Trump approved payment of $2 million bill for North Korea care of Warmbier: report
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
WASHINGTON, April 25 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump approved the payment of a $2 million bill presented by North Korea to cover its care of comatose American Otto Warmbier, a college student who died shortly after being returned home from 17 months in a North Korean prison, the Washington Post reported on Thursday.
The Post said an invoice was handed to State Department envoy Joseph Yun hours before Warmbier, 22, was flown out of Pyongyang in a coma on June 13, 2017. Warmbier died six days later.
Yun, when asked for comment, said in an email "I cannot comment/confirm on diplomatic exchanges."
The U.S. envoy, who was sent to retrieve Warmbier, signed an agreement to pay the medical bill on instructions passed down from Trump, the Post reported, citing two unidentified people familiar with the situation.
“We do not comment on hostage negotiations, which is why they have been so successful during this administration," White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told Reuters.
The bill was sent to the Treasury Department and remained unpaid through 2017, the Post reported. It was not known if the administration later paid the bill.
Warmbier, a University of Virginia student visiting North Korea as a tourist, was imprisoned there for 17 months starting in January 2016. North Korea state media said he was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor for trying to steal an item bearing a propaganda slogan from his hotel. (Reporting by Jeff Mason, Doina Chiacu and David Brunnstrom; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and James Dalgleish)
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According to this story, Trump approved of payment, to a US adversary, for the "care" of an American citizen who had been mistreated in that "care" to the point that he died from his injuries a few days later.
I suppose one could argue that it needed to be done to get Warmbier freed, but imagine the conservative uproar if Obama or a Clinton administration had done it.
So basically Trump paid them for what they did to an American. The family is appalled now that this has come to light. You don't see the right wing outrage here, anything Trump does no matter how horrific is fine with them.
What's horrific about it? Is NK holding anymore hostages?
It's called an attempt at diplomacy, greases the skids for later deals.
Little Kimmy will likely come to terms while Trump is still president.
Didn't the right complain about Obama paying for war remains being brought home?
The right was screaming that Obama couldn't get anything done without paying them.
Now it is called diplomacy? I call it hypocrisy.
Has Trump paid North Korea? Will he ever?
It doesn't even say that.
So, we have another unconfirmed article that uses unidentified sources. Thanks for the morning laugh!
For the left, any scandal in a storm they can create is okay with them...
One would think that out of the 4 "journalists"/reporters and 2 editors, at least 1 of them would have had some integrity and held off until they had hard facts.
Newspapers and other news outlets publish stories based on "unidentified" sources every single day. It is a staple of news reporting. Many people with valuable information would not give it to reporters if they thought their name was going to be revealed in the story.
The Washington Post knows who the "unidentified" person is, why dont you sue them and try and get them to reveal it?
You completely missed the point of my comment, John, but that's OK. I have no reason to sue anyone - what a ridiculous comment.
The Washington Post has a "hard fact", they have individuals in a position to know that told them what happened. That is the fact. If you dont want to believe it fine, but your allegations are that newspapers make this stuff up, and that is ridiculous. These types of sources are used in news reporting 365 days a year.
What are their names again ?
You mean like all those fake and phony left wing news stories that get seeded here on a daily bases from "unnamed sources" or some such, that have zero credibility, let alone being hard facts.
What I got out of the comment is that you think it shouldn't be reported on.
At the same time, the administration will not give any facts at all. All the while not denying anything.
The most open administration in history? More like shrouded in secrecy.
Some use to praise leakers. Saying that they are needed to keep government in check. Now they either seem to be called liars or traitors.
Sure, but they don't claim that these sources were participants or even witnesses. They're just "familiar with the situation." Well Hell! Anyone who watches the news is "familiar" with that situation.
What exactly would a defender and apologist for Trump, do with facts, and how would they know one....
Well the constant pathological liar Donald Trump has denied the payment, so therefore we could conclude it is likely true. This is what happens when you have zero credibility. For example, Trump once denied paying Stormy Daniels and then it was discovered on audio tape.
Trump is a version of the little boy who cried wolf. He lies so much that nothing he says can be believed.
