Dear Comrade the Leader, Episode 246
Chapter 87. hidden intentions?
“Hey, that building didn’t exist when I was there last time… … As the republic develops, the neighboring Yanbian Autonomous Prefecture also changes accordingly. Not only the buildings, but also the streets have changed a lot.”
“is it? Unlike my comrade, Yanbian is the first road… … But how is it different?”
“It’s a signboard, Comrade Kim Yong-geon, Minister of Foreign Affairs. Last time I came for a task for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, there were a lot of signboards with large Chinese and small Korean words on them, but now… … .”
Kim Yong-geon, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Prime Minister of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, who listened to the attendants and secretaries as they pointed to and explained to him on the streets, noticed what their fingertips were pointing at, and nodded, noticing what they were trying to say.
“Right. Now, there are an absolute majority of places that have the Joseon language in a larger size. No, there are a lot of places where only the Korean language is written.”
“It happened when the capital of the Republic, especially the money coming from the nearby Rason, reached here, comrade. Half of my comrades in Yanji here work for a company in the Republic, or do they say that they make a living by making a deal with the company in some way?”
“There have been some people already saying that if the Siberian Railway passing through the Ra line is opened in the future, the speed will accelerate and this Yanbian area will be just like the front yard of our republic in terms of only China… … .”
At the words of the attendant who spoke excitedly, Yonggeon Kim frowned slightly and put his finger to the corner of his mouth.
It’s because someone who is a member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs doesn’t seem to notice at this sensitive time.
“Shh, don’t say such frivolous things. But what if it even enters the ears of our ‘blood alliance’ side who are here now? Are you just wanting to catch the pods ahead of an important event?”
“Sin, I’m sorry! comrade!”
“Don’t blow your shit, now go back. Again, good luck with your entry and exit.”
‘No, maybe this is really the general secretary’s double heart.’
To be honest, even Kim Yong-geon himself, who firmly warns the excited members of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as if he had entered the continent, could not help but think like that.
The view of Yanji, the largest city in Yanbian Korean-Chinese Autonomous Prefecture, China, where he is now, was so much that people with nationalistic values would be thrilled to say that Goguryeo was finally resurrected during the Three Kingdoms period and began to recover its ancient land.
‘The clothes worn by the wives and wives passing by are all fashionable in Pyongyang now, the city is full of Korean-style restaurants, and more than half of the words you hear on the streets are in Korean… … The most important thing is that Yanji’s economy itself is run by Republicans or Koreans who go to the Republic to earn money… … .’
Right now, Kim Yong-geon and other trainees finished their local inspection in the city and boarded an official car as they passed by, and it was difficult to tell whether this was China or a bustling city in North Korea from the sight of today’s destination, the scene from the window, going to Yanji train station.
Yanbian Korean-Chinese Autonomous Prefecture, abbreviated Yanbian.
This autonomous province with a population of 2 million, which is one of the largest of China’s 30 autonomous provinces, is actually Deng Xiaoping’s reform and opening-up policy of “Let’s get rich first, and let them lead the rest of the people to get rich together.” Even when he was excited about wealth, he was alienated from development.
The main reason was that it was located inland and there were no ports nearby. Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Guangzhou were the first-class cities that had been the center of China’s development until Deng Xiaoping, then Jiang Zemin, and now Bo Ji-rai-Xi Jinping. Considering the same East Coast cities, this was fatal.
However, it is not that other transportation infrastructure such as high-speed rail is satisfactory, and the logistics infrastructure is poor, so there is no industry.
In the end, the place to trust was North Korea, the neighboring town, which was still one bloodline, but when that North Korea was more backward, the only ‘industry’ in Yanbian went to South Korea, another bloodline, to make money as a domestic helper, a salaried worker, or a lamb skewer trade. It was all I was getting.
Of course, things have changed a lot now, to be exact, a few years ago.
“It has arrived. Prime Minister Comrade! The Chinese are already here.”
“Okay.”
Yanbian Autonomous Province, which directly benefited from the great North-South compromise in 1998, which was a turning point for North Korea’s reform and opening up and leap forward, and the remarkable growth that has continued since then, has developed rapidly.
