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Tourists take pictures as police officers stand guard in front of Notre Dame Cathedral, in Paris, Tuesday. Notre Dame has been evacuated after a man committed suicide in the 850-year-old monument and tourist attraction. (Thibault Camus/AP)

Campaigner against gay marriage in France kills himself in Notre Dame

By Sara Miller Llana, Staff writer / 05.22.13

When French President François Hollande set out to legalize gay marriage, he faced an unexpectedly virulent outcry. Protests, including one that was the largest of its kind in 30 years, drew religious leaders, conservatives fighting for the preservation of family values, and those simply looking for a way to express their discontent with the president. 

There were attacks at gay bars and clashes between protesters and police. One image, of a man who’d been beaten up while walking with his partner on the streets of Paris, went viral when it was posted on Facebook as the “Face of Homophobia.” 

Now that gay marriage has become law – President Hollande signed the act last weekend and the nation’s first gay marriage is expected to take place later this month – has the violent debate reached new levels of drama? 

On Tuesday afternoon, just days ahead of major protests against gay marriage scheduled for May 26, a far-right French historian walked into Paris’s famed Notre Dame Cathedral, reportedly walked up to the altar, and turned a gun on himself. He pulled the trigger in front of approximately 1,500 tourists. 

It is unclear what exactly his motive was. He is said to have left a letter at the scene that has not yet been made public. But the words and statements that have emerged since yesterday’s event point to a planned and public condemnation of gay marriage, immigration, and other topics considered by the far right as a threat to French society.

On his personal blog the historian, Dominique Venner, condemned the “vile” gay marriage law, in a piece dated May 21, the day of his suicide. He called on protesters planning to amass on May 26 not to limit their discontent to just the law but against the “peril” of immigration to France from North Africa.

In what may have been a reference to his impending suicide, he wrote: "There will certainly need to be new, spectacular, symbolic gestures to shake off the sleepiness ... and re-awaken the memories of our origins." 

Hours after the suicide, a message apparently written by Mr. Venner was read by a friend on a conservative radio station: "I believe it is necessary to sacrifice myself to break with the lethargy that is overwhelming us," the friend read on the air. "I am killing myself to awaken slumbering consciences." 

France’s far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who has risen in polls, wrote in a tweet Tuesday of her respect for Venner, calling his suicide "eminently political." 

Notre Dame – the symbol of French Catholicism – was quickly evacuated. The cathedral this year marks 850 years since construction began – but commemorative events celebrating the anniversary will likely be overshadowed, in history, by Venner’s action.

France’s Interior Minister Manuel Valls told reporters: "Notre Dame is the cathedral of Paris, one of the capital's – and the country's – most beautiful monuments, so we realize how symbolic this event truly is."

People walk in the business district of La Défense, Paris, Wednesday. The Monitor's Europe bureau chief learns not to let strangers through the front door, even in Paris. (Christophe Ena/AP)

Don't let strangers in, even in Paris

By Sara Miller Llana, Staff writer / 05.17.13

I let a stranger into our apartment.

I suppose that in moving from Mexico City to Paris, and feeling a sudden burst of elation for not having to worry so intently about drug and gang violence and, worst of all kidnapping, I went to the extreme.

A man knocked on the door of our temporary apartment saying he needed to check on something and asked if he could come in. He must have said what he was checking but my French, only now on its way back after lying dormant for over two decades, missed the details. He was dressed in work clothes, and I let him in.

He first said he was looking for the heater panel, then started asking all kinds of questions about who we were and how long we’d been in France. I thought this was a bit bizarre, but didn't think much of it.

Then he spotted the chimney. He opened the screen: “Oh no, look at all of this soot.” (I had to look up the word for soot, suie, on my laptop.)

“You have a small child,” he went on. “If she breathes this in, it could be the end. I am obligated to fix this.”

In my daze of jetlag, living out of suitcases, with a mountain of bureaucracy to tackle each day, I actually thought this man might be from the city government, and he was doing his municipal duty, for free, to make sure no Paris residents – even foreigners, God bless France! – breathe contaminated air.

I almost let him get to work – until my more rational husband said, “Let’s call the owner first.”

