Environmental crisis on the Korean Peninsula

Hyping missile threats have caused the Korean peninsula to fall prey to a state of exigency. Seoul finds cues about the encroaching perils incoming from their immediate neighbor regularly. The likeliness of North Korea’s capabilities over nukes is congruous but the call for scientific-technological advances fails to keep with the ascertaining supremacy politically as well as militarily. The impetus to attack South Korea does not hold any credibility in contemporary times. Decoding the strategies and blueprint over Disarmament and Nuclear Proliferation Treaties, the boom in military operations, drills, and the exaggerated cautionary of first strikes remains a catastrophic proposal. The heavy development and increased attention towards the missile defense system do not toss away the fair shake of a missile attack by Kim Jong-un’s regime.

The series of missile launches have earned apprehensiveness and reprobation from the international community. The Japanese government has waved the flag to its imperial coast guard to look out for any indication of further developments of the missiles. The US Indo-Pacific Command and South Korea on the other hand, are trying to gather all possible intel following the nuclear tests, which is critical for the holistic development of the Korean peninsula. With hostility and jitters underway, the dubiosity by the analysts paints a different narrative. Carrying out such experimentation to see how the wind blows indicates North Korean dictatorship, grinding its nose to suffice the bare minimum target goals domestically, and proving its’ strategic political influence in matters of power in increasingly dynamic global geopolitics.

The astriction over the neoteric events related to the multiple accounts of ballistic missile launches by DPRK has drawn the international community to ponder upon the long-banned activities by UNSC. Marking the ninth missile test launch of this year, DPRK has been symmetrically carrying out hypersonic missile experiments with a high-efficiency rate routinely. The recent development of nukes tests has come in a fortnight before South Korea conducts its democratic presidential election, whose believed abstraction of North Korea’s power politics maneuvering happens to be a primordial issue.

Nuclear Weapons Tests and Environmental Consequences

Promulgating missile threats and nukes might be implausible but the menace of Climate change is at grubstake. Possessing severe menaces towards the lives of many, studies show the height of indiscretion and absurdity to do away with carcinogenic diseases and other related ailments as just a mere affliction of life. The Korean Peninsula has experienced the buffeted yellow dust from China, causing conditions of severe smog and respiratory maladies. The desert dust is non-analogous compared to the abhorrent amalgamation of droughts along with torrential rains that remained hazardous and almost wiped out Korean agriculture in both countries. Whilst the pandemic is in progress, the South Korean air particulate index is foreboding given the excessive percentage of microparticles as an upshot byproduct, released by outmoded factories, and traditional power plants are driven by coal in China and North Korea. 

The mad drive for political and armed security has driven the Korean factions away from the grounds of mutual planning for a sustainable regional biosphere. Although, the plutocratic economy of the South has enough money bags to lead potential sustainable game-changing economy reflecting the lowest level of pollution, the administration security policy of Seoul does not scout out the analysis behind declining water levels, failed aquifers, or hike in contagious arid and barren fallow percentage over China and North Korea. The astigmatic and precarious procedures can only elucidate the need for acquiring military assets from suppliers then provide solutions to variegated issues.

The transformation in Korean security issues on climate change and various environment-related disasters must call for immediate scrutiny in the adaption of the cultural economy within the Korean peninsula. The infrastructure obligates an investment worth fifty years to thrive sustainably for its continuity in the longer run. Such expenditure proposes a hefty vested interest to gauge a diversion in purchasing more solar panels for a stable environment in the longer run, as compared to its ‘casino approach’ to its GDP. The Korean economy has been grappled with unprecedented demurs with a sharp increase in its aging population. The old withstanding mindset in the older generation fails to grasp the legal connotation pertaining to the policies of heavy industries like iron & steel, aluminum, automobile sector, petrochemicals, and others, whose growth is stagnant in itself. The economic breakthrough for the Korean economy seems absurd considering the slow death and declining opportunities in this sector. The immediate effect of naphtha and heavy-metal supported industries remains unexplored to date while scrutinizing the catastrophic environmental hazards caused by its direct impact. The perception of well-built roads and modernization have caught appraisal amidst the mass, ignoring the eradication of lurking resource-rich farmlands. The Korean population like most South Asians is taught about the demolition of green cover in states like Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Russia, China, without paying heed to the climatic challenges of the future. The affliction done on a global scale is irreplaceable despite attempts being made for afforestation. If not regulated accurately, all kinds of individual deeds on the global ecological community may leave serious ramifications for future generations to dwell by.

