So, as everyone knows, Kim Jong-il
launched some missiles yesterday, prompting several emergency meetings of the UN Security Council, the apparently most relevant members being China, Russia, Japan, and the US. Japan is calling for economic sanctions, China and Russia are disagreeing, though John Bolton claims there is
broad support for the proposal, whatever that means.
I'm trying to figure this out. Maybe I'm totally stupid, but I'm not clear about what North Korea stands to gain from missile tests, what China and Russia stand to lose from sanctioning North Korea, how the Bush regime will respond, what the stakes are for the parties involved, or basically anything else about the "missile crisis". (Though I can imagine why Japan might be a little upset).
Bush already admitted that
he doesn't know what's going on, but that's hardly news. One of the AP articles mentions something about one-on-one vs six-party negotiations, but I'm basically clueless about the implications of either. Is there anyone in KosLand who can explain this situation in real simple terms?
(If I missed a bunch of diaries about this already, my apologies...)
