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North Korea: U.S 'stirring up bad blood' with sanctions

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Foreign ministry reiterates Pyongyang was not involved in Sony hacks

KCNA/Reuters

KCNA/Reuters

by Nadia Prupis, Common Dreams

North Korea denounced the U.S. on Sunday for imposing new sanctions on the country in retaliation for recent hacks into Sony Pictures’ systems.

The financial embargo would not weaken North Korea’s military, but would serve to antagonize the country, North Korea’s foreign ministry said on Sunday, according to the state-run news agency KCNA.

“The policy persistently pursued by the U.S. to stifle the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea], groundlessly stirring up bad blood towards it, will only harden its will and resolution to defend the sovereignty of the country,” an unnamed spokesperson told KCNA.

That includes a call for an increase in arms, such as nuclear weapons, as a “deterrent” against the sanctions.

The identity of the hackers is still unknown. Officials in Pyongyang—and cybersecurity experts in the U.S—continue to deny that North Korea orchestrated the attacks. However, the FBI continued to point the finger at the nation, while the White House promised on Friday that the sanctions were only the first step in its retaliation campaign.

In addition to imposing financial restrictions on 10 officials and three agencies, President Barack Obama said the U.S. was also considering adding North Korea back on to its list of state sponsors of terrorism. The White House did not elaborate how those restrictions would prevent any potential cyber attacks in the future. Moreover, analysts have noted that the sanctions will likely have limited effect, as North Korea has already been under strict sanctions in the U.S. and worldwide for several decades.

“The persistent and unilateral action taken by the White House to slap ‘sanctions’ against the DPRK patently proves that it is still not away from inveterate repugnancy and hostility towards the DPRK,” the foreign ministry said Sunday.

US sanctions North Korea over Sony hacking

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Korean government officials among those blacklisted for cyber attack on Sony Pictures firm blamed on Pyongyang.

Hackers began to issue threats against Sony over the release of the comedy film 'The Interview' [EPA]

Hackers began to issue threats against Sony over the release of the comedy film ‘The Interview’ [EPA]

by Al Jazeera

The United States has imposed fresh sanctions on North Korea in retribution for a cyber attack on Hollywood studio Sony Pictures blamed on Pyongyang.

In an executive order on Friday, US President Barack Obama authorised the US Treasury to place on its blacklist three top North Korean intelligence and arms operations, as well as 10 government officials, most of them involved in Pyongyang’s arms exports.

Obama said he ordered the sanctions because of “the provocative, destabilising, and repressive actions and policies of the government of North Korea, including its destructive, coercive cyber-related actions during November and December 2014”.

The activities “constitute a continuing threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States,” he added, in a letter to inform congressional leaders.

“The order is not targeted at the people of North Korea, but rather is aimed at the government of North Korea and its activities that threaten the United States and others,” Obama added.

The sanctions came after hackers penetrated Sony’s computers in late November, stealing and releasing over the internet employee information, unreleased films and an embarrassing trove of emails between top company executives.

The hackers, a group calling itself Guardians of Peace, then began to issue threats against the company over the looming Christmas release of the comedy film “The Interview”, which depicts a fictional CIA plot to kill North Korea’s leader.

The threats led first to worried movie theater owners dropping the film and then Sony cancelling the public debut altogether, beforereleasing it online.

After the hackers invoked the 9/11 attacks in their threats, the White House branded it a national security threat, and an investigation by the FBI said North Korea was behind the Sony intrusion.

Pyongyang repeatedly denied involvement, but has applauded the actions of the shadowy Guardians of Peace group.

‘Proportional’ response

The White House stressed Friday that its response will be “proportional”, but also that the sanction actions were only “the first aspect of our response”.

“We take seriously North Korea’s attack that aimed to create destructive financial effects on a US company and to threaten artists and other individuals with the goal of restricting their right to free expression,” said White House press secretary Josh Earnest.

In parallel with the White House announcement, the US Treasury named the first targets of sanctions in the Sony case.

They included the Reconnaissance General Bureau, the government’s main intelligence organisation, and two top North Korean arms exporters: Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation (KOMID) and Korea Tangun Trading Corporation.

The individuals named included agents of KOMID in Namibia, Russia, Iran and Syria, and other representatives of the government and the sanctioned organisations.

An administration official, briefing reporters, said that they remain “very confident” in their assessment that Pyongyang is behind the attack on Sony, amid doubts raised by security experts.

The official said the three organisations had “no direct involvement” with the hacking. “They are being designated to put pressure on the North Korean government,” the official said.

It was the first time US sanctions had been invoked due to a threat to a private company, the official acknowledged.

The sanctions forbid US individuals and companies from doing business with those blacklist, and freezes any assets those blacklisted might have on US territory.

A particular aim of such sanctions is to limit their access to international financial services by locking them out of the US financial system.

All three of the organisations blacklisted in the Sony case are already under US sanctions for the country’s persistence with its nuclear weapons program, its alleged provocations on the Korean peninsula, and other “continued actions that threaten the United States and others,” as Obama said in his letter.

The Interview, Hollywood and the politics of ridicule

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Is it ever okay to depict the assassination of living person? KCNA/Reuters

Is it ever okay to depict the assassination of living person? KCNA/Reuters

by Patricia Phalen, The Conversation

Sony’s decision to cancel the Christmas Day release of its film The Interview is drawing harsh criticism from Hollywood’s elite. George Clooney is asking everyone to stand up against the cancellation. Judd Apatow is defending comedy’s history of attacking people who are “bad to other people.” Rob Lowe, Steve Carell, Jimmy Kimmel and many, many more celebrities have added their voices to the mix.