The owner's response was immediate: “Get that guy out of the house now.”

I learned later that it’s a well-known scam in Paris that plumbers or electricians and other workers will come in, and tell you you need X, Y, and Z fixed. A colleague told me one man entered her house, broke a pipe, and then tried to get them to pay to fix it. I told the guardian downstairs about our visitor, and she said any communal or municipal work to be done will always be posted in the building.

Some of these scams are actually done by thieves, she said, who might rob you – or worse. “Don’t let anyone in your house. It could be very dangerous.”

I did learn back in elementary school not to talk to strangers, and most definitely not to let them through the front door.

But I had a momentary lapse of judgment, a good reminder that you have to be careful anywhere – even in Paris!

German Chancellor Angela Merkel attends a discussion panel on 'making Europe strong' during the Europe forum conference in Berlin Thursday. Germany has consciously avoided a leadership role in Europe since the end of World War II, but the eurocrisis has put it in the limelight – with all the criticism that brings. (Gero Breloer/AP)

Germany's uncomfortable role as Europe's 'economic police'

By Sara Miller Llana, Staff writer / 05.16.13

Americans took a leading role in the world in the post-World War II era. And today they are used to being unpopular, yet called upon when needed.

Germans in the postwar era, on the other hand, have preferred to blend into the background.

But amid Europe's sovereign debt crisis, as Germany's healthy economy has put it at the head of the 27-member European Union, that's been proving impossible. And now Germans are dealing with the criticism that accompanies being a regional – if unwilling – hegemon.

While a recent Pew poll shows Germany to be considered by many countries to be the most trustworthy nation in Europe, it has also accrued new enemies far and wide, with Greeks burning German flags or picketing with signs of German Chancellor Angela Merkel dressed in Nazi uniform. There have even been claims from France that Germans are out to rule the Continent.

“We have made a lot of commitment to help those people,” says Markus, a musical theater stage producer, in Berlin’s Alexanderplatz, a public square and major transportation hub in Germany’s capital Berlin. “It’s really unfair.”

It’s also untrue – at least the part about Germany wanting continental dominion, say German and European observers. Instead, the avoidance of tough positions in foreign policy, so Germany is not led into a moral dilemma, is ingrained in the postwar mentality, they say.

“There is no appetite for domination. Germany has been pushed into this position by default,” says Jan Techau, director of Carnegie Europe in Brussels for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “There is no ambition to shape the continent in the image of Germany.”

“Germans want to be liked by the rest of the world,” says Michael Wohlgemuth, director of Open Europe Berlin. “Germany feels uneasy in its new powerful role. We don’t want to be leaders of Europe.”

Outside the US embassy in Berlin, Erkan Arikan says that Germany is being unfairly maligned in Europe. But he says he can also laugh it off, as a German of Turkish descent in a multicultural Germany that has nothing to do with the 1930s.

He says that he can see some parallels between the hegemonic positions of Germany and the US today, but there is a limit. “The US is still the world police for everyone; Germany doesn’t want to be the focus,” he says. “But maybe it’s becoming the economic police of Europe.”

It’s a role that many Germans might feel uncomfortable playing, especially with the bad will that can breed.

If Americans don’t like the term “ugly American,” Germans like it even less.

Ulrike Guérot of the European Council of Foreign Relations says when she travels around the country and talks to everyday Germans, they are starting to ask, “Are we responsible for this youth unemployment in Spain? There is an uneasiness they they are just starting to feel,” she says. “They don’t want to be the ‘ugly German.’”