One reason was that Korean-Chinese workers who were going to South Korea at first moved to North Korea, which is close to their hometown, but as the situation in North Korea gradually improved and wages rose rapidly these days, South Korean and foreign businessmen who came to North Korea after seeing low wages began to look for alternatives. The fact that I am starting to choose Yanbian is emerging as another factor these days.
Anyway, the streets of Yanbian or North Korea are overturned and run down, and if you leave your corporation in North Korea and move your factories, the institutional preferential treatment for trade with China remains the same.
In addition, North Korean businessmen were now moving their factories to Yanbian, where they could speak and speak, rather than their own country, where they were entering a high-wage country.
The current situation is that the subcontracting rush that moved from South Korea to North Korea a few years ago is now moving from North Korea to Yanbian.
In this case, there was a drawback that it was inevitable in China’s system, which is famous for omitting only foreign capital. However, at the end of Jiang Zemin’s reign in the late 1990s, Yanbian was selected as a Sino-DPRK preferential trade zone after Dandong for several years. there was.
-Now that our republic has undergone reform and opening up, we need to get closer to the closest big country like a fly on a cow. Hmm, geographically speaking, you should first connect Yanbian to the railroad.
The reason why the Chinese, who caused the economy to encroach on foreign capital, made such a treaty so easily, is probably, ‘What kind of capital do you guys have just opened up to eat our territory? However, since it is a clan, I have to let him eat, right?’ Kim Yong-geon smiled bitterly, saying that his gaze played a big part.
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No matter how backward they were, they would never have dreamed that North Korea would climb up so quickly and exert such a powerful economic influence on a part of its territory.Of course, the biggest reason was that Yanbian Autonomous Province had been an economically independent communist region in China, where there was no capital or industry, so to speak.
‘Looking back, Comrade General Secretary seems to have looked forward to this day at the time the treaty was signed. So he sent me here today.’
Anyway, thinking like that, Kim Yong-geon got out of the car and the band and the welcoming crowd lined up on the podium for today’s event, the opening ceremony of the Hoeryung-Yeongil train station and a test ride, caught my eye.
Jilin Province, to which the autonomous province belongs, and officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China.
After Kim Yong-geon shook hands with them according to the scheduled ceremony, as he cut the ribbon, confetti flew in the sky along with congratulatory cannons.
Poop Poop Puff Poop!!!!!
“Okay then, with this, the Hoeryong-Yanji city railroad through a joint venture between China and Korea was opened!”
clap clap… … !!!
The Han Chinese, who make up the other half of Yanbian, also liked it, but the people they liked the most at the ceremony were the Korean-Chinese businessmen, who do business in the republic, or those who did business in Yanbian with investment from the republic.
Just by looking at it, it was possible to see at a glance which classes would directly benefit from the opening of today’s trains.
However, contrary to this atmosphere, Kim Yong-geon, who noticed that the Foreign Minister of the State Council of China seemed uncomfortable somewhere, without delay (a South Korean expression that has begun to spread to the Republic through the Internet these days) uttered a ‘sales remark’.
“From now on, the people of Yanji who commute to Hoeryong-Yanji can enjoy the benefits of simplified immigration procedures and visa-free in just 40 minutes, and can engage in economic activities in both countries more comfortably. It fills my heart to see the DPRK-China relationship developing day by day from neighbors to brothers walking the path of reform and opening up and co-prosperity together.”
“… … By the way, isn’t Prime Minister Kim too high-ranking in Joseon to directly visit the opening ceremony of a single line in a three-tier city? Considering our side’s respect for the clan, I even came to this village by myself, but it’s still a bit surprising.”
“… … Hmmm, I’m talking about Gigan… … .”
Kim Yong-geon stroked his chin and pulled out his words, but he quickly shook his head, not knowing what to say.
As the Minister of Foreign Affairs pointed out, considering Kim Yong-geon’s status as the Prime Minister of North Korea, China’s only ‘blood alliance’, he was a person with too high ‘water supply’ to directly visit the border railroad opening ceremony in Yanji, a third-tier city in the outskirts.
Since the Prime Minister himself came to an event where only vice-chief executives could be sent, I had to wonder if North Korea was attaching much greater meaning to this event than China did for China.
