Turkish Activists Mulling Flotilla To North Korea

“Any regime that opposes the West, especially the US, automatically gets inaugurated into the good-guy camp, and the more oppressive, the better.”

Marmara, August 10 – Increasing tensions and heightened rhetoric between isolated North Korea and the United States has as least one humanitarian group considering a relief flotilla to the Asian dictatorship to highlight the misery for which they hope to blame the US.

Members of IHH, the movement that sponsored and executed the ill-fated Mavi Marmara mission to Gaza in 2010, ostensibly to provide aid to Gaza, but which carried almost no such supplies, informed acquaintances today that they intend to orchestrate a similar operation to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. As with the Gaza mission, which was intercepted by Israeli naval commandos in international waters before it could breach Israel’s blockade of Gaza, IHH will conduct the “relief” mission primarily to thumb its nose at the “imperialist” enemy, this time the US instead of Israel.

“The whole idea is to show solidarity with oppressive totalitarian regimes à la Hamas as if they are the noble good-guy underdogs, as opposed to the fascist thugs they really are,” explained one activist. “Really, the only way to shore up the Muslim world’s antidemocratic and illiberal ethos in any sustainable way is to brand actual liberal, democratic countries as the opposite of that, and then assume the mantle of progressivism. Any regime that opposes the West, especially the US, automatically gets inaugurated into the good-guy camp, and the more oppressive, the better.”

Details of any such operation remain vague, as in contrast to the situation around Gaza, no formal blockade of North Korea is in place. International sanctions apply to trade with the Communist dictatorship, but those obtain more in the realm of financial consequences and penalties than in an active effort to interdict physical goods. Thus, explained MK Haneen Zoabi, a participant in the Mavi Marmara flotilla, actually reaching Norht Korea would not have the same impact.

“The whole idea with the 2010 flotilla was to challenge Israel’s blockade,” she recalled. “The goal was to generate sympathy by provoking an Israeli response, which we could – and did – use to spread libels about excessive force and brutality; or, if they decided not to confront us, thus forfeit the blockade. But there’s no such blockade of North Korea, so a different set of tactics might be necessary if such a mission is to succeed.”

Sources in Pyongyang indicated that no matter the circumstances and intentions of anyone on board such a flotilla, its members would likely be detained and tortured.

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