Illustration by M. Morgenstern  NUCLEAR blackmail is an old
trick of Kim Jong Il, North Korea's 68-year-old dictator, learnt
at the knee of his father, Kim Il Sung. Since April 5th, and the
launching of what North Korea said was a satellite but the rest
of the world reckons was a failed missile, he has been at it
again. North Korea expelled United Nations inspectors from its
ageing reactor complex at Yongbyon and now declares itself no
longer bound by the six-party process involving South Korea,
China, Japan, Russia and the United States that was meant to
lead to abandonment of its nuclear-weapons programmes, in return
for aid and respect. After days of wrangling over the launch,
the UN Security Council delivered no more than a light knuckle-
rapping.  Yet North Korea professes to be insulted. It threatens
to rebuild Yongbyon and start making weapons-grade plutonium
again. This week, after its first talks with the South in more
than a year farcically broke down after just 22 minutes, it
accused the South of “a