Kungfu Food Credit: CRIMSON TAZVINZWA
How does the British passport fare in the list of the world’s strongest? (Picture: PA/Getty)
With Brexit looming, the UK has slid down the list, while the passport power has shifted to Asia.
Japan and Singapore have held on to their joint top spot, with each country offering visa-free access to 189 destinations.
The UK and the US now share sixth place, the lowest position either has held since 2010. The pair were top of the list in 2014.
THE WORLD’S STRONGEST PASSPORTS:
1. Japan, Singapore
2. Finland, Germany, South Korea
3. Denmark, Italy, Luxembourg
4. France, Spain, Sweden
5. Austria, Netherlands, Portugal, Switzerland
6. Belgium, Canada, Greece, Ireland, Norway, United Kingdom, United States
The UK, along with the US and Ireland, offers visa-free access to 183 destinations worldwide.
Since the Brexit referendum in 2016, there has been a significant increase in the number of Britons applying for an EU passport.
In 2018, the number of Britons applying for Irish passports jumped 12.5% to 183,000, the second consecutive annual increase.
Almost 2,000 Britons applied for Swedish passports last year, another record, and about four times the number who did so in 2015.
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Applications for French passports among Britons more than trebled to 1,300 in 2016, then more than doubled in 2017.
The latest ranking was compiled by the Henley Passport Index, which takes global mobility into account and is based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
The Henley Passport Index warned that Britain’s ranking could get even worse in the years to come.
“Throughout most of the index’s history, the UK has held one of the top five places in the ranking,” it said.
“However, with its exit from the EU now imminent, the UK’s once-strong position looks increasingly uncertain.
“The Brexit process has not yet had a direct impact on the UK’s ranking, but new research using exclusive historical data from the Henley Passport Index indicates that this could change, with consequences that extend beyond a decline in passport power.”
Dr Christian H Kaelin, chairman of Henley & Partners and the creator of the passport index concept, said: “This latest research appears to confirm something that many of us already knew intuitively: that increased visa-openness benefits the entire global community, and not just the strongest countries.”
North Korea reportedly launches short–range ballistic missile. South Koreamedia is reporting North Korea has launched a missile. North Korea reportedly launched multiple unidentified short–range “projectiles” off its eastern coast Saturday.
“North Korea fired several short-range projectiles off its east coast on Saturday, in a move likely to raise tensions as denuclearization talks with the United States remain stalled,” the New York Times reports.
“The V-shape formation is usually used when going through a crowd of people. But on Friday, it was likely used as a show of North Korea’s meticulousness,” the official told local news. The guards are the most elite soldiers of the North Korean army, reports say. While most North Korean male citizens are obligated to 10 years of military service, Kim’s guards serve for at least 13 years.
“The South Korean military said in a statement that the North had fired several short-range projectiles between 9:06 a.m. and 9:27 a.m. from near Wonsan, a coastal town east of Pyongyang, the capital. The projectiles flew 70 to 200 kilometers before they landed in the sea between North Korea and Japan, it said.”
Seoul, South Korea — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un arrived in Russia by train on Wednesday, a day before his much-anticipated summit with President Vladimir Putin. The visit comes as Kim’s recently-feverish diplomacy with the Trump administration, aimed at ridding the North Korean regime of its nuclear weapons, remains deadlocked.
Kim, dressed in a black coat and a fedora, met Russian officials at Russia’s Khasan train station near its border with the North. The official website of the Primorye governor released pictures of Kim stepping off the train and being given the traditional Russian gifts of bread and salt at the station.
Speaking to Russia’s state-owned Rossiya-24, Kim said on arrival that he was hoping for a “successful and useful” visit and would like to discuss with Putin, “settlement of the situation in the Korean Peninsula” as well as bilateral ties with Russia.
Kim then sat down with local officials, as well as a Russian deputy foreign minister, before setting off again for the Pacific port city of Vladivostok for his summit with Putin, set to begin on Thursday. It is Kim’s first visit to Russia, and the first by a North Korean leader since his late father, Kim Jong Il, visited in 2011.
“I have heard a lot about your country and have long dreamt of visiting it,” Kim was quoted as saying. “It’s been seven years since I took the helm, and I’ve only just managed to visit.”
Kim evoked his father’s “great love for Russia” and said that he intended to strengthen the ties between the two countries.
