North Korean Economy Watch

Daily NK
Yang Jung A
1/18/2007

On the 9th, a Japanese broadcast “tv asahi” exposed footages of drug smuggling at a boarder station between North Korea and China.

The footage caught a North Korean dealer crossing the Tumen River via a tube. On meeting a female Chinese dealer, the North Korean dealer unraveled a pink package which contained an envelope written “Opium powder” in red.

The drug seems to have been manufactured at “Ranam pharmaceutical factory.” This factory is known for its manufacture of mediocre drugs. Although opium is normally supposed to be packaged as medication, it is common that the drug falls into the hands of smugglers.

The moment the Chinese dealer gets hold of the package, she confirms the quality of the drug and hands over Chinese currency. The North Korean dealer counts the money and scurries back over to North Korea. It was agreed that additional dealings would be made via the telephone.

The transaction that was made on this day was 8~9 bags, each containing 100g of opium. 

As the international community continues to enforce its regulations against drugs and counterfeit dollars, drugs dealings have taken effect in North Korea with increasing illegal trades occurring between China and North Korea, the broadcast claimed. In addition, the number of drug addicts in North Korea is also on the rise.

The footage also captured the North Korean drug dealers sniffing the drugs as well as the dealers talking about the transaction. Of the dealers, one person was a worker managing the level of humidity at a manufacturing factory and seemingly the intermediary supplier who obtained the drugs.

It seems that the 3~4 people sitting in a circle are personally testing the quality of the drugs before purchase. Although the dealer’s child has entered the room, the buyers continue to inhale the drugs.

The woman who seems to be buying the drugs in this footage, scrupulously inhales the drug as if her body was very accustomed to it.

The woman showed signs of drug addiction murmuring “I’m so used to it (taking drugs). My hardest moment was when I was in custody. If I can’t sniff any drugs, my nose is runny and my head spins.”

Also, she suggested that drug addiction had spread throughout North Korea “It has spread from the top, right to the bottom.”

As the dealers need to give bribes to the border guards, a deposit is first received then the balance paid after the goods given.

Comments were also made on the distribution of the latest drugs. The latest drug, blue in color is made naturally and is much more effective than the original, so is very popular amongst the rich.

Of the people there, one man was acting as the link to the boarder patrol, whereas the remaining people examined the issue of reliable Chinese buyers.

The first footage exclusive of North Koreans communally taking drugs was exposed in Korea by the DailyNK in October 2005.

Yonhap
1/15/2007

International aid for North Korea has increased over the past few months, but is still far behind the amount needed to help the country in its recovery efforts, the U.N. World Food Program (WFP) said Monday.

A tally as of Sunday showed the relief agency received slightly more than US$16.25 million in assistance from donor nations, up from $12.7 million in November. But the total accounts for only 15.9 percent of the $102 million the WFP says it needs for its protracted relief and recovery operation (PRRO) in North Korea.

In November, the WFP received 12.43 percent of the target amount.

Russia remained the biggest nation donor with $5 million, putting up 4.9 percent of the desired aid.

Switzerland increased its offer to $2.57 million from $2.2 million in November, and Ireland to $640,000 from $319,000.

The collected assistance includes $2.3 million carried over from the previous operation.

Private donations stayed the same at $8,470, while multilateral donation increased from $1.2 million to $1.9 million.

The WFP has been the main organizer of food aid to North Korea who, for the last decade, have depended on international handouts to feed its people. Pyongyang asked the relief agency to leave at the end of 2005, so the WFP now maintains a low-scale presence and has switched its efforts from food to development and reconstruction projects.

South Korean civic organizations and informed sources say there is now a contagion of infectious diseases like scarlet fever and typhoid in North Korea.

Kyodo
1/14/2007

Song Il Ho, the North Korean envoy in charge of normalizing relations with Japan, demanded in a recent meeting with a senior Japanese lawmaker that Japan lift a ban on a North Korean ferry service to a Japanese port on humanitarian grounds, informed sources said Sunday.