Obama - $1.7B to Iran - for four U.S. hostages and to stop their nuclear program???
The money returned to Iran was their money. An international court had determined that the US was no longer going to be allowed to detain it.
The two million, if it is true, is not a lot of money, but Jong Un was undoubtedly happy with the principle of getting paid for releasing an American prisoner.
That was debunked long ago.
Show me with some FACTS that it was debunked.
Let's also not forget Obama's five terrorist trade for one deserter either....
How many times do I have to correct this claim? That money was Iran's but it had been frozen in US banks since the 1979 hostgate crisis and from a military deal that never happened. It wasn't a gift or a bribe. Reapating a lie doesnt nmake it true.
That money should never have been given to Iran
1. It should have been forfeit for seizing Americans and holding them hostage
2 Iran is using that money to further Islam terrorism. Funding Hezbollah, Hamas and their war efforts in Yemen and Syria
Obama provided aid and comfort to the enemy and should be tried and convicted for treason
It was not given to them. It was part of the negotiations. International law isn't as simple as you wish it to be. Iran feels the same way about the money we give to Isreal.
Maybe he will share a cell with sHillary in your dreams.
The "deal" that was NOT in our best interests would not have occurred with the money being returned.
Any way you want to look at it, it was a ransom
It was in our best interests for Iran to put a hold on their nuclear program. Trump pulling out of that deal makes it easier for Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.
Funny how the right just pulled out of the deal, then we have nothing. Only the occasional lip service to say how horrible they are and what a bad deal Obama had.
Meanwhile, they are now left to their own devices.
IMO better to have a foot in the door than standing across the street yelling about previous plans.
Accomplishing nothing.
Israel opposed the deal, so conservatives were fed that talking point.
I wonder when Israel will sign the NNPT and allow IAEA inspections of Dimona and other nuclear facilities?
No rational person who has studied history and that of the Muslim goal of world conquest would accept the lie that Iran has put their nuclear program on hold.
The Iran nuclear deal was a farce. No one who understands how Islam views the US and Israel or it's view on treaties believes they have stopped nuclear development. They have steadfastly refused any outside inspection of key military facilities where they continue their nuclear arms development.
Central to all of this is the Islamic doctrines of using Treaties to bid time until they believe they have the upper hand
You cannot understand these negotiations unless you understand Islamic terms. Understanding them is why many of us know that Iran has no honorable intentions in this deal.
Treaty of Hudaybiyya and Hudna
Hudna ( هدنة ) is an Arabic term meaning a temporary " truce " or " armistice " as well as "calm" or "quiet", coming from a verbal root meaning "calm". It is sometimes translated as " cease-fire ". In the Lisan al-Arab ( Ibn al-Manzur 's definitive dictionary of classical Arabic , dating to the 14th century) it is defined as follows:
" hadana : he grew quiet. hadina : he quieted (transitive or intransitive). haadana : he made peace with. The noun from each of these is hudna ."A particularly famous early hudna was the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah between Muhammad and the Quraysh tribe.
According to Umdat as-Salik , a medieval summary of Shafi'i jurisprudence , hudnas with a non-Muslim enemy should be limited to 10 years: "if Muslims are weak, a truce may be made for ten years if necessary, for the Prophet made a truce with the Quraysh for that long, as is related by Abu Dawud" ('Umdat as-Salik, o9.16).
Taqiyya
Within the Shia theological framework, [1] the concept of Taqiyya ( تقية - 'fear, guard against', also taghiyeh ) [2] refers to a dispensation allowing believers to conceal their faith when under threat, persecution or compulsion. [3]
The word "al-Taqiyya" literally means: "Concealing or disguising one's beliefs, convictions, ideas, feelings, opinions, and/or strategies at a time of imminent danger, whether now or later in time, to save oneself from physical and/or mental injury."
Taqiyya is basically the Shia version of Hudna in it's practice and effect.
