July 7, 2018

North Korea Calls Latest Nuke Talks “Regrettable”

The Straits Times/ZUMA

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The latest on North Korea:

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo came away from a two-day visit to North Korea on Saturday without meeting North Korean leader Kim Jong Un or securing a breakthrough in efforts to implement the denuclearization agreement signed by Washington and Pyongyang in Singapore last month….[He said the talks] were “productive” and he claimed progress on “central issues” between the two longtime adversaries.

His rosy outlook was almost immediately rejected by North Korea’s foreign ministry, which called the U.S. attitude to the talks “regrettable” and accused the United States of making unilateral demands for denuclearization. Pompeo just hours earlier said the two sides engaged in “good-faith negotiations.”

Anything else?

So North Korea is stalling on even the simplest promise made last month. Needless to say, this gives them more and more time to build out their nuclear program while the United States engages in endless futile talks over trivia.

Just for the sake of context, it’s worth noting that this is why treaty talks usually start at lower levels and only turn into presidential-level meetings toward the end, when the basics have been settled and the top guys can make decisions on a few remaining hard issues. Trump did it the other way around because it made good TV, but the result is that none of the basics have even been discussed, let alone settled, and even if the talks are done in good faith it will take years to do this.

Unfortunately, there’s every reason to think they aren’t being held in good faith. You see, Kim Jong Un likes good TV too.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

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