World
North Korea closes multiple embassies around the world

North Korea is poised to close as many as a dozen embassies including in Spain, Hong Kong, and multiple countries in Africa, according to media reports and analysts, in a move that could see nearly 25 percent of Pyongyang’s missions close worldwide.
North Korea’s recent closing of its diplomatic missions was a sign that the reclusive country is struggling to make money overseas because of international sanctions, South Korea’s unification ministry said on Tuesday, Reuters reported.
On Monday, North Korean state media outlet KCNA said the country’s ambassadors paid “farewell” visits to Angolan and Ugandan leaders last week, and local media in both African countries reported the shutdown of the North’s embassies there.
Both Angola and Uganda have forged friendly ties with North Korea since the 1970s, maintaining military cooperation and providing rare sources of foreign currency such as statue-building projects.
The embassy closings set the stage for what could be “one of the country’s biggest foreign policy shakeups in decades”, with implications for diplomatic engagement, humanitarian work in the isolated country, as well as the ability to generate illicit revenue, wrote Chad O’Carroll, founder of the North Korea-focused website NK Pro.
More than a dozen missions may close, likely because of international sanctions, a trend of Pyongyang’s disengaging globally and the probable weakening of the North Korean economy, he said in a report on Wednesday.
Seoul’s unification ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, said the pullout reflected the impact of international sanctions aimed at curbing funding for the North’s nuclear and missile programs.
“They appear to be withdrawing as their foreign currency earning business has stumbled due to the international community’s strengthening of sanctions, making it difficult to maintain the embassies any longer,” the ministry said in a statement. “This can be a sign of North Korea’s difficult economic situation, where it is difficult to maintain even minimal diplomatic relations with traditionally friendly countries.”
North Korea has formal relations with 159 countries, but had 53 diplomatic missions overseas, including three consulates and three representative offices, until it pulled out of Angola and Uganda, according to the ministry.
North Korea will also shut down its embassy in Spain, with its mission in Italy handling affairs in the neighbouring country, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported.
Correspondence with the Spanish Communist Party released on the party’s website showed the North Korean embassy announcing the closing in a letter dated Oct. 26.
The North’s embassy in Madrid was in the spotlight after members of a group seeking the overthrow of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un staged a break-in in 2019, during which they bound and gagged staff before driving off with computers and other devices.
Pyongyang denounced the incident as a “grave breach of sovereignty and terrorist attack,” and accused the United States of not investigating the group thoroughly and refusing to extradite its leader.
World
Trump says he still has good relations with leader of ‘nuclear power’ North Korea

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday he still has a good relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, with whom he held several summits during his first term, and referred to North Korea once again as a “nuclear power.”
Asked by reporters during an Oval Office meeting with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte whether he had plans to reestablish relations with Kim, Trump said: “I would … I have a great relationship with Kim Jong Un, and we’ll see what happens, but certainly he’s a nuclear power,” Reuters reported.
On January 20, when he was inaugurated for his second term, Trump said North Korea was a “nuclear power,” raising questions about whether he would pursue arms reduction talks rather than denuclearization efforts that failed in his first term in any re-engagement with Pyongyang.
After referring to Russia and China’s nuclear arsenals, Trump said: “It would be a great achievement if we could bring down the number. We have so many weapons, and the power is so great.
“And number one, you don’t need them to that extent. And then we’d have to get others, ’cause, as you know, in a smaller way – Kim Jong Un has a lot of nuclear weapons, by the way, a lot, and others do also. You have India, you have Pakistan, you have others that have them, and we get them involved.”
Asked if Trump remarks represented any shift in policy towards North Korea’s nuclear weapons, a White House official said: “President Trump will pursue the complete denuclearization of North Korea, just as he did in his first term.”
On February 15, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his Japanese and South Korean counterparts reaffirmed their “resolute commitment to the complete denuclearization” of North Korea in accordance with U.S. Security Council Resolutions.
Last week, Kim Jong Un’s powerful sister Kim Yo Jong criticized the Trump administration for stepping up "provocations" and said it justified North Korea increasing its nuclear deterrent. This week North Korea fired multiple ballistic missiles, its first since Trump took office.
World
Iran’s President to Trump: I will not negotiate, ‘do whatever the hell you want’
“It is unacceptable for us that they (the U.S.) give orders and make threats. I won’t even negotiate with you. Do whatever the hell you want”, state media quoted Pezeshkian as saying.

President Masoud Pezeshkian said Iran would not negotiate with the U.S. while being threatened, telling President Donald Trump to “do whatever the hell you want”, Iranian state media reported on Tuesday.
“It is unacceptable for us that they (the U.S.) give orders and make threats. I won’t even negotiate with you. Do whatever the hell you want”, state media quoted Pezeshkian as saying.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Saturday that Tehran would not be bullied into negotiations, a day after Trump said he had sent a letter urging Iran to engage in talks on a new nuclear deal, Reuters reported.
While expressing openness to a deal with Tehran, Trump has reinstated the “maximum pressure” campaign he applied in his first term as president to isolate Iran from the global economy and drive its oil exports down towards zero.
In an interview with Fox Business, Trump said last week, “There are two ways Iran can be handled: militarily, or you make a deal” to prevent Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Iran has long denied wanting to develop a nuclear weapon. However, it is “dramatically” accelerating enrichment of uranium to up to 60% purity, close to the roughly 90% weapons-grade level, the IAEA has warned.
Iran has accelerated its nuclear work since 2019, a year after then-President Trump ditched Tehran’s 2015 nuclear pact with six world powers and reimposed sanctions that have crippled the country’s economy.
World
Philippines’ ex-President Duterte arrested at ICC’s request over ‘drugs war’ killings

The Philippines arrested firebrand former President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday at the request of the International Criminal Court, a major step in the world body’s investigation into thousands of killings in a bloody “war on drugs” that defined his presidency.
Duterte, the maverick former mayor who led the Philippines from 2016 to 2022, was served an arrest warrant on arrival from Hong Kong at Manila’s main airport and was now in custody, the office of his successor Ferdinand Marcos Jr said in a statement.
The “war on drugs” was Duterte’s signature campaign platform that swept the mercurial, crime-busting former prosecutor to power in 2016 and he soon delivered on promises made during vitriolic speeches to kill thousands of drug dealers and users, Reuters reported.
If transferred to the Hague, he could become Asia’s first former head of state to go on trial at the ICC.
Duterte has insisted he told police to kill only in self-defence and has repeatedly defended the crackdown, saying he was willing to “rot in jail” if it meant ridding the Philippines of drugs.
In a video posted on Instagram by daughter Veronica Duterte from Manila’s Villamor Air Base, where he has been placed in custody, the former leader questioned the reason for his arrest.
“What is the law and what is the crime that I committed?” he said in the video. It was unclear who he was speaking to.
“I was brought here not of my own volition, it is somebody else’s. You have to answer now for the deprivation of liberty.”
The president’s office has yet to clarify the next steps for Duterte and it was not immediately clear what the ICC has charged him with.
According to police, 6,200 suspects were killed during anti-drug operations that they say ended in shootouts. But activists say the real toll of Duterte’s crackdown was far greater, with many thousands more slumland drug users, some named on community “watch lists”, killed in mysterious circumstances.
The ICC’s prosecutor has said as many as 30,000 people may have been killed by police or unidentified individuals.
Police have rejected allegations from rights groups of systematic executions and cover-ups.
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