A user tries out the QWERTY keyboard on a smart phone. (Graeme Roy/The Canadian Press/AP)

Good Reads: From Chinese dreams, to the Tsarnaevs, to a QWERTY challenger

By Gregory M. Lamb, Senior Editor / 05.16.13

China asks its citizens to dream

A nation confidently on its way to becoming the biggest economy in the world ought to be chasing its own special dreams. So Chinese Communist Party General Secretary Xi Jinping has taken on promoting “the Chinese dream” as his personal motto, and the Chinese character for “dream” has been declared the “character of the year” in China. But what do Chinese think about when they dream? In “Chasing the Chinese dream,” The Economist points out the term’s vagueness is both an advantage and a difficulty, a meme able to be fitted to many goals. Militarists see it as more than just an “American dream” of middle-class prosperity; it’s their dream of a powerful China preeminent on the world stage. Democratic reformers see a move toward Western-style personal and political freedoms. US Secretary of State John Kerry recently tried to lasso the term in the service of better Sino-American relations, proposing that Chinese and American dreams merge into a vision of a “Pacific Dream” that the two nations pursue together. But where it’s all headed is uncertain: When a people are allowed, even encouraged, to “dream,” the process may set off a series of unintended consequences.

How radical were the Tsarnaev brothers?

What caused Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to carry out their bombing of the Boston Marathon? We may never get a definite answer. But in “The Bombers’ World,” Christian Caryl in The New York Review of Books digs for facts and theories and concludes that despite possible links to radical Islamists “there are many other details of the Tsarnaev brothers’ case that make it seem starkly unique, more of an outlier than something that can be easily slotted into a larger pattern.” Those particulars include the Chechen culture, which places a high value on family and “honor” (and put immense pressure on Tamerlan, the older brother, to succeed when at the same time he was failing). Among the unanswered questions: Why was this particular Chechen family unable to assimilate into American culture when other Chechens have?

Stopping a humanitarian disaster

The sectarian war in Bosnia in the 1990s taught American presidents two irreconcilable lessons: First, US involvement is indispensable when it comes to stopping a humanitarian disaster. Second, a US president has little to gain politically from intervening overseas and plenty to lose if it goes badly. Just ask President George W. Bush, who ignored the lessons, invaded Iraq, and suffered the consequences. In “The Thin Red Line: Inside the White House debate over Syria,” Dexter Filkins of The New Yorker paints a grim portrait of US alternatives in Syria. (“All the options are horrible,” says one former presidential adviser.) Disturbing reports indicating that the Syrian regime is using poison gas, perhaps sarin, (cautiously and selectively to not rouse world opinion) have upped the stakes. President Obama has looked tentative, perhaps for good reason – drawing a “red line” warning against the use of chemical weapons but then being vague in assessing whether they have been used or saying exactly what the US response would be. “People on the Hill ask me, ‘Why can’t we do a no-fly zone? Why can’t we do military strikes?’ ” a senior US official says. “Of course we can do these things. The issue is, where does it stop?”

A future with ‘baked in’ heat

Bryan Walsh at Time magazine is among a throng of scientists and journalists noting that the level of carbon dioxide in the world’s atmosphere is about to pass a significant threshold: 400 parts per million. Why should we care? “The last time CO₂  levels were this high was likely during the Pliocene epoch, between 3.2 million and 5 million years ago,” he points out. “The Earth’s climate was warmer during the Pliocene than it is today – perhaps by 2 to 3 [degrees] C – and sea levels were much higher. It was a very different planet than the one we’ve lived on so successfully for thousands of years.” Passing 400 p.p.m. means that warming effects of rising CO₂  are already “baked in” to Earth’s future for many years to come. The Keeling Curve, which has measured and documented the rise in worldwide CO₂  levels over the past half century, is “a roadmap for our future,” he says, “a future that will almost certainly be hotter and wilder.”

A keyboard for fat thumbs

KALQ is an effort to redesign a keyboard for mobile devices that better arranges the pattern of letter keys for the ubiquitous two-thumb system of typing. But can any new arrangement ever replace QWERTY, the more-than-a-century-old arrangement of letter keys on, first, typewriters and now computers and even tiny phones and tablets? “Fact of Fiction? The Legend of the QWERTY Keyboard,” a post at the Design Decoded blog at Smithsonian magazine, notes that the origin of QWERTY remains “a little foggy.” The popular notion that the keys were arranged so as to not jam the mechanisms of early typewriters may not be true. A new theory suggests the arrangement was a convenience for telegraph operators, who were among the first workers to adopt touch typing. Once early typewriter companies banded together and agreed on QWERTY, and set up training courses to learn the system, the die was cast. QWERTY has become what’s known in the design world as a “path dependency,” too entrenched to be replaced even by a superior system. Other letter arrangements have been proposed over the years, most notably the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard in the 1930s, but none have typed over QWERTY. Will KALQ be the first?

