as representative example in order to make the point that modern Korean capitalism had its origins in the colonial era, rather that the pre-colonial Chosun [...]

The “business travelers forecast” on CNN International gave the weather for Pyongyang this past weekend, the weatherman cautioning that those traveling there would see some rain there. Just giving the temperatures or forecast I suppose would be normal for any capital city, but he spent his time talking about Pyongyang to the exclusion of, you [...]

Why is Taiwan being left out? Some choice bits from the Weekly Standard:
Yet, although Washington and Tokyo are expected to use the occasion to tout progress on nearly all major strategic questions, the two allies will almost certainly remain silent on one pressing issue: Taiwan’s increasingly uncertain role in their East Asian security architecture. [snip]
But [...]