Earlier Wednesday, the North’s state media confirmed Kim’s departure aboard his khaki-green armored train from an undisclosed location in North Korea. Yonhap, citing an analysis of North Korean photos on Kim’s departure, speculated Kim may have left from a rural area, not Pyongyang.
Kim was expected to arrive in Vladivostok around late Wednesday afternoon and attend a dinner reception hosted by Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Trutnev, according to South Korean media. After his summit with Putin, Kim may tour neighbouring facilities or landmarks before departing for home on Friday, the reports said.
Kremlin adviser Yuri Ushakov told Russian media the summit would focus on North Korea’s nuclear program, noting that Russia would seek to “consolidate the positive trends” stemming from President Trump’s meetings with Kim.
In February, Kim’s second summit with Trump in Hanoi ended without any agreement because of disputes over U.S.-led sanctions. There have since been no publicly known high-level contacts between the U.S. and North Korea, though both sides say they are still open to a third summit.
Despite the failure to make any significant progress in their last meeting, and the fact that North Korea appears to have resumed some of its nuclear work, Mr Trump himself has said another meeting with Kim, “would be good in that we fully understand where we each stand.”
Kim wants the U.S. to ease the sanctions to reciprocate some partial disarmament steps he took last year. But the U.S. maintains the sanctions will stay in place until North Korea takes more significant denuclearization steps.
Some experts say Kim could try to bolster his country’s ties with Russia and China. Others say it’s not clear how big of a role Russia can play in efforts to restart the nuclear negotiations. The summit could allow Putin to try to increase his influence in regional politics and the standoff over North Korea’s nuclear program.
“Kim wants to show that he’s cooperating with Russia too, rather than looking to only the U.S. and China. But I think it’s not easy for Russia and China to provide North Korea with practical assistance that leads to the inflow of dollars,” said Chon Hyun-joon, a former senior researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul.
North Korea has increasingly expressed frustration at the deadlocked negotiations. Last week, North Korea tested a new weapon and demanded U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to be removed from nuclear talks.
Putin’s adviser added that the Kremlin would try to help “create preconditions and a favorable atmosphere for reaching solid agreements on the problem of the Korean Peninsula.”
Ushakov pointed at a Russia-China roadmap that offered a step-by-step approach to solving the nuclear standoff and called for sanctions relief and security guarantees to Pyongyang. He noted that the North’s moratorium on nuclear tests and scaling down of U.S.-South Korean military drills helped reduce tensions and created conditions for further progress.
There seems to be a real fascination with Kim Jong Un’s security and how exactly he goes about his business while paranoid of assassination attempts and decapitation strikes from afar and from potential competition within his own circle of power.
It turns out that Kim doesn’t just have a Secret Service-like agency tasked with his protection. He has his own 100,000 man army with a stove-pipe command structure that reports directly to him. This elite unit is known as Guard Command.
Kim’s personal protection unit, which is made up of the best that Guard Command has to offer, usually melts into the shadows during his appearances. But recently, members of a select offshoot of this special outfit have become something of an international sensation, as they have appeared running in unison alongside the Supreme Leader’s Mercedes Pullman Guard armored Limousine on multiple high-profile occasions.
This human phalanx of fit North Korean commandos dressed in tailored business suits with earphone pigtails dangling from their heads definitely appears to mean business when it comes to defending their principal, but they also serve a major propaganda tool. The spectacle visually highlights Kim’s near-sacred importance and the might of his sprawling security apparatus.
Back home, Guard Command serves to protect the ruling family’s interests throughout the country and includes a range of capabilities, as well as a large assortment of equipment used to carry out its unique missions. In the fabulous research document North Korea House Of Cards: Leadership Dynamics Under Kim Jong Un, the Committee For Human Rights In North Korea describes Guard Command as such:
The GC (Ho-wi Sa-ryeong-bu), which is also referred to as the Bodyguard Command, is responsible for the safety and welfare of Kim Jong-un, his family, and senior North Korean officials. Its origins begin in 1946, when elements of the 90th Training Command were made responsible for providing security for North Korea’s emerging leadership. It has been restructured several times.
