Panel Discussion: North Korea and Nuclear Security

Wednesday 27 March 2024

On Wednesday March 27 2024, the Perth USAsia Centre hosted a public ‘in-conversation’ discussion on North Korea and nuclear security between Professor Gordon Flake, Professor Rüdiger Frank and Jasmin Diab CSC.

In 2024, North Korea’s actions are once again making waves across the region. In recent months it has concluded a weapons agreement with Russia, conducted cruise missile and underwater attack drone tests, closed embassies, and most significantly, removed reunification with South Korea as a goal from its constitution. These shifts in North Korea’s strategic outlook have once again renewed fears of regional conflict.

However, it is difficult to fully understand the underlying strategic objectives of the infamously hermetic North Korean state. North Korean specialist Professor Rüdiger Frank and nuclear security specialist Jasmin Diab helped unpack this complex environment through our expert discussion.

Of particular focus was North Korea’s refusal to participate in the rules-based order and its disruption of the nuclear status quo. With perspectives from both Europe and Australia, the audience gained a global understanding of North Korea’s threats to nuclear non-proliferation and its impact on our own security strategy.

Amid uncertainty over the non-proliferation regime, Australia should maintain its active advocacy for non-proliferation and the robust oversight of nuclear technology in our region.

Speakers

Professor Gordon Flake

Professor Gordon Flake is the founding Chief Executive Officer of the Perth USAsia Centre at The University of Western Australia.

Professor Flake is one of the world’s leading authorities on strategic developments in the Indo-Pacific. Having spent twenty-five years in the US foreign policy community focused on the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asia and now nine years in Australia’s Indian Ocean capital he is an expert on key strategic relationships in the broader Indo-Pacific. He has authored many scholarly and policy studies on security developments in the region, and their policy implications for the US and its regional partners.

Since establishing the Centre in 2014, Professor Flake has worked to build stronger international relationships between Australia, the US and the broader Indo-Pacific. He has led the growth of several major international conferences in Australia and the region; and established a range of high-level diplomatic and policy dialogues on issues of shared concern for the Indo-Pacific.

Professor Flake is a sought-after media commentator, particularly on strategic developments in the Indo-Pacific and change order issues to do with US politics and foreign policy. His work has appeared in many leading international outlets, including the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, as well as across the Australian media landscape.

Professor Flake holds a number of strategic leadership roles. He is a Governor of the American Chamber of Commerce in Australia (AmCham) and serves on the board of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. He is a member of the Australian “Friends of Vietnam” group and a member of the international advisory board of the David M. Kennedy Centre at Brigham Young University.

Prior to joining the Centre, he was the Executive Director of the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation, an Associate Director of the Program on Conflict Resolution at The Atlantic Council of the United States, and Director for Research and Academic Affairs at the Korea Economic Institute of America.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts (Korean) and Master of Arts (International and Area Studies) from Brigham Young University. He speaks both fluent Korean and Laotian.