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March 24, 2004

DPRK

It's been an uneventful couple of days -- sort of. My ACL project finished and (unfairly) graded, I went to a luncheon meeting with representatives from Syracuse University, some lawyers, and a delegation from North Korea. I have to say that the luncheon was amazing. Nothing was done, but it's the first time I've been to any sort of formal meeting.

The Vice Chancellor from Kim Chaek University (North Korea's MIT) came to Syracuse with a group to study formal methods and other fun things at University. The idea is to eventually build a twin lab with our school, so that research collaboration on joint projects can be exchanged more readily. Naturally, exports to North Korea, especially as far as technology and information are concerned, is a tricky bit of business.

The luncheon itself was, as I said, a rather formal affair. The Vice Chancellor spoke through a translator about their desire to set up a twin lab, and how pleased he has been with the joint work so far. The laywer spoke through the translator to tell the DPRK reps about export control law, and that the list of hardware would need to be checked. Like I said, this was all known by everybody (presumably) before the meeting started. It's still interesting in a way to see the formalities of the thing -- you can almost sense what people are allowed to talk about and what they aren't. At the same time, I can tell that I would never want to be a diplomat, because of the lack of immediate action.

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