Friday Grab Bag: Anju, UN, pr, app
Anju’s outdoor market
Voice of America published a series of photos from inside the DPRK. Many of the pictures are from Anju. Looking through them, I saw this outdoor market of which I was unaware. It did not, however, take too long to find it on Google Earth. The coordinates of the outdoor market are 39.623199°, 125.680848°. Anju and nearby Sinanju both also have one covered market each. Lots of shoes for sale.
UN Conference on Disarmament
The winner of the “rolling eyes” award this week goes to the announcement that the DPRK has been named to the presidency of the United Nations Conference on Disarmament. According to the official press release:
In his initial address to the Conference as president, So Se Pyong of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea said that he was very much committed to the Conference and during his presidency he welcomed any sort of constructive proposals that strengthened the work and credibility of the body. He was ready to work closely with all members to provide the grounds for strengthening their work. As president, he would be guided by the Rules of Procedure and take into account the position of each delegation to find common ground on substantive issues and procedural matters as well. With their support and cooperation, he would do everything in his capacity to move the Conference on Disarmament forward.
I am sure you can think of some recommendations for him!
Canada has since boycotted the committee (2011-7-11).
How to Generate Good Press: Write it
This week the Wall Street Journal’s Korea Real Time had a great post about the North Korean proclivity to purchase advert space in foreign publications and then report “favorable coverage” to the people back home. ”See how much foreigners envy us and out leader[s]“?!
Paying for space in Blitz actually represents something of an economy drive for the Pyongyang publicity machine. Back in 1997, as famine gripped the land, the regime shelled out for some pricier real estate: a full page in the New York Times. That allowed the KCNA to boast that the U.S. newspaper of record had “dedicated one whole page to a special writeup under the title ‘Kim Jong Il Emerges As Lodestar For Sailing the 21st Century’”—with, as the KCNA noted, a large color picture.
Here are five stories from KCNA citing praise in the New York Times: KCNA 1, KCNA 2, KCNA 3, KCNA 4, KCNA 5. As far as I can tell, the DPRK has never advertised in the Wall Street Journal. Wouldn’t that be something.
DPRK: There’s an app for that
Martyn Williams writes about Eric Lafforgue’s new iPhone app featuring his pics of the DPRK. His photo set is here. Now all we need is a Kernbeisser iPhone app.