Kenyan demonstrators, some chained to each other, gather near the gate of parliament in Nairobi, Kenya, Tuesday. Police fired tear-gas, water cannons and swung their batons at protesters gathered outside Kenya’s parliament building to pile pressure on the country's legislators to drop demands for a salary increment. (Sayyid Azim/AP)

Kenyan police clear protesters - and a drove of pigs - from Parliament's gates

By Fredrick Nzwili, Correspondent / 05.14.13

Kenyan police on Tuesday fired teargas and used water cannons to disperse hundreds of demonstrators who had camped outside Parliament protesting an attempt by lawmakers to increase their own pay.

The protests began with a march through Nairobi's streets, with demonstrators chanting and carrying placards critical of Members of Parliament (MPs). Protesters had planned to then go inside and "Occupy Parliament," but that proved difficult after police in riot gear surrounded the building.

The police made 15 arrests, but struggled to control the agitated crowd as well as a drove of pigs – bearing the inscriptions "MPigs" – which demonstrators brought to the assembly's entrance. They also covered the ground with pig blood, which the pigs mingled in.

“We want to see resources being directed to service delivery, not meeting the wage bill” of lawmakers, says Morris Odhiambo, the director of the Centre for Law Research International.

According to Mr. Odhiambo, many Kenyans were living in deplorable conditions, because their tax money has either been stolen or paid to undeserving people. Nurses and teachers, who have sought pay increases, have not received serious attention from the government, he says. “The attempt by MPs to increase their salary emphasizes the highest level of impunity.”

Kenya recently decreased the legislators’ annual earnings from $120,000 to $75,000 to rein in the burgeoning salary expenses, following the creation of new state offices by a new constitution. Some analysts were already warning government operations may become unsustainable unless the government controls salaries of state officers.

Disregarding the developments, MPs have demanded an upward adjustment of the salary from the current $6,250 back to $10,000 per month, demands that have angered the public.

“If they can’t take the pay, they should resign. We want to rein in their greed. They have not done any work and we are disappointed they are seeking a pay raise even before they work,” says Mr. Simon Muoki, a young environmental rights campaigner.

“This has been our country’s problem for the last 50 years. MPs have forced decisions – including their pay – in disregard of the feelings of those who elect them,” says Jedida Wanjiru, an octogenarian at the demonstrations.

For the past month, the lawmakers have arm-twisted the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC), a government body that’s sets salaries of all state officers. With MPs threatening to disband it, the SRC has stuck to its guns.

On Monday the commission said it will not increase the salary even with threats and intimidation. Sarah Serem, SRC’s chairperson said the commission’s concern was how to reduce the wage bill so that the savings can be used for development work. She said Kenya's total revenue was $11.8 billion, but the country spends $5.7 billion on salaries.

“This amount is not only huge, but it is unaffordable and unsustainable. It stands in the way of the country’s development agenda,” Ms. Serem told a news conference in Nairobi.

The Dalai Lama answers questions during His Holiness the Dalai Lama Environmental Summit on "Universal Responsibility and the Global Environment" at Veterans Memorial Coliseum, Saturday, May 11, 2013 in Portland, Ore. (Motoya Nakamura, The Oregonian/AP)

Friendly with the Dalai Lama? Good luck talking with Beijing

By Peter Ford, Staff writer / 05.13.13

Prince Charles, heir to the British throne, has never had very good relations with the Chinese government. But now his personal envoy to Beijing is offering to help another British leader who seems to be even more firmly in the Chinese doghouse – Prime Minister David Cameron.

Mr. Cameron, who would dearly like to head a trade and investment mission to China, incurred Beijing’s wrath last May by meeting the Dalai Lama. The fact that it was a private meeting, on sacred ground in St. Paul’s cathedral, makes no difference. He will be persona non grata until he apologizes.

That status can be costly: A 2010 study by academics at the University of Gottingen in Germany found that countries whose top leadership received the Dalai Lama lost an average of 8.1 percent of their exports to China over the following two years, though the effect wore off after that punishment period.

