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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Evil As Usual |
| 2010-03-12 |
| Claudia Rosett Movies and television teach us that evil comes draped in drama, set to a sinister sound track, often with lots of visible gore. But all too often, especially in matters of tyranny, evil appears in banal ways that blend into the accepted landscape. For years I have remembered a scene of this kind. It involves a thin Asian man in a shabby coat, standing by a gate in the snow of eastern Russia, wearing sneakers with no laces or socks. But I am getting ahead of my tale. What brought this scene again to mind were news reports this week that in Russia's eastern port city of Vladivostok, two North Korean defectors climbed over a wall to enter the South Korean consulate, asking for asylum. South Korean authorities have been refusing to comment. But both South Korea's Yonhap News Agency and China's People's Daily describe these defectors as lumberjacks. |
| Posted by:Steve White |