In a meeting with Taku Yamasaki of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party who visited Pyongyang last week, Song said, “There are people who can no longer travel to and from Japan even if they want to,” according to the sources.

“Humanitarian problems must be removed immediately,” Song was quoted as saying. Japan has banned entry by the North Korean passenger-cargo ferry Mangyongbong-92 as part of its sanctions against the North following its missile launches into the Sea of Japan in July.

Song also said Japan’s trade sanctions against the North after its first nuclear test in October is hurting sales of clams and matsutake mushrooms, according to the sources.

“We are faced with difficulty selling clams and mushrooms,” Song was quoted as saying. He also said Japan’s economic sanctions “have not been effective.”

The sources said Yamasaki was served cuisine featuring matsutake and Song told him, “I feel pity for the Japanese who can no longer eat delicious clams and matsutake” and implicitly requested that Japan lift the trade embargo against North Korea.

Returning to Japan from a five-day visit to Pyongyang until Saturday, senior LDP lawmaker Yamasaki also said on a TV Asahi program Sunday that North Korea denied it abducted Kyoko Matsumoto, a woman the Japanese government added last year to a list of Japanese nationals abducted by the North.

Yamasaki quoted Song as saying, “Several years ago, the Japanese government made an inquiry. After investigations, we found that no such person existed.”

Matsumoto, who disappeared from Tottori Prefecture in 1977 at age 29, was added to the list of abductees as the 17th victim in November. The abduction of Japanese nationals has been one of the major sticking points in the normalization of ties between Japan and North Korea.

Yamasaki visited Pyongyang despite the Japanese government’s urging not to do so when it is imposing economic sanctions against North Korea. The visit was also seen by some as paving the way for former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to make his third trip to the country.

On that point, Yamasaki said, “I personally think it would be nice if the trip is realized but nothing definite was made this time.”

Yamasaki said China is raising hopes that the United States and North Korea will meet later this month to discuss U.S. financial sanctions against the North.

Yamasaki said he met with Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei on Tuesday and Wu made a remark to that effect.

Korea Times
Lee Jin-woo
1/11/2007

Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said Thursday that some 40 small factories, mostly clothing manufacturers, will move into the joint industrial complex in North Korea this year.

But he said it would take more time for the ministry to fully resume the halted expansion of the Kaesong Industrial Complex.

Last September, the South Korean government decided to hold off expanding the inter-Korean business venture because of heightened tension on the Korean Peninsula after the North’s launching of ballistic missiles in July. After the Stalinist state’s first-ever nuclear test on Oct. 9, tensions increased further.

“We’ve decided not to postpone helping small South Korean manufacturers, which have been struggling with adverse domestic business conditions, especially high wages,” Lee said during a press briefing at the ministry.

The manufacturing companies will move into a new five-story building constructed by the state-run Korea Industrial Complex Corp. involved in a pilot project for the industrial complex.

Construction of the building will be completed by June. It is not related to the postponed sale of the second section of the industrial complex, the minister said.

The number of North Koreans working for the 18 South Korean firms at the industrial complex surpassed 10,000 last year.

When fully expanded by 2012, the complex is expected to house about 2,000 South Korean manufacturers employing about half a million North Koreans, according to the Ministry of Unification.

The minister, however, said more progress in the stalled six-party talks is necessary for the government to resume expansion of the project.

He said he will continue discussing the matter with the Korea Land Corp., a state-run land developer, which has been involved in the Kaesong project, and Hyundai Asan, the business arm of Hyundai Group that handles the Mt. Kumgang tourism project.

Lee said the government would not provide medical aid to the Stalinist state to help stem the spread of scarlet fever, an infectious disease.

“Scarlet fever is not a fatal infectious disease. Given the significance of the disease, we believe that North Korea itself will be able to solve the problem,” Lee said.