Since the 1990s, it has been growing in importance as the center of the regime’s Praetorian Guard. The GC numbers close to 100,000 personnel dispersed across the country in a number of battalions, regiments, and brigades. In addition to providing for the personal security of Kim Jong-un and other high-ranking officials, it conducts surveillance on high-ranking political and military officials. It also shares responsibility for the defense of the capital with the Pyongyang Defense Command and the Pyongyang Anti-Aircraft Artillery Command.
Located in Puksae-dong, Moranbong District, Pyongyang, the corps-sized GC is equipped with tanks, artillery, and missiles. It has several combat brigades stationed at the Kim family’s residences and other critical facilities throughout the country.
Various subunits within the GC’s structure execute a wide variety of roles. These include maintaining and guarding the Kim family’s palaces and shrines, controlling access to the Capital via checkpoints, providing medical care not available to any other North Korean in order to prolong the “Dear Leader’s” life, and protecting other North Korean elites. A logistics group supports all these endeavors in a traditional sense but also procures the luxury items and consumables only available to the Kim family and the regime’s top power brokers.
One unit, the Rapid Response Force, is made up of a couple thousand hardened soldiers with a fleet of armored personnel carriers and heavy weaponry who are dispersed throughout Pyongyang. Their sole responsibility is to counter a coup attempt at a moment’s notice, by grabbing and holding strategic command and control and information facilities to ensure that the regime is not successfully overturned.
Another unit focuses on communications and is likely the force that would convey Kim’s nuclear weapons release commands if they were issued. It is described by North Korea Leadership Watch as such:
The Guard Command’s Security Department manages and monitors all telephone and Internet communications by members of the DPRK leadership. One section of the Security Department is tasked with meeting KCI’s communication needs (telephone, fax, Intra/Internet) to issue instructions and orders. In cooperation with the Ministry of People’s Security, the Guard Command’s Security Department also manages the personnel and technical maintenance of hardwired telephone and fax lines used by senior government, party and military leadership in Pyongyang and provincial capitals.
The Second Guard Department of the Guard Command works to protect Kim and his family directly and has some of the most capable troops in the entire order. They work directly with an even more select group of bodyguards that are part of the so-called Office Number Six, to coordinate Kim’s personal protection operations.
Office Number Six is made up of highly experienced GC operatives with at least a decade of dedicated service and provides the innermost protective circle around Kim Jong Un. They also provide a key administrative function—planning and executing the Supreme Leader’s events and travel arrangements. The CFHRINK report describes this shadowy unit in detail:
The Office of Adjutants (Office 6) coordinates the protection of the Supreme Leader. It presumably liaises with the Guard Command and other elements of the internal security apparatus. Adjutants from this office accompany Kim Jong-un on his guidance inspections. According to one source, the adjutants form the inner circle of security around the Supreme Leader and are the only people allowed to carry guns in his presence. Under Kim Jong-il, this office had approximately 1,200 officers and soldiers, the size of a KPA battalion.
…
Office 6, which reports directly to Kim Jong-un’s Personal Secretariat through the GC, takes the lead in all of Kim Jong-un’s public appearances. It is responsible for the protection of the Supreme Leader at the closest range. As such, it provides security inside the first two layers of security in a seven-layer cordon every time the Supreme Leader travels outside of his Party headquarters or one of his residences.
In addition to providing physical security, which is the responsibility of the Bodyguard Department, Office 6 has a number of other functions. The Plans Department coordinates the Supreme Leader’s events in terms of the list of participants and the operational aspects of the protection plan. An editorial bureau attached to Office 6 is responsible for how the images and news of the Supreme Leader are crafted by North Korean media.
Here is a chart showing how Kim’s security is organized for events:
In some ways, this arrangement is somewhat analogous to America’s Secret Service Uniform Division and the President’s Protection Detail, but in North Korea, the whole operation is highly militarized and operates on a much grander scale.
The SSD, or State Security Department, that is mentioned in the organizational chart above, doesn’t have to do with Kim’s personal protection primarily, but considering we are talking about the North Korean police state, their involvement in Kim’s travel planning and protection during visits is worth noting. The CHFRINK report states:
SSD carries out a wide range of counterintelligence and internal security functions normally associated with the secret police. It is responsible for finding anti-state criminals—those accused of anti-government and dissident activities, economic crimes, and disloyalty to the political leadership. In addition, it runs political prisons and has counter-intelligence and intelligence collection responsibilities. It monitors political attitudes and maintains surveillance on people who have returned from foreign countries. Department personnel escort high-ranking officials, guard national borders, and monitor international entry points. The degree of fear it instills in the political security bureaus of the KPA, which have representatives at all levels of command, is uncertain. However, it occasionally takes actions against members of the elite.
