Open Sources
John Everard, who served as British ambassador to Pyongyang for two and half years from February 2006 […] told a seminar hosted by Korea Economic Institute of America in Washington that rice in sacks with labels marked “Republic of (South) Korea” or “World Food Program” was traded openly at black markets in North Korea. Food that South Korea and international aid organizations gave to the North are traded in black markets after being embezzled by those in power, including the Kim Jong Il family and power elites of the ruling Workers’ Party and military, rather than being distributed to North Koreans. This means the North`s power elite has been reaping double profits by taking advantage of the hunger of its impoverished people.
The U.S.-based broadcaster Radio Free Asia quoted Wednesday an American businessman with good knowledge of the North`s situation as saying many North Koreans are aware of the protests in Egypt because mobile phones are rapidly spreading information from the outside world. He also said North Korean officials overseas talk about the situation in Egypt to their relatives or friends in the North, with the news spreading via mobile phones.
Let me know if you can find the original RFA story, because I couldn’t. I wonder if what role the Orascom phone network in North Korea is playing in the spread of this information, or whether this only involves those illicit phones that piggyback on the Chinese networks near the border.
Kim Sang-hun, an activist on North Korean human rights, stood before a surprisingly large crowd on Jan. 29 at the Ilmin Art Center in downtown Seoul where the documentary “Kimjongilia” was screened. “What you saw in the documentary is only the surface (of the brutality by the North Korean regime against its people),” he said.
Read the rest here.
Funny, they don’t look Jewish (ht to James).