The ministry considered providing medical aid to the North after scarlet fever broke out in the northern part of North Korea last October.

Earlier, South Korean humanitarian aid groups shipped 36 types of medicine including penicillin and other antibiotics to Pyongyang.

Asia Times
1/10/2007
Ting-I Tsai

North Korea’s nuclear test has been a hot topic among analysts around the world. But inside the isolated Stalinist state, getting a hold of a pair of running shoes, a bicycle or a television set is still what most excites ordinary citizens.

And Chinese businesses continue to cash in on these material desires by selling goods manufactured at home or in North Korea at prices higher than their quality justifies, sparking much criticism.

When Pyongyang publicized its intention to initiate economic reforms in July 2002, most people had doubts about how far the policy would be taken. Four years later, the regime is still struggling to implement its reforms, but it has at least partly satisfied some of the daily demands of citizens by allowing more Chinese products to be manufactured in North Korea and more Chinese goods to be imported.

Shoes, bicycles, TV sets, beverages and clothes made in China or by Chinese companies in North Korea are helping to satisfy demand, but some disreputable Chinese companies are ruining their country’s reputation by dumping factory seconds and damaged goods on the market.

Over decades of isolation, North Koreans have been suffering not just from food shortages, but from a scarcity of basic consumer goods. In past years, Pyongyang has reportedly asked the South Korean government to donate thousands of tons of soap and clothes, as well as material for the production of 60 million pairs of shoes. In a visit to Pyongyang in November, products such as Colgate toothbrushes, toothpaste and a Japanese facial cleaner were carefully displayed in glass cases bearing price tags equivalent to US$2.60-$5.90, well beyond the financial reach of all but a few North Koreans.

After years of studying China’s experiences, Pyongyang is now gearing up to solicit foreign investment and advanced technologies to modernize its decades-old manufacturing base.

Supply and demand
“Because the supply can’t satisfy the demand, prices of most of the Chinese products simply soar in the North Korean market,” said Su Xiangzhong, chairman of a Tianjin company that founded a beverage-manufacturing joint venture, Lungjin, with a North Korean.

Trade between the two countries increased by 35.4% in 2004, followed by a 35.2% increase in 2005. By the end of October 2006, bilateral trade had reached $1.38 billion, a 4% increase over 2005.

Beijing-based Winner International Industries Ltd was one of the Chinese companies that foresaw North Korea’s consumption potential in 2000. By then, the company had co-founded a joint-venture running-shoe and clothing-manufacturing presence in North Korea. With advanced machinery from Taiwan, its shoe-manufacturing division is now capable of producing 8 million pairs of running shoes, according to an official from the company, who declined to identify himself. The clothing-manufacturing division, he said, has been a supplier to South Korean and Japanese companies. However, he added that orders from the two countries had recently decreased for unknown reasons.

Leather shoes for soldiers are of high quality, but they are not available to the average person. In Pyongyang shops catering exclusively to foreigners, a pair of leather shoes could cost as much as $326. The North Korean government is still soliciting foreign investment and purchasing shoemaking equipment via Chinese companies.

To get around in a country with underdeveloped public transportation, getting a pair of shoes is not enough. Taking advantage of that situation, Tianjin’s Digital Co started making bicycles in Pyongyang in October 2005, after the North Koreans agreed to let the Chinese take a 51% controlling share in the joint venture, virtually a monopoly, for 20 years.

It is estimated that the nation’s demand for bicycles is about 7 million, according to the Chinese media. The company now manufactures some 40 models and 60,000 bicycles annually, with the most popular model costing $26. In coming years, it plans to produce 300,000 bicycles annually and construct another three bicycle plants.