Enter Sir David Tang, Hong Kong fashion tycoon and flamboyant London socialite, who also heads Prince Charles’s charitable foundation in Beijing. He told the Daily Telegraph’s gossip columnist over the weekend that he is ready to help defrost London’s diplomatic relations with Beijing.

“Look at the Prince of Wales,” he told the paper. “He’s now very engaged with lots of Chinese people.”

’Twas not ever thus. The Prince’s stock here hit rock bottom in 2005 when somebody leaked the private diary he had kept in 1997, when he represented the Queen at the handover of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. He famously described the assembly of top Chinese leaders at the ceremony as “appalling old waxworks.”

In 2009, however, Prince Charles opened a Chinese branch of his international foundation, funding projects that build sustainable communities. That has helped, but he has still never visited mainland China.

Charles himself is close to the Dalai Lama, which makes him a suspicious character in Beijing’s eyes. The Chinese authorities go to extraordinary lengths to persuade foreign leaders not to meet the Tibetan leader, whom they accuse of being an anti-Chinese  “splittist,” and when those leaders fail they grow very angry.

Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy was subjected to such anger when he met the Dalai Lama. 

France emerged from such a period of diplomatic and trade punishment in 2009, only after it signed a joint statement with China clarifying that Paris “fully appreciates the importance and sensitivity of the Tibet issue and reaffirms … that Tibet is an integral part of Chinese territory.”

Since the Dalai Lama himself has also said, repeatedly, that Tibet is part of Chinese territory, and that he does not seek independence, French diplomats could argue that they were not conceding anything. But the symbolism of the statement was clear.

London appears to have escaped the export boycott: A British government spokesman pointed out that UK exports to China had climbed by 13.4 percent last year.

He also defended Cameron’s right to choose who he meets in private regardless of China’s feelings on the matter. “It is entirely reasonable for the prime minister to decide who he meets,” the spokesman said. 

But no sooner had the queen finished her speech opening Parliament last Wednesday, than Cameron was offering olive branches to Beijing. A senior member of the ruling Conservative Party lobbed the prime minister a clearly pre-arranged question about Sino-British relations; Cameron lost no time in reassuring Parliament, and Beijing, of course, that “we recognize Tibet as part of China. We do not support Tibetan independence and we respect China’s sovereignty.

“We do want to have a strong and positive relationship with China,” he stressed.

It remains to be seen whether this will be enough to placate Beijing. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin and US Secretary of State John Kerry (r.) arrive for their meeting in the Kremlin, Moscow, Tuesday. Kerry is making his case to Putin for Russia to take a tougher stance on Syria at a time when Israel's weekend air strikes against the beleaguered Mideast nation have added an unpredictable factor to the talks. (Maxim Shemetov/AP)

US balks as Russia prepares to deliver missiles to Syria (+video)

By Fred Weir, Correspondent / 05.10.13

The United States has appealed to Russia to stop the reported delivery of six batteries of advanced S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to the Syrian government, warning that this type of weaponry threatens to "destabilize" the region.

According to media reports, the US was alerted this week by Israel that Russia is preparing to begin deliveries, perhaps as early as this summer, on a $900-million contract for six S-300 launchers with 144 of the long-range surface-to-air missiles. They are said to be the equivalent to the US Patriot system.

"We have consistently called on Russia not to provide a further supply of weapons to the Assad regime, including air defense systems that are particularly destabilizing to the region," White House press spokesman Jay Carney told journalists on Thursday.

"I think we have made it crystal clear that we would prefer that Russia is not supplying assistance," to Syria, Secretary of State John Kerry told journalists during a visit to Italy.

"We have previously stated that [these] missiles are potentially destabilizing with respect to the state of Israel," he said.

Israel has carried out two airstrikes on Syrian targets in the past week, dramatically raising the stakes in the Syrian civil war, which is now in its third year.

Introduction of the S-300 into Syria's air defense arsenal could sharply limit the future options not only for Israel but for the US as well, should it decide to intervene in the conflict.

