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THE CHEONAN COVER-UP

Aidan Foster-Carter

Asia Times, April 10, 2010

It's now almost two weeks since the Republic of Korea navy corvette Cheonan mysteriously exploded and sank close to Baengnyeong, South Korea's northwestern-most island, late on Friday night, March 26. Fifty-eight of its 104 man crew were swiftly plucked from the chilly waters, but 46 drowned - although only two bodies had been found as of April 8.

Since then 10 more have died: one navy diver, and nine fishermen on a boat commandeered to help the search after it was apparently in collision with a Cambodian-registered freighter. The original explosion was powerful enough to tear this substantial vessel - 88 meters long, 1,200 tonnes - in half. Strong currents, which are still hampering investigations, swept the bow section fully six kilometers southeastward from the stern. Fortunately both are in fairly shallow waters; meaning salvage of the wreck should be feasible though may take weeks.

So what happened? Summoned to a BBC studio for instant punditry, still struggling to take in what little we knew in those first hours, I feared the worst. I mean, just look at the map. Baengnyeong was in Southern hands when the Korean War ended - only with an armistice: there is still no peace treaty - in 1953, but geographically it's an outlier: far from the South Korean mainland, nearer to Pyongyang than to Seoul, and close to the North Korean coast.

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