Aside from daily necessities, there are few entertainment options for North Koreans, which means there is a high demand for TV sets. Nanjing Panda, a TV maker, appeared to be the only Chinese company to foresee the emergence of the North Korean market when it invested $1.3 million there in 2002. After four years of operation, its 17-inch black-and-white and 21-inch color TV sets are reportedly the hottest items available in Pyongyang. With Panda products beginning to dominate the local market, it is becoming increasingly difficult for others to import TV sets into North Korea, according to Chinese business people.

The Panda joint venture is now digging up another potential gold mine by manufacturing personal computers (PCs) in North Korea.

In 2003, Chinese non-financial investments in North Korea amounted to just $1.12 million. That total, however, soared to $14.13 million in 2004, and reportedly reached $53.69 million in 2005. According to the Chinese media, there are now about 200 Chinese investment projects operating in North Korea. A Pyongyang-based foreign businessman described the Chinese investors as “by far the largest group by country doing business there, in all kinds of fields – plus they are from one of the few countries with the protection and representation of a big embassy”.

In March 2005, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao signed an investment-protection agreement with his North Korean counterpart, and the two nations inked five bilateral economic-cooperation agreements between 2002 and 2005.

During North Korean leader Kim Jong-il’s visit to China last January, Wen introduced new economic-cooperation guidelines.

Despite these positive moves, controversy over the role of Chinese businesses has emerged. A Pyongyang-based Western businessman suggested that quite a few disreputable companies “go there with the intention of getting rid of old or damaged goods they can’t sell in China, and rip off North Koreans, who have no way to get their money back”.

“Also, a lot of fake goods come from China,” he added.

Still, more and more Chinese business people are rushing to Pyongyang. Su Xiangzhong, chairman of a Tianjin-based company, noted that his firm is creating a new beverage brand, like China’s Wahaha, in Pyongyang. North Koreans are also very interested in cooperating with Chinese enterprises in manufacturing and mining.

Chinese-made clothes for women and children, low-end and generic-brand household products and sundries, color TVs and PCs are popular products in North Korea.

Li Jingke, a Dandong-based Chinese businessman who runs the China-DPR Korea Small Investor Association, suggested that natural-resource exploitation and manufacturing are the best industries for foreigners to invest in, adding that more investment-friendly policies would likely be introduced in April. By then, he said, Chinese business people might need to become more concerned about unprofessional conduct.

“When North Korea introduces more liberalized policies, competent companies from everywhere will enter the market, which would likely eliminate the existence of those Chinese businessmen who don’t have modern commercial ideas in mind,” Li said.

Asia Times
Ting-I Tsai
1/10/2007

North Korea’s nuclear test has been a hot topic among analysts around the world. But inside the isolated Stalinist state, getting a hold of a pair of running shoes, a bicycle or a television set is still what most excites ordinary citizens.

And Chinese businesses continue to cash in on these material desires by selling goods manufactured at home or in North Korea at prices higher than their quality justifies, sparking much criticism.

When Pyongyang publicized its intention to initiate economic reforms in July 2002, most people had doubts about how far the policy would be taken. Four years later, the regime is still struggling to implement its reforms, but it has at least partly satisfied some of the daily demands of citizens by allowing more Chinese products to be manufactured in North Korea and more Chinese goods to be imported.

Shoes, bicycles, TV sets, beverages and clothes made in China or by Chinese companies in North Korea are helping to satisfy demand, but some disreputable Chinese companies are ruining their country’s reputation by dumping factory seconds and damaged goods on the market.

Over decades of isolation, North Koreans have been suffering not just from food shortages, but from a scarcity of basic consumer goods. In past years, Pyongyang has reportedly asked the South Korean government to donate thousands of tons of soap and clothes, as well as material for the production of 60 million pairs of shoes. In a visit to Pyongyang in November, products such as Colgate toothbrushes, toothpaste and a Japanese facial cleaner were carefully displayed in glass cases bearing price tags equivalent to US$2.60-$5.90, well beyond the financial reach of all but a few North Koreans.

After years of studying China’s experiences, Pyongyang is now gearing up to solicit foreign investment and advanced technologies to modernize its decades-old manufacturing base.