The latest version of the S-300 reputedly has a range of 125 miles, can engage 12 targets simultaneously, and can strike missiles or aircraft at altitudes of up to 20 miles.

The US and Israel waged a long and ultimately successful diplomatic campaign to persuade Russia to renege on a contract it had signed many years ago to provide S-300 missiles to Iran.

But since agreeing in 2010 to cut off arms supplies to Iran, the Kremlin has dug in its heels and refused to sign on to any more sanctions against its dwindling number of client states.

Russia has an estimated $5 billion in outstanding arms contracts with Syria, mostly sophisticated anti-aircraft weapons, tactical surface-to-surface missiles, submarines, warships, and training aircraft.

Though Moscow has not yet commented on the allegation that it is preparing to deliver S-300s to Syria, Russian officials have repeatedly insisted that they are acting within the framework of international law in honoring arms contracts with a long-standing ally that is not subject to any United Nations-approved sanctions.

Moscow also complains that the US continues to sell huge amounts of modern arms to its Arab clients, such as Saudi Arabia, some of whom it says are surreptitiously arming the Syrian rebels.

The fresh accusations against Russia for supplying arms to Syria come just days after Mr. Kerry met with President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin and agreed on the need for Russia and the US to combine efforts in a joint push to find a peaceful settlement to the spiraling Syrian conflict.

Rescuers carry a survivor pulled out from the rubble of a building that collapsed in Saver, near Dhaka, Bangladesh, Friday. When the woman, whom soldiers identified as Reshma, was freed within an hour of her discovery in the flooded basement of the building, the crowd erupted in both cheers and tears. (AP)

Hope rises: Woman found alive 17 days after deadly Bangladesh factory collapse

By Saad Hammadi, Correspondent / 05.10.13

Seventeen days after the building collapsed killing more than 1,000 workers in Bangladesh, armed forces and firefighters have rescued one woman alive from the basement of the eight-story building at 4:28 p.m. local time, raising cautious hope that more people could still be found alive.

When the woman, whom soldiers identified as Reshma, was freed within an hour of her discovery in the flooded basement of the building, the crowd erupted in both cheers and tears. Despite her ordeal, she appeared to be in good shape and was rushed to a military hospital on the outskirts of the Bangladeshi capital.

Reshma’s rescue comes 12 days after Bangladesh mourned a failed attempt to rescue another woman, Shahina Akhter. After the death of Ms. Akhter, rescuers lost hope of finding anyone alive in the rubble and rolled out heavier equipment to clear the rubble and recover dead bodies. But with Reshma's rescue, the mood at the scene has been uplifted. 

The death toll from the collapse of a building, which housed five factories, reached 1,036 today, and that number is expected to rise as more bodies are being found. The incident is being described as the world's deadliest garment industry disaster and one of the worst industrial accidents. As many as 6,000 people may have worked in the building, according to some estimates. The collapse puts a spotlight on the often extremely poor labor conditions of the country’s $20 billion garment industry, which provides cheap clothing for major retailers around the world.

As some bulldozers were crushing building beams to clear the way to look for bodies today they reached the basement, and noticed something.

“We were removing slabs. Between 2:45 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. we learned of the trace of a person,” says Lt. Col. SM Imran-Uz-Zaman, an Army spokesman at the site. “We immediately halted work in all other areas and [focused] people on rescuing Reshma.”

Maj. Gen. Chowdhury Hasan Sarwardy, coordinator of the search and rescue operations at the disaster site, told The Christian Science Monitor how she was discovered: “She shouted when we were going inside. We saw her. I talked to her,” he says.

“We have halted use of all heavy equipment such as hydraulic drilling. Our rescuers are working with information we are getting from her,” said Sarwardy – just before she was rescued. 

Rescuers at the site said Reshma was confined between two beams and they had to be extremely cautious in order to rescue her alive. 

After a fire broke out just before the rescue of Shahina, Imran said the rescuers put water around the perimeter of their rescue operation to ensure that wouldn’t happen again. 

Once the woman was pulled out alive, says Sawardy, “we provided her with oxygen and saline.” Reshma was rescued unhurt but with complications after 17 days without food and trauma.