The covid pandemic coupled with several natural disasters has put the North Korean nation in a cliff-hanging situation as Kim Jong Un continues to contest for nukes in the world geopolitics. However, picking one’s brain, it is still difficult to comprehend the million-dollar question: how will these nuclear weapons affect our ecological and environmental system? Nuclear tests have already facilitated 80% destruction in greenery and soil fertility, around the regions of Punggye-Ri. According to North Korean defectors, the groundwater table also dropped, thereby causing the wells to dry up. Nukes involve a heavy discharge of radioactive particulates which if mixed with air, soil and water will endanger human lives. Though Pyongyang and Beijing ascertain the level of radioactivity to be under control, it does hold a fair share of future threats under the conditions of increased nuclear experimentation.

2020 recorded the maximum amount of rainfall count in four provinces, during the early months of summer. The data is rather intimidating, given the last four decades hardly reported heavy levels of precipitation. The same year also saw DPRK being hit by four massive typhoons which caused havoc to the economy, in particular both infrastructure and agriculture. The intense flooding due to heavy torrential downpours led Pyongyang to adopt several measures to combat climate change in contemporary times. North Korea’s Kangwon, North Hwanghae, South Hwanghae, North Pyongan, and South Pyongan were the most adversely affected – causing the ‘breadbasket’ stability of DPRK to go haywire. The U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) indicated in 2020 North Korea experiencing extreme food shortages while being engulfed in heavy flooding. Adding the nation to its list of forty-five vulnerable states entailing aid and assistance, FAO stated, North Korea could only provide a yearly yield of nearly 70% of the six million tons of sustenance that it requires annually – which also impelled its citizens to give up its domesticated animals and pets to meet the dearth of food. Knocking off the regular supply of raw materials, the DPRK also witnessed severe crippling of its infrastructure throughout the length and breadth of its national territory. Buildings, Homes, and other property holdings were reported to be in ruins or showed considerable damage as told by North Korean public broadcasting representatives. The loss was huge as many of these buildings were newly constructed, aging not more than half a decade ago. This indicates signs of heavily influenced indoctrination taken up by the North Korean government to push the country forward towards a continued path of industrialization and urbanization over the past years, leaving behind and ignoring other prospects of growth and sustainability.

There are some positive signs, however.

Emphasizing the dire need to improve the current condition of the country, the supreme leader asserted North Korea’s land management authorities to come up with better strategies and if required to alter them, given the floods have washed away the critical foundational structures, especially harboring on the eastern coast of the country. The poor economy proposed several environmental schemes and protocols to protect the nation sustainably from nature’s wrath. Newly fangled baby steps into the world of progress, it is questionable if North Korea can keep its promises and continue to provide a greener society to its people. The government had introduced educative methods to create awareness amongst people, about typhoons, and climate change along with measures to curb or reduce them. The North Korean Workers’ Party set its sights on achieving the highest levels of success to combat the impasse, soon after the catastrophe hit.

Kim Jong-un’s initiatives to solemnly sensitize the impacts of natural disasters at stages and levels of government is surprising, but he is making it at large, to set up rehabilitation and restoration centers, especially for the disaster-stricken South and North Hamgyong provinces. He further encouraged diving into the deep root cause to understand the repercussion of such climate instabilities – which were broadly addressed under the theme of ‘single-minded unity’ of his nation. The threats to climate hazards have increased given the abnormal conditions are largely at bay but it is necessary for the North Korean nation to solemnly pursue a framework to improve watershed management systems, erosional control, tidal embankment projects, and construction of dams as an integral part of North Korea’s ardent immediate Five-Year plan.