The Accidental Further Adventures of the Hundred-Year-Old Man

USA, North Korea

The new president of the United States had been forced to fire his security advisor after it turned out the advisor was a security risk. Beyond this, his focus during the initial period of his presidency was to try to get the media to shape up. It was going so-so.

As a result it was basically a welcome interruption for President Trump when the Supreme Leader in Pyongyang allowed four mid-range Pukguksong-2 missiles to be fired five hundred kilometres straight out into the Sea of Japan.

On the initiative of the United States, Japan and South Korea, the UN Security Council was convened, and it soon unanimously condemned the North Korean test. The American ambassador to the UN commented that ‘It is time to hold North Korea accountable – not with our words, but with our actions.’ What those actions might be, she was happy to hand over to the president, who in turn tweeted a number of suggestions.

It so happened that little Sweden was a member of the aforementioned Security Council that year. Margot Wallström, Sweden’s minister for foreign affairs, was known for her outspokenness and enterprising nature. It was said, but not confirmed, that Benjamin Netanyahu had a picture of her on his office wall in Jerusalem and liked to throw darts at it each time he needed to work out his frustrations. This was because Sweden, on the urging of Margot Wallström, had upped and recognized the state of Palestine. A state without borders, without a functioning government and, as Netanyahu and others saw it, a state full of terrorists.

But Wallström persisted. And now, on the Security Council, she aimed high. Among her colleagues she promoted the idea that she should personally visit Pyongyang to establish a direct line of contact with the leader about the serious nature of things, as a representative of both Sweden and the UN Security Council. The visit must first be sanctioned by North Korea, and it must be completely unofficial. A high-level diplomatic game, but also a serious attempt to tone down the war rhetoric coming from both sides.

No Western country had as genuine a diplomatic relationship with North Korea as Sweden did. The Security Council gave Wallström the green light. All that remained was to convince the Supreme Leader to do the same.

If Torsten Lövenstierna had been an athlete, he would have been world-renowned and a multi-millionaire. But instead he was a diplomat, so no one had ever heard of him.

During his nearly thirty years in the Swedish foreign service, he had quietly performed his highly qualified services in Egypt, Iraq, Turkey and Afghanistan. Among his merits were a posting to the UN in New York, being a special advisor during the Iraq inspection, taking on a leadership role in Mazar-e Sharif, and serving as the Swedish consul general in Istanbul.

What Torsten Lövenstierna didn’t know about advanced diplomacy wasn’t worth knowing. Now he was Sweden’s ambassador in Pyongyang, perhaps the most complicated embassy posting of all.

According to some, he was a genius. Whatever, it was this man who had received the delicate task of bringing the North Koreans onto the track of discreet arbitration.

World peace was on the line. Torsten Lövenstierna prepared himself meticulously, as always. Following his preparations he requested, and was granted, an audience with the Supreme Leader. The ambassador wasn’t nervous – he’d been around far too long for that – but he was incredibly focused.

With great precision, deploying the right word at exactly the right moment, he conveyed the UN’s argument for why quiet arbitration in Pyongyang would be in the best interest of the aforementioned world peace. He was so skilled at his job that he managed to finish his speech without being interrupted even once. What Torsten Lövenstierna accomplished in front of the Supreme Leader was nothing other than a feat of diplomacy.

When he had finished, he expressed thanks for being allowed to take up the leader’s precious time, then awaited a response.

The leader looked the star diplomat in the eye and said, ‘A secret peace summit? Here? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.’

And with that, the audience was over.

‘Then I ask permission to withdraw,’ said Ambassador Lövenstierna, backing out of the Supreme Leader’s gigantic office.

And that would probably have been the end of that. If it weren’t for Allan Karlsson.