Beijing Newspeak

I had plenty of time last week to pour over the news agency wires and marvel at the latest confusion over the six-party talks. Despite Xinhua’s diplomatic desk being a few metres up the corridor, I rely firmly on Reuters and AP for the breaking news for obvious reasons. Substitute pretty much any country you like for Romania in this article and it is nearly always applicable. I have long suspected the overuse of the cut and paste function in the diplomatic section.

Not that I’m being given much of Xinhua’s convoluted spiel, translated word for word from Foreign Ministry statements, at the moment. This may have something to do with me completely losing the plot last week, launching a tirade of foul abuse at the unfortunate soul who had concocted the latest piece of unintelligble nonsense and tossing the wretched hard copy on the floor. I was told my anger was “unnecessary” and I would have to agree entirely. On a selfish note, I felt much better. Especially when I had more time to appreciate the KCNA’s latest poetry, which is still a couple of notches of below Xinhua in terms of logic but a darn sight more pleasurable to read.

However, I have to say the reporting of the breakdown of the six-party talks on the foreign wires grated somewhat. There appeared to be a total lack of analysis. I appreciate a news agency is required to be as objective as possible but international newspeak always requires interpretation. I was particularly suprised at AP’s effort - and therefore half the world’s press - which allowed the U.S. negotiator to lay the blame for the collapse of the negotiations firmly at the door of North Korea.

“The problem has been that the North Koreans said they must have this BDA matter finalized before they move forward on the other issues and that sort of sequential approach slowed us down,” Christopher Hill, the chief American envoy, told reporters.

This was then quickly followed by a quote from some guy from a Washington think-tank to ram home the downright stubbornness of those naughty Kim Jong Ilians.

Nicholas Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think tank, said the stalemate could have been predicted as Pyongyang was following its usual tactic of committing, then pulling back.

“This is what they do and no one should be surprised,” Eberstadt said in a telephone interview. “It’s absolutely business as usual. They don’t play until you pay. Then they will return to discussions to find out what they can get at the next round.”

I rarely stick up for North Korea (how pleasurable it is to be released from the Xinhua shackles and be able to ignore that most ludicrous of abbreviations, DPRK) but hang on a minute. North Korea made it quite clear the talks could continue once the 25 million U.S. dollars had been transferred to the Bank of China from Banco Delta Asia in Macao. Ah, behold the 13th paragraph, when the true situation begins to emerge:

Russian envoy Alexander Losyukov, who also left for home Thursday, was quoted by ITAR-Tass news agency as saying “the whole problem came from the American side.”

He said the United States failed to assure the Chinese side that the Bank of China could receive the funds without fear of U.S. sanctions or discrimination by the banking community and the U.S. government.

What blatant contempt for the basic news-writing principle of the inverted pyramid! That shining gem of a rule that taught budding writers, within the first ten minutes of journalism school, to put rescuer, cat and tree all in the lead paragraph. This is the reason for the breakdown of the talks but, it seems, Russian words do not carry much weight.

The Reuters report chose to elevate the Japanese chief negotiator’s comments to prominence.

“It is deplorable that North Korea did not show a positive stance and stuck to its position to the bitter end that it would not take part in talks unless the funds were returned,” Japanese chief negotiator Kenichiro Sasae said.

This is before they chose to reveal the crux of the issue - China’s seeming inability to persuade the Bank of China (BOC) to accept 25 U.S. million dollars of dirty money from a bank that has been crippled by U.S. financial sanctions. Apparently, it is frightened the money - which after all is a piddly sum for the BOC - will damage its credit rating. Can’t imagine why.

Chinese chief envoy Wu Dawei said the problem hinged on convincing the Bank of China to accept the transfer.

“Whether or not the Bank of China can fulfil this responsibility, we need to consult with them,” Wu told a news conference. “This is a matter that cannot be decided by the government.”

A Bank of China spokesman, asked about reports it was blocking the transfer, said it had not been asked to conduct the transaction and stressed that the bank was obliged to abide by anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism laws.

Now, I am confused. Forgive me for being sceptical but BOC, as a state-owned bank, should dam well do what the Chinese government tells it to do. Except it hasn’t been told anything. The matter can not be decided by the government you say? Well that claim is shot to pieces by the BOC spokesman saying the bank has not been asked to transfer the money. If it was asked, would it be in a position to say, “actually boss, no can do”?

The clear problem here is a disagreement between the U.S. and China - North Korea is merely waiting for them to sort it out. China is reluctant to harbour the money on the mainland and the U.S. has failed to assure it that there will be no problems for the BOC. Sorry if this is so incredibly obvious but my point is this: the news reports from both AP and Reuters fail to provide the international press with the proper story. Which means the phrase “bloody North Koreans” will be uttered by the majority of the world’s newspaper readers.

More galling is a brief look at the minutes to the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman’s press briefing (always a barrel of laughs by the look of the transcripts), where all the right questions were asked, including:

Q: I asked the Bank of China of how to resolve the transfer issue today and was told that the Foreign Ministry will have the answers. Has the Chinese Foreign Ministry discussed the issue with the Bank of China?

A: If the Foreign Ministry has the answer, this issue has already been resolved. Now this issue is still under discussion.

Still, I won’t be turning to Xinhua’s coverage just yet.