The MPS, or Ministry of People Security, acts as the state police in North Korea, so their involvement with Kim’s movements doesn’t need explanation.
Guard Command supposedly goes to North Korean highs schools to find the best specimens to fill out its ranks. According to defector Lee Young Kuk who was the personal bodyguard for Kim Jong Il for over a decade, well-proportioned bodies and the lack of scars are desirable features for candidates, and they must come from families with impeccable loyalty to the party dating back multiple generations.
Training, which lasts years, includes smashing granite slabs on your chest with a sledgehammer, breaking light bulbs with a single finger, and crushing tiles with your head, as well as a lot of fairly brutal martial arts.
CNN did an interview with Lee Yong Kuk, it stated:
Lee says he went through very similar training before he was considered fit to protect a leader. “It’s tough training,” says Lee. “But why do it? It’s to build up loyalty. A handgun won’t win a war and taekwondo serves nothing but the spirit, but it creates loyalty.”
His training also involved more traditional methods. Target practice, physical, tactical and weight training, swimming and using a boat. But that’s only part of the preparation.
A large part of the training, he claims, is ideological brainwashing. Lee says he was trained to believe Kim Jong Il was a god — and that the only reason he was born was to serve and protect the “Dear Leader.”
Lee noted that even with all his power, Kim Jong Il was an uneven and violent man that was struck with fear at all times:
He recalls “two faces” to the man, describing him as someone who could give out gold when he was happy, and death sentences when he was not.
“When Kim Jong Il would arrive in his vehicle, 60- to 70-year old advisors would run away and throw themselves onto the grass. They had dust on their clothes but they wanted to hide from him,” says Lee.
“They are scared because even when he was happy he would be rude and could chop off their heads. “He remembers a senior official who once used Kim Jong Il’s private elevator and ashtray. When Kim found out, he sent him to a concentration camp, where the man died.
But his successor, the man now negotiating on equal footing with the U.S., is even more brutal according to the veteran bodyguard:
Lee knew the North Korean leader was cruel when he was serving him. But, he says, it was only after he escaped to South Korea, his new home, that he realized Kim was a true dictator, as his father Kim Il Sung had been before him, and his son and current leader Kim Jong Un is now.
But he is worried that Kim Jong Un may be the worst of all. “Kim Jong Un ended up killing his uncle, who even Kim Jong Il could not kill,” said Lee. “As power was handed down to the third generation, it became crueler. Kim Jong Un has created loyalty, but it is fake and based on fear.”
Regardless of who in the Kim family is crueler, the massive security apparatus surrounding the top echelons of the regime is a manifestation of what it takes to sustain a reclusive military dictatorship with a royal-like family at its pinnacle. And all of it costs gobs of money, which could be used to satisfy the basic needs of North Koreans, namely clean water, consistent electricity, and especially a steady diet of basic nutrition.
Yet considering the closed society they come from, one in which the common man must be an idolator of the Kim family and the party they rule, as well as their extreme training, indoctrination, and not lack of distractions, North Korea’s top bodyguards are no laughing matter and their dedication is likely among the most extreme on the planet.
Guard Command’s workload and repertoire seems to be on the precipice of a drastic expansion as Kim Jong Un’s profile rises on the world stage. Just the idea of a “Young General” that travels outside of North Korea’s own borders is a new concept, at least in the years since Kim Jong Un rose to power, and his father wasn’t much of a globetrotter either as he hated to fly. But the unit was behind the impressive logistics ballet that brought the young ruler to Singapore for the historic, albeit hollow, summit with the American President.
With all this in mind, we are likely to be seeing a lot more of the General Guard and Office Number Six’s ‘unique’ capabilities, and they may even be descending onto Washington, D.C. in the not so distant future.
While the Secret Service may be the best-known head of state protective unit in the world, and the Pope’s Swiss Guard is certainly the most colorful, Kim Jong Un’s force is by far the most expansive.
Contact the author: Tyler@thedrive.com