Supply and demand
“Because the supply can’t satisfy the demand, prices of most of the Chinese products simply soar in the North Korean market,” said Su Xiangzhong, chairman of a Tianjin company that founded a beverage-manufacturing joint venture, Lungjin, with a North Korean.

Trade between the two countries increased by 35.4% in 2004, followed by a 35.2% increase in 2005. By the end of October 2006, bilateral trade had reached $1.38 billion, a 4% increase over 2005.

Beijing-based Winner International Industries Ltd was one of the Chinese companies that foresaw North Korea’s consumption potential in 2000. By then, the company had co-founded a joint-venture running-shoe and clothing-manufacturing presence in North Korea. With advanced machinery from Taiwan, its shoe-manufacturing division is now capable of producing 8 million pairs of running shoes, according to an official from the company, who declined to identify himself. The clothing-manufacturing division, he said, has been a supplier to South Korean and Japanese companies. However, he added that orders from the two countries had recently decreased for unknown reasons.

Leather shoes for soldiers are of high quality, but they are not available to the average person. In Pyongyang shops catering exclusively to foreigners, a pair of leather shoes could cost as much as $326. The North Korean government is still soliciting foreign investment and purchasing shoemaking equipment via Chinese companies.

To get around in a country with underdeveloped public transportation, getting a pair of shoes is not enough. Taking advantage of that situation, Tianjin’s Digital Co started making bicycles in Pyongyang in October 2005, after the North Koreans agreed to let the Chinese take a 51% controlling share in the joint venture, virtually a monopoly, for 20 years.

It is estimated that the nation’s demand for bicycles is about 7 million, according to the Chinese media. The company now manufactures some 40 models and 60,000 bicycles annually, with the most popular model costing $26. In coming years, it plans to produce 300,000 bicycles annually and construct another three bicycle plants.

Aside from daily necessities, there are few entertainment options for North Koreans, which means there is a high demand for TV sets. Nanjing Panda, a TV maker, appeared to be the only Chinese company to foresee the emergence of the North Korean market when it invested $1.3 million there in 2002. After four years of operation, its 17-inch black-and-white and 21-inch color TV sets are reportedly the hottest items available in Pyongyang. With Panda products beginning to dominate the local market, it is becoming increasingly difficult for others to import TV sets into North Korea, according to Chinese business people.

The Panda joint venture is now digging up another potential gold mine by manufacturing personal computers (PCs) in North Korea.

In 2003, Chinese non-financial investments in North Korea amounted to just $1.12 million. That total, however, soared to $14.13 million in 2004, and reportedly reached $53.69 million in 2005. According to the Chinese media, there are now about 200 Chinese investment projects operating in North Korea. A Pyongyang-based foreign businessman described the Chinese investors as “by far the largest group by country doing business there, in all kinds of fields – plus they are from one of the few countries with the protection and representation of a big embassy”.

In March 2005, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao signed an investment-protection agreement with his North Korean counterpart, and the two nations inked five bilateral economic-cooperation agreements between 2002 and 2005.

During North Korean leader Kim Jong-il’s visit to China last January, Wen introduced new economic-cooperation guidelines.

Despite these positive moves, controversy over the role of Chinese businesses has emerged. A Pyongyang-based Western businessman suggested that quite a few disreputable companies “go there with the intention of getting rid of old or damaged goods they can’t sell in China, and rip off North Koreans, who have no way to get their money back”.

“Also, a lot of fake goods come from China,” he added.

Still, more and more Chinese business people are rushing to Pyongyang. Su Xiangzhong, chairman of a Tianjin-based company, noted that his firm is creating a new beverage brand, like China’s Wahaha, in Pyongyang. North Koreans are also very interested in cooperating with Chinese enterprises in manufacturing and mining.

Chinese-made clothes for women and children, low-end and generic-brand household products and sundries, color TVs and PCs are popular products in North Korea.