Though Reshma told rescuers there were no more survivors in her area, workers began to sift through nearby rubble for more survivors.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina congratulated the rescuers for saving Reshma. "This is an unbelievable feat," she was quoted as saying by her assistant, Mahbubul Haque Shakil.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un (l.) and former NBA star Dennis Rodman watch North Korean and US players in an exhibition basketball game at an arena in Pyongyang, North Korea, in February. Rodman is tapping his friendship with Kim Jong-un when he tweeted a request 'to do me a solid' and free Kenneth Bae, a Korean-American man detained in the North. (Jason Mojica/VICE Media/AP/File)

Dennis Rodman to Kim Jong-un: 'Do me a solid' and free Kenneth Bae (+video)

By Ryan Lenora Brown, Correspondent / 05.09.13

When Dennis Rodman spent a week touring North Korea in February, he had nothing but glowing words for the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un.

“Guess what? I love him,” he told reporters. “He’s really awesome.”

But now the basketball diplomat is testing his friendship with the young Kim by asking the leader to release an American sentenced last week to 15 years of hard labor for “hostile acts” against the North Korean regime.

“I’m calling on the Supreme Leader of North Korea, or as I call him, ‘Kim,’ to do me a solid and cut Kenneth Bae loose,” Mr. Rodman tweeted Tuesday. 

The missive came in response to a Seattle Times opinion piece last week, in which writer Thanh Tan called on Rodman to put his goodwill with Pyongyang on the line for Mr. Bae, a tour operator arrested in November on murky charges.

Perhaps now is the time for the NBA has-been to practice some real basketball diplomacy and call up his so-called friend for a favor: Grant American detainee Kenneth Bae amnesty and release him to his family….

Bae is being used as a political pawn by a desperate despot who happened to gallivant around the country with Rodman in March. Perhaps now is the retired player’s chance to use his notoriety for something other than to over-inflate his ego.

Rodman apparently got the message.

“In direct response to your article headline, 'Ok.' Read your story @uscthanhtan, and I decided to help,” he tweeted.

And while Twitter is an admittedly feeble platform for diplomacy, it’s not out of the question that Kim will see the tweet. After all, the North Korean government has an active – if bizarre – Twitter presence itself, putting out an erratic blast of messages about American imperialism and the “victory and glory” of the Kim regime.

But even if Kim gets Rodman’s message, will he understand it? After all, “do me a solid” isn’t exactly a phrase that translates easily.

Washington Post blogger Max Fisher writes that the closest Korean equivalent of the colloquialism would be the somewhat menacing (at least to American ears) phrase, “Look at my face and release Kenneth Bae.”

“Look at my face,” he writes, “is a Korean expression that’s like a special, for-friends-only version of ‘do me a favor.’”

Whether Kim will look at Rodman’s face – double nose ring and all – remains to be seen, but Americans favored by North Korea have helped coax the regime to release American prisoners in the past.

In 2009, for instance, former President Bill Clinton visited Pyongyang and shortly after the visit then-Dear Leader Kim Jong-il pardoned two American journalists who were being held in the country. In total, six Americans – including Bae – have been held by the North Korean government since 2009, the Monitor reported. The other five were all released.

Rodman’s February visit to North Korea – along with the friendship tour of Google Chairman Eric Schmidt in January – was initially hailed by some Western observers as a sign that the young Kim might be more interested in opening his country to the rest of the world than his father and grandfather had been.

However, analysts say there have been no fundamental changes to the regime’s posture since then. If anything, interaction with Western celebrities puts the regime in a more powerful position because it can claim new geopolitical cache. 

“Ultimately, they [North Korea] come out ahead because they can portray it as the world coming to pay tribute, or at least to be there,” Aidan Foster-Carter, a Korean expert, told the Monitor in March.

Indeed, as the state-run Korean Central News Agency (as well as Western outlets) reported during Rodman’s trip, the basketball player was an enthusiastic tourist, visiting a greatest hits list of Kim-related sites. 

Rodman and his cohort "paid high tribute to Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il before their statues. They entered the halls where Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il lie in state and paid homage to them,” a press release announced. “They made an entry in the visitor's book.”