Top officers in the North Korean military held an emergency meeting shortly after South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol declared martial law at 10:23 pm on Dec. 3. In addition, North Korea apparently kept its entire military on an emergency footing for around 18 hours after Yoon’s martial law declaration.
Multiple high-ranking sources in the North Korean military told Daily NK on Dec. 6 that the General Staff Department of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) had senior officers assemble at its headquarters in the Sokbong neighborhood of the Sosong district of Pyongyang around 11 pm, half an hour after Yoon declared martial law.
Key officials in the General Staff Department attended the meeting in person, while leaders of the navy, air force and strategic forces, including major corps commanders, attended over video.
North Korea’s military leaders were informed about Yoon’s declaration of martial law and about the South Korean military boosting its readiness and discussed potential countermeasures. In the early hours of Dec. 4, immediately after the meeting, the North Korean military leaders ordered all forces to assume emergency operational readiness, which was not relaxed until 5 pm that day.
Since the South Korean military had elevated its readiness after the martial law declaration, the North Korean military had no choice but to adopt emergency readiness as well, the source explained.
North Korea’s Ministry of State Security and Ministry of Social Security — responsible for the country’s secret police and civilian police, respectively — apparent held separate emergency meetings after Yoon’s martial law declaration and informed officials that the entire military had been placed on alert.
Senior officials in the Workers’ Party of Korea, who have relatively good access to information from overseas, reportedly learned about the martial law declaration in short order.
After learning about the martial law declaration, some party officials suspected that the KPA had attacked South Korea, a disturbing possibility since they had not been informed about any such military action.
Other party officials wondered whether the members of the Seoul branch of the ruling party’s United Front Department had been arrested.
While the actual presence of North Korean agents in South Korea has not been confirmed, these remarks indicate that North Korean officials assume that agents from the Central Committee’s No. 10 Bureau (formerly the United Front Department) are still in Seoul and that the declaration of martial law might mean those agents had been discovered.
According to the source, any North Korean officials who are aware of South Korea’s martial law declaration learned about it through private channels because the regime has not yet mentioned the declaration, not even to party officials.
“The reference newspaper that’s only read by high-ranking officials contains foreign articles that aren’t printed in the Rodong Sinmun newspaper. But apparently the reference newspaper has yet to cover martial law first being declared and then lifted,” said a source in Pyongyang.
The North Korean regime publishes a reference newspaper on a daily, weekly and monthly basis so that officials of the middle rank and above can stay abreast of what is actually happening in South Korea and other countries.
The daily reference newspaper, which is only made available to the highest officials, apparently did not contain any news about South Korea’s martial law incident on Dec. 4 or 5.
The regime appears to be carefully weighing how much information about the martial law incident to disclose to officials. But since the reference newspaper covers major news from around the world, it is likely that the martial law incident will be covered, if only briefly, before too long.
No coverage in state media
North Korean media provided to the general public, including the Rodong Sinmun newspaper and Korean Central Television, have not covered the martial law incident at all.
The Rodong Sinmun’s lack of coverage of this issue — despite its frequent articles about demonstrations calling for Yoon’s resignation — appears to be due to concerns about how North Koreans would react to the news that the president’s martial law declaration was countermanded by the National Assembly.
In North Korea, the orders of the supreme leader take priority over the Constitution, as well as resolutions of the Supreme People’s Assembly (North Korea’s legislature, similar to the South Korea’s National Assembly). The regime apparently fears that if North Koreans were to learn that the South Korean president’s orders had been immediately invalidated by the National Assembly, it could encourage them to entertain fantasies about democracy.
In fact, North Korean party officials were more surprised that the martial law order was lifted by South Korea’s National Assembly than that it was declared in the first place.
“How could an order given by the president be rescinded by the National Assembly? Officials were shocked to learn the order was immediately canceled because of opposition from the National Assembly,” the source said.
“If the South Korean government’s unilateral martial law declaration had gone into effect, the North Korean regime would have immediately used that in propaganda about the chaotic political situation in South Korea. But since the martial law declaration was canceled through the democracy process, the regime is uncomfortable with sharing those facts with the public,” Hong Min, a senior researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification, told Daily NK.
North Koreans are unfamiliar with the idea of a national leader’s orders being revoked through democratic procedures, and that could raise uncomfortable comparisons with the North Korean system. That is reason enough for the regime not to go public with the news. But now that the National Assembly’s impeachment vote against Yoon is over, some think the North Korean authorities may disclose the political situation in South Korea.
“In the past, North Korea has generally refrained from disclosing uncertain situations to the public. Rather than immediately publishing news about the martial law incident, the regime is likely to present selective information that serves its interests once the outcome of the presidential impeachment vote becomes clear,” Hong predicted.
Daily NK works with a network of sources in North Korea, China, and elsewhere. For security reasons, their identities remain anonymous.
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December 11, 2024 at 12:00PM
by DailyNK(North Korean Media)