Li Jingke, a Dandong-based Chinese businessman who runs the China-DPR Korea Small Investor Association, suggested that natural-resource exploitation and manufacturing are the best industries for foreigners to invest in, adding that more investment-friendly policies would likely be introduced in April. By then, he said, Chinese business people might need to become more concerned about unprofessional conduct.

“When North Korea introduces more liberalized policies, competent companies from everywhere will enter the market, which would likely eliminate the existence of those Chinese businessmen who don’t have modern commercial ideas in mind,” Li said.

Joong Ang Daily
Choi Hyung-kyu
1/5/2007

A North Korean cargo ship detained here last October for safety violations is apparently going to be released within a few days, according to remarks by the ship’s captain.

The seafarer, who refused to give his name, told a reporter Wednesday that he expected to sail his ship, the Kang Nam, back to North Korea in two or three days.

An official at the ship’s agency here, Topping Enterprise, said the payment for repairs required to meet Hong Kong safety standards had been received recently, allowing port officials to release the ship.

Unsaid by either the captain or the agent was that the underlying reason for the ship’s detention in the first place was a search for contraband. The decision to search the ship was in line with recent United Nations sanctions on shipments by North Korea of sensitive military or nuclear-related cargo.

The sanctions also include a ban on trade in luxury goods with North Korea.

Seoul has been urged to join a U.S.-led effort to tighten enforcement of the ban on those types of North Korean international commerce, but has refused for fear of further straining North-South Korea relations.

The ship’s captain refused to say whether his ship had been searched for material prohibited under the terms of the UN sanctions resolution, but was defiant in sending a political message.

“The world is clamping down on us, but we can overcome that. I hope that the two Koreas can reconcile, and let’s hope that in the new year things similar to this will not happen again,” he said.

The ship’s crew had been fed by the vessel’s Hong Kong agents during their enforced stay tied up to a dock in this capitalist mecca, but had refused any other kind of outside help while in port.

The cost of the necessary repairs and port charges for the 70-day stay were estimated at about $40,000.

Yonhap:
Hong Kong detains second N. Korean ship in week for safety violations
10/27/2006

Hong Kong’s marine inspectors have detained another North Korean cargo ship this week for safety violations, officials said Friday.

The officials from the Hong Kong Customs and Marine Department said the North Korean vessel, Kang Nam 5, has been barred from leaving the port after its inspectors found about a dozen safety violations Thursday. Details of the suspected violations were not available.

The vessel was the second North Korean cargo ship detained in Hong Kong this week after a 2,000-ton freighter, Kang Nam 1, was placed under detention Monday for 25 reported safety violations, including faulty navigational and fire-fighting equipment and outdated nautical charts.

The measures prompted wide speculations whether Hong Kong, or China, was beginning to put pressure on nuclear-armed North Korea as they followed a U.N. Security Council resolution that calls on countries to inspect cargo leaving or arriving in the communist North to prevent transfer of any equipment, material and items related to missile or weapons of mass destruction programs.

The Hong Kong inspectors dismissed such speculations, saying the detentions were the result of their routine inspections.

“The decision to detain the North Korean ship is part of routine procedures based on port safety regulations,” the Hong Kong government said.

Including the Kang Nam 5, seven North Korean vessels have been detained this year, mostly for safety violations, according to the officials. A total of 10 North Korean ships have been inspected this year.

The latest North Korean ship to undergo safety inspections arrived without cargo, according to the officials.

Korea Times
1/5/2007

North Korea finished constructing a hospital ward for patients with bird flu and other contagious diseases with financial support from the World Health Organization (WHO), a media report said Sunday.

The WHO had been helping North Korea to build the isolation ward inside a Pyongyang hospital since June, said the Chosun Sinbo, published by the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan.

In early 2005, North Korea reported an outbreak of avian influenza at several chicken farms in Pyongyang and asked for help from the international community.

