TNorth Korean state newspapers on Monday released a message of congratulations from the queen on Monday asking informed experts to speculate that Pyongyang should have invented the Buckingham Palace note in a propaganda move to bolster the international position of the ‘rogue state.
A royal spokesman, however, confirmed to The Daily Beast that Queen Elizabeth II sent a cheerful message to Kim Jong Un on the occasion of the 73rd anniversary of its founding as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
North Korea “regularly greets our queen on her birthday,” Korean expert Aidan Foster-Carter, a senior researcher at the University of Leeds in England, told Daily Beast, “but I find no trace of any message for us, so far. So that’s intriguing. “
The message, dated Sept. 7, two days before the North Korean founding day parade, was revealed Monday by the Pyongyang Central News Agency, which published it in its entirety among dozens of other messages. of leaders from countries such as Algeria, the Seychelles and Azerbaijan. The controversial king of Thailand was another good wisher, but the leaders of other great Western powers were notable for his absence.
The queen avoided any personal tribute to the Korean dictator despite celebrating the anniversary of the establishment of the Kim dynasty.
“As the people of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea celebrate their National Day, I send you my best wishes for the future,” he said.
A royal spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the message to The Daily Beast, dispelling suspicions that it could have been an elaborate hoax. The palace would only say that the message had been sent to the head of state, although there is only one man to whom this could refer. The Pyongyang KCNA confirmed that he was sent to Kim Jong Un as “chairman of state affairs.”
“It was a message sent by the Office of Foreign Affairs and the Commonwealth (FCDO) on behalf of Her Majesty to the people of North Korea on the national day,” a palace spokesman said. These messages are routinely sent on behalf of the Queen by the FCDO and on the advice of the FCDO, she would not have crafted the message herself.
However, efforts to minimize the importance of the message will not appease critics who fear the regime will make use of the queen’s message to give legitimacy to its autocratic system. North Korea’s nuclear aspirations were once again demonstrated on Sunday with successful tests of a new long-range cruise missile.
DPRK leaders have been trying for years to relate to the queen, sending good grades to the family and their citizens. In 2014, for example, Kim Yong Nam, then head of state of North Korea, sent birthday congratulations to the queen in which she wished her and her subjects “health and happiness … well-being and prosperity “.
The meaning then, as now, was that North Korea was seeking friendship with the United Kingdom despite the hostility dating back to the Korean War, when British troops played heroic roles under the auspices of the United Nations Command in battles along the line between north and south. .
Bruce Bennett, an expert on North Korea at the Rand Corporation, said the queen’s message could also be seen as pro-Western propaganda, designed to attract the people of North Korea rather than the ruling family.
I firmly believe that the ROK (South Korea, the Republic of Korea), the US and other allies should tell the people of North Korea not to hate them. Contrary to what the regime tells them, we are not their enemies and we hope that they can have a better life ”.
Bennett suggested that the US should follow the Queen’s example in congratulating North Koreans on birthdays.
“I’ve always been baffled why the U.S. government doesn’t try to send these messages,” he said. While Kim Jong Un “seems paranoid about foreign information, the US and its allies should regularly send appropriate messages to the people of North Korea, messages that contradict the regime’s villainous propaganda.”
“Because Kim has so many internal problems right now, she needs scapegoats to blame,” Bennett said. “What better message to send that we are not hurting North Korea, the regime is.”
Andrew Salmon, author of groundbreaking books on the British in the Korean War, saw the leaders of the two countries in a symbiotic relationship. He said these few words from the queen were “a message from a hereditary (constitutional) monarch to a hereditary (absolute) monarch.”
But there may be more messages than just words, according to Choi Jin-wook, who for decades has been discussing North Korea’s problems with the National Unification Institute of Korea and others.
“A wild conjecture!” he said, noting that the United States and the United Kingdom “maintain intimate communication” and may have collaborated on the message. “A country or a person like North Korea should be treated well, isolated and labeled as a regular suspect. Otherwise, it can cause problems, “he said.
Choi said the United States was not in a position to “do anything”, but curiously, the DPRK’s top US negotiator, Sung Kim, was in Tokyo conferring with South Korean and Japanese envoys, even while KCNA was reporting the message. Sung Kim’s goal was for the U.S. to dialogue with the north “regardless of progress in denuclearization,” according to Yonhap, the South Korean news agency.
In fact, Sung Kim talked about the negotiations even though North Korea boasted of having successfully launched a new type of cruise missile over the weekend. Without referring to cruise missile tests, he said the United States was “ready to work in cooperation with the DPRK to address humanitarian concerns,” Yonhap reported.
Shim Jae-hoon, a longtime analyst on Korean issues, had a less beneficial explanation of the royal gesture. “Think about your age (95 years),” he said. “It may just be ahead.”