However, Kim Yong-geon has already found an excuse to flirt with China while raising the mood.
“To explain, it wasn’t because of that railroad.”
“A railroad?”
“Isn’t it a national task to develop high-speed trains made with pure Chinese technology in large countries for the past 10 years? But last time, I heard that there were a lot of dissatisfaction with the fact that Korea decided to order the Republic of Korea’s high-speed train, KRX, rather than the high-speed train of a large country, but South Korea’s KTX.”
“What… … That’s true though. Obviously, even within the Ministry of Transport and the railroad construction of our Party, there was a saying, ‘If Joseon remembers the blessings of the past, it will have no choice but to select the high-speed rail project made in China as the target of its own high-speed rail project that challenges the best in the world’.”
‘The best in the world? It’s something I’ve felt for a long time, but these guys are so shameless,’
From the late 1990s to the present, China has started to develop large-scale national land in cooperation with overseas high-speed trains, including the Japanese Shinkansen and French TGV, but its ultimate goal was to develop domestic high-speed trains by receiving technology transfer as a bait for large-scale orders. .
And for the demonstration and accumulation of the technology developed after a long process of research over the past few years, we have to actually make one. It was a conclusion drawn.
Although there are many mountainous regions, the land is smaller than China, the length of the route is short, the difficulty of construction is low, and above all, a country in a position where it is easy to apply diplomatic pressure is looking for an operator to release a high-speed rail in its own country, so it was perfect for use as a prototype test bed from the Chinese point of view.
Of course, North Korea, who read this, rejected this request and selected Korea’s KTX as a target, although relations between the two countries were strained at one time.
Kim Yong-geon, who knows all these internal circumstances thanks to his position as Minister of Foreign Affairs, laughed so cynically on the inside, but still smiled and laughed on the outside.
“Haha, did it happen? The general secretary was always apologetic for that, but he taught me to go directly to China’s first high-speed rail overseas export site today, build a great nation’s face, and show the integrity of the blood alliance.”
“Hmm… … Well, I have to thank you for that, but it’s an overseas export… … .”
The expression on the Chinese foreign minister’s expression changed to a bizarre expression, “I want to catch a tantrum, but I’m getting out of it.”
In fact, as part of an attempt to improve relations with the past, the railway operator between Yanji and Hoeryong was selected as the China Railway High-speed Corporation.
Although North Korea’s KRX paid 80% of the cost of the Lee Hoeryong-Yanji railway connection project, China’s railway technology has developed rapidly over the past few years, and the decision was made to take into account diplomatic relations as a single route anyway. will come down from
Most of the routes are located in their own Chinese land, but anyway, as they connect to Hoeryong, the territory of North Korea, there is nothing that cannot be called an overseas export like Kim Yong-geon’s father-in-law.
In addition, since the Party had already advertised to the people that China’s high-speed rail was exported overseas, the Chinese officials could only frown on their faces, neither affirming nor denying.
Taking advantage of that opportunity, Kim Yong-geon came up with another purpose for coming here today, or, in fact, a proposal close to the main purpose that the general secretary directly ordered.
“I had to tell you that I brought another proposal to further develop Yanbian Autonomous Prefecture, the bridgehead and gateway of the 70-year-old clan of the Joseon Dynasty.”
“exactly? Please tell me.”
“I heard that even in large countries these days, there is a lot of interest in the development of information and communication technology and dissemination to the region… … But from what I heard, here in Yanji, or no, in Yanbian Autonomous Prefecture, the computer penetration rate is extremely low, and there is hardly any internet connection.”
“… … Well, other developments are delayed and young people are going to work in the city, so there is no choice but to do it.”
“If that’s the case, I would like to provide the latest optical communication internet line and personal computer at a low price in order to let our compatriots living in other countries bask in the light of the information age. A private enterprise in the Republic of Korea is already showing enthusiasm to bear the entire cost.”
“… … Where is that private enterprise?”
“You may have heard of it, but it’s called Union, a place that operates a search engine. Lately, starting with South Korea, they are in the process of advancing into all regions where the Korean language is spoken.”