Where do you see it? Which one is it? Obviously, it's both, but you could side with one.

Trying to unpack what the Chinese Communist Party is really thinking in terms of intentions is an extremely difficult task.

This is an authoritarian regime.

This is a closed regime.

This is a regime that under Xi Jinping has become only more authoritarian.

But from the information that we have, what we can think and what we can surmise is that on the one hand, any action taken by the US that can be seen to be destabilizing the US's network of alliances, both in its vicinity, and by the vicinity, I include, I mean, the Asia Pacific, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, or further afield, is likely to be viewed by Beijing as a little victory.

But on the other hand, we've got to remember that the issues that we've seen involving the ongoing conflict in Iran have also not been to China's benefit.

Every strategic decision they're taking is, how does this help us vis-a-vis China?

But why would you say they took that decision to join the war? And what do you find so far the most important consequences of it?

The North Korean regime, in all its three dynastic iterations, has always, um, needed money and cash.

And the North Korean regime now, as before, will do anything it can to get access to cash, in addition to the pursuit of enhanced nuclear and missile capabilities.

When Kim Jong Un decided to not only send artillery shells, and as of the beginning of this year, twenty twenty-six, North Korea has sent at least twelve million rounds of artillery to Russia.

When Kim Jong Un made that decision to send artillery, then missiles to Russia, then manpower in the form of around about fifteen thousand North Korean troops to assist Russia's war against Ukraine, this decision was not made on a whim.

You know, when Pyongyang got involved in the war just after the first year, North Korea's economy was on crutches.

North Korea's economy was still under lockdown owing to coronavirus.

So what is the prospect of, you think, in the next few years, or will it take longer to get off those sort of historically rooted principles and have a policy which deals with North Korea as it is rather than as they would like it to be?

Il connaît parfaitement ces cas et nous avons souhaité connaître son avis sur ce qui se passe exactement lorsque l'on est capturé en Corée du Nord.

The cases of Americans being detained in North Korea show that the North Korean penal system is brutal, that North Korea will coerce detained individuals into saying Pyongyang's version of their story.

There will often be a sham trial, a forced confession in which the detainee denounces the West as pursuing a hostile policy towards North Korea, or where the detainee repents of their so-called crimes.

The detainee may often denounce criticisms of North Korea's egregious human rights record in this forced confession.

And this will often be followed by severe sentencing, which also includes hard labor.

Juste un accord discret pour les ramener chez elles.

When North Korean state media announced their release, they used this as an opportunity to reinforce Pyongyang's worldview of the US as a hostile power.

This has long been North Korea's worldview towards the United States ever since the Korean War.

Mm.

You know, China, as you both know f- from your own experience, you know, in the six-party talks made lots of statements s- supporting this idea, vague at the time, of denuclearization.

We had the 2005, um, September 2005 document that came out which gave a really clear picture of what this denuclearization would entail.

Now, 21 years later, I see Beijing ac- ac- I see Beijing actually not really doing very much, if anything, and with respect to a, a, a delinquent nuclear neighbor.

So what could be on the agenda? I think China wants to assert its influence over the Korean Peninsula.

It signed the Korean War Armistice Agreement in 1953.

I think that's something that's very important.

Yes

Do we have another question we want to stack with? No? OK.

Thank you for the online question for mentioning Europe.

I think I cannot give this talk without talking about Europe or the United Kingdom.

The reason I say this in all seriousness is because So whether it's the Yoon administration or the Lee Jae-myung administration, South Korea really cannot avoid the fact that, yes, it is trapped between great powers, but it's also got global ambitions, whether as a global pivotal state to use the Yoon administration's rhetoric or whatever the Lee Jae-myung administration comes up with that's basically a synonym of this.

And engaging with Europe, I think, is very important here.

Europe-South Korea relations have been going on for a long time.

And I think cooperation, particularly in the cyber domain, in AI, in the digital domains, this is one way forward.

So if you don't mind talking about some specific takes in both the short and the long term that you identified that Washington and Seoul can do.

I started by asking him what he made of the news.

So I think we need to be clear that Kim Jong Un himself has not yet announced his daughter as his successor.

The South Korean intelligence agency has said that Kim Jong Un has chosen his daughter as the successor.

And I think the reason I mention this is because we do need to make sure that we do not rush to conclusions here, because only when we hear or see something from the North Korean regime, from the Kim Jong Un regime, will we know for certain.

That said, I think she has been increasingly visible over the past year, couple of years, which indicates that the likelihood that she would succeed him in the event of his death in the longer term is reasonably high.

But I think we need to be careful here.

Firstly, yes, she's been increasingly visible with her father at intercontinental ballistic missile launches, at military banquets, and crucially, she accompanied him to his visit to Beijing last September.

As far as we know, what is the domestic context in which this decision takes place, or perhaps international context? What do you think is on Kim's mind when he decides this?