“As part of preventive measures against the spread of contagious diseases, this ward was constructed in cooperation with the WHO,’’ the pro-Pyongyang newspaper said.

The report, however, did not give details on when the hospital ward would open officially.

According to the newspaper’s earlier reports, the isolation ward in Songsin Hospital will be a single-floor building with eight rooms covering 695 square meters of land.

Korea Times
1/4/2007

The number of inter-Korean cross-border visits climbed 15.1 percent last year from a year earlier despite escalating tensions over North Korea’s test-fire of missiles and the underground detonation of nuclear devices, the Ministry of Unification said Thursday.
A total of 101,708 South and North Koreans visited each other’s country, compared with 88,341 in 2005, according to the ministry.

It said the number did not include South Korean tourists to scenic Mt. Kumgang in the North. Last year, 234,446 South Koreans traveled to the mountain resort, down 21.4 percent from 2005.

The ministry said that 100,838 South Koreans visited the North, while 870 North Koreans visited the South.

It added that the increasing inter-Korean economic exchanges drew 87,845 South Korean visits to the North.

The inter-Korean trade volume jumped 27.8 percent year-on-year to $1.3 billion last year, according to the ministry.

According to DPRK Studies, Jean Baptiste Kim, Administrator for Voice of Korea and organizer for “rock for peace” has resigned his DPRK related activities and written a resignation letter that pulls no punches.  He denounces the regime, but also endorses opening up trade as a means of bringing the most social change:

[L]arge scale of regular free trade at national level will make ordinary people awaken from internal darkness because they will taste the differences from outside world. The regime will be unable to control people when people are massively moving forward to make money for themselves. Do not threat them. It only makes them be cautious and this kind of tension only drive ordinary people fall into the famine and death. Let them trade freely and legally. I dare to say that they will never go back to the past when start to make money. The solution is not GUN but MONEY but do not give them money but allow them make money by themselves.

Full text of the resignation letter is posted on DPRK studies.

Additionally, the Voice of Korea web site is down.

Part 1 from the First Post:
11/14/2006
Joe Mackertich

Billed as “Rock for Peace”, the event is an attempt to promote the values and stability of North Korea. “We are not a mad, isolated country. We are part of an ordinary world, just like yourselves,” organisers told The First Post.

The decision to invite bands to play “western, capitalist” music was designed to change people’s perception of the Hermit Kingdom.

What it will resemble musically is anyone’s guess as no bands have yet been confirmed and anyone who accepts the invitation will have to refrain from mentioning war, sex, violence, drugs, imperialism or “anti-socialism”. Despite these strictures, the organisers hope to attract rock musicians such as Eric Clapton, U2 and – most surprising, given their redneck credentials – Lynyrd Skynyrd.

If the Rock for Peace festival is a success, there is talk of making it a regular occurrence and even staging the next one in the DMZ (demilitarised zone) between North and South Korea, the most heavily guarded border on earth.

Part 2: Voice of Korea
Here is a blurb from their website (bold added by NKEW):

There are few restrictions and conditions on participation but any band will be considered even though you are from USA. The lyrics should not contain admirations on war, sex, violence, murder, drug, rape, non-governmental society, imperialism, colonialism, racism, anti-DPRK, and anti-socialism. The concert will be held from May 01 to May 04, 2007 under the management of Voice of Korea. We currently received requests of 54 bands from 20 countries and participations are increasing every week. ‘ROCK FOR PEACE’ will be the 2007 version of Woodstock rock festival in 1969 but in a different location and with a different goal, We welcome every musician as long as they are purely music based without political intentions. Every band is financially responsible for their own trips to/from and staying in DPRK but we will offer sightseeing in many different places including DMZ, mountains, rivers, monuments, etc,,. Your musical instruments and related equipments, except passengers, will be transported at free of charge. If any band need confirmation letter from us in order to get sponsors, please do not hesitate to ask.