The Interview, which features Randall Park in the role of North Korean leader Kim Jung Un, follows an absurd (and supposedly comical) assassination plot that ends with Mr. Kim’s violent death (evidently, his head explodes). The filmmakers might argue this is “all in good fun,” but the people ridiculed in the film are clearly not amused.

The North Korea-linked cyber-terrorists who hacked into Sony’s computer network last month threatened violence against theaters that screened the film and any moviegoers who dared to attend. When theater owners began backing out of their commitments to show the film, Sony pulled The Interview from distribution. The situation was, effectively, a bomb scare called in to every theater in the U.S.

So far, public discussion has centered on the hackers’ success at using threats of violence to derail an American film. Particularly galling is the notion that cyber-terrorists can dictate the business decisions of an American company. Because the entertainment industry is involved, most see this as a direct attack on freedom of expression. The loudest and most pervasive analysis of this situation is that Sony negotiated with terrorists, Sony caved, and the terrorists won.

On one level, this argument is a fair characterization.

However, we could use this incident as a springboard for a different – and more complicated – discussion, one that goes beyond the “they won, we lost” binary and introduces important questions: does the American entertainment industry have an ethical responsibility when it comes to representing real people? If so, what are the parameters of this responsibility?

The 2006 British film Death of a President portrayed the fictional assassination of George W. Bush. Many commentators couldn’t quite articulate the problem with showing the violent death of a living person, but there was a shock factor in this film that went beyond simple bad taste.

2006’s Death of a President depicted a fictional assassination of President George W. Bush. imdb.com

The Interview’s filmmakers probably thought Kim Jung Un was a safe target, given the overwhelmingly (and justifiably) negative public opinion of his regime. If the hackers hadn’t been able to make credible threats, the film might have gone virtually unnoticed by many Americans. Nonetheless, a fictional assassination of a real political figure is ethically problematic.

While Hollywood’s claim to the right of “creative expression” rings true, perhaps this freedom isn’t (or should not be) absolute. I am not suggesting any kind of externally imposed rules limiting the content of films; only from within the ranks of filmmakers can any kind of normative guidelines evolve.

In the end, Sony will most likely find a way to distribute The Interview – and the controversy is sure to enhance its profitability as an “on demand” option or even a theatrical release.

But the question of ethics in the entertainment world will – and should – persist.

Patricia Phalen is an Associate Professor of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University.

The Conversation

Leaked emails: Obama exerted influence over “The Interview”

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the interview

by Robert Barsocchini

Antiwar.com’s Dan Sanchez has just reported on leaked emails that reveal that the Obama regime exerted influence over the movieThe Interview “to encourage assassination and regime change in North Korea”.

Regarding the threats of bombings of theaters if the film was shown, Obama has been personally encouraging people to “go the movies” anyway, while hardliners like Mitt Romney have specifically encouraged people to go see The Interview.

This is not the first time strongman Obama has been closely involved with promoting or influencing Hollywood movies spouting negative propaganda about countries Obama and the US want to invade and conquer. Michelle Obama personally presented the Academy award for “best picture” for the filmArgo.

Argo whitewashed the history of US aggression and genocide against Iran. Since 1953, the US has been an accomplice in the torture and killing of over a million Iranian citizens, thousands with chemical weapons.

The Interview almost certainly whitewashes the history of US genocide against Korea, and apparently depicts US forces causing the North Korean leader’s head to explode.

In its aggressive attacks against North Korea in the early 1950s, the US intentionally targeted civilians and flattened entire villages and cities, including Pyongyang. The attacks killed up to 4 million people, mostly civilians, most of whom were killed by the US, many through direct and intentional targeting, such as the machine-gunning of women and children by US soldiers at No Gun Ri.

Scholar Chalmers Johnson finds the North Korea of today a proud, struggling nation that, unlike the US public, is very aware of what was done to it by the US, and sees the aggressive, threatening stance the US has since maintained towards that country.

Johnson also notes that the worst act committed against Koreans by a “Korean” government was the bayoneting of thousands of students by the US-backed South Korean dictatorship in the late ’80s.

The Interview would almost certainly be another exercise in genocide denial for the US, a country that has gotten away with all of the crimes, including multiple genocides, it has thus far committed.

However, though we may be happy when Holocaust deniers and the like decide to hold their tongues, it is extremely unfortunate that Sony’s decision not to release such a film was brought about not by free will but threats of violence from unknown sources, which are to be condemned as threats against speech itself.

According to the leaked emails, Sony was hesitant about depicting the assassination of the North Korean leader, but was “encouraged” by the Obama regime to go forward with it.

It may be useful to imagine how we would feel about the reverse: a slapstick buddy comedy about the infiltration of the country considered the most dangerous in the world – the USA, not North Korea – and the “comedic” assassination of Obama by having his head catch on fire and explode.

It is also relevant to note that North Korea’s official complaint about the film, that it incites terrorism against North Korea (which is what the Obama regime apparently intended), is the same reason the US government has given countless times over the course of its existence to justify brutally crushing free speech and protest – facts all but fully ignored or suppressed in dominant US discourse.

And, as Antiwar.com and Wired report, “North Korea almost certainly did not hack Sony”.

Robert Barsocchini focuses on global force dynamics and writes professionally for the film industry. He is a regular contributor to Washington’s Blog, and is published in Counter Currents, Global Research, State of Globe, Blacklisted News, LewRockwell.com, DanSanchez.me, Information Clearing House, Press TV, and other outlets. Also see: Hillary Clinton’s Record of Support for War and other Depravities. Follow Robert and UK-based colleague, Dean Robinson, on Twitter.

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