Kitman-
close to “taqiyya,” but rather than outright dissimulation, it consists in telling only a part of the truth, with “mental reservation” justifying the omission of the rest. One example may suffice. When a Muslim maintains that “jihad” really means “a spiritual struggle,” and fails to add that this definition is a recent one in Islam (little more than a century old), he misleads by holding back, and is practicing “kitman.” When he adduces, in support of this doubtful proposition, the hadith in which Muhammad, returning home from one of his many battles, is reported to have said (as known from a chain of transmitters, or isnad), that he had returned from “the Lesser Jihad to the Greater Jihad” and does not add what he also knows to be true, that this is a “weak” hadith, regarded by the most-respected muhaddithin as of doubtful authenticity, he is further practicing “kitman.”
During a debate at the University of Aarhus, Ahmad Akkari, one of the Muslim participants, stated: “Islam has waged war where this was necessary and dialogue where this was possible. A dialogue can thus only be viewed as part of a missionary objective.”
In The Force of Reason , Italian journalist and novelist Oriana Fallaci recalls how, in 1972, she interviewed the Palestinian terrorist George Habash, who told her that the Palestinian problem was about far more than Israel. The Arab goal, Habash declared, was to wage war “against Europe and America” and to ensure that henceforth “there would be no peace for the West.” The Arabs, he informed her, would “advance step by step. Millimeter by millimeter. Year after year. Decade after decade. Determined, stubborn, patient. This is our strategy. A strategy that we shall expand throughout the whole planet.”
Fallaci thought he was referring simply to terrorism. Only later did she realize that he “also meant the cultural war, the demographic war, the religious war waged by stealing a country from its citizens — In short, the war waged through immigration, fertility, presumed pluriculturalism.”
Today, radical groups and conventional Muslims alike often use the term hudna when they divide areas not controlled by Islamists into a realm of Islam ( dar al-Islam ) and a realm of war ( dar al-harb ), or pagan ignorance ( jahiliyya ). The leading exponent of this latter concept was Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood ideologue Sayyid Qutb (1906-66) who, in his 1964 treatise, Ma'alim fi 'l-tariq (Milestones), wrote:
For Qutb's fellow travelers and intellectual successors, Muslim countries that are not theocracies—any state except Iran, Saudi Arabia to a limited degree, or Sudan—are treated as though they had reverted to paganism.
They should not agree to any such thing. Israel would be utterly destroyed if you leftists had your way. Their ability to defend themselves is all that stands between them and the complete destruction of Israel and the Jews as commanded by Islam
How does agreeing to the NNPT and allowing inspections by the IAEA disarm Israel?
Was the US disarmed by signed the NNPT in 1968? Did the SALT I and SALT II treaties disarm the US? Is the US disarmed when we allow IAEA inspections into out nuclear weapons and other nuclear facilities?
We should never have agreed to it.
Why do you believe that to be true? What is the harm in IAEA inspections and signing the NNPT?
What did we actually have in the first place ?
Did You firgits ?
Mr. "I can wind surf at my age" Kerry told us ALL....Nothing was "LEGALLY BINDING" in any of the negotiated deals !
Lol
The timing of the first payment was delayed to pressure Iran into releasing the hostages. The nuclear program was not part of the negotiations.
As it has not yet been confirmed we may just suppose for the time being.
But if true it should come to no ones surprise that the North Koreans remain unpaid, if Mr. Trump continually stiffed his suppliers, contractors and employees why not the North Koreans as well.
It would be no surprise if it was never paid. The agreement to pay is what Kim Jong Un now has to brag about.
I would place no more credence in what Un states than I would in anything Mr. Trump says.
They were made for each other.
Here's my problem with the whole thing....the North Koreans put that young man in that state. To bill the US for his health care is just downright....arrogant!
I was leaning to absurd. How about both?
Absurd works. I was searching for the right word
Are you saying the North Koreans don't deserve to be stiffed? They are the ones that tortured him into a coma to begin with!
Absolutely not!
My point was that they should not be surprised based on Mr. Trumps past payment history. If this bargain was truly made, there will be a public outcry.
There already is a faux outcry with no payment being made. If Trump shafts North Korea and gets the hostage back that is all good in my book. Let the left rage all they want about "negotiating with terrorists"- we can't start WWIII with North Korea; but sticking it to them in negotiations is something we can do.
And that's where I pretend the online WaPo is a physical paper just so I can crumple it up and throw it in the garbage where it belongs.