North Korean Economy Watch

Over the last couple of decades, Pyongyang has shown a callous reluctance to part with its foreign currency reserves to acquire the necessary amount of food needed to sustain its population.  The DPRK government has, however, promoted a number of domestic initiatives, some financed locally and others with international assistance, intended to boost regional food security (and decrease individual mobility) which have cost it little in the way of scarce foreign currency. Some of these projects have been previously documented on this web page: The construction of regional fish and fruit farms, as well as large-scale land rezoning, land-reclamation (and here), and sea-scaping projects.

Today the Russian media reports yet another clever idea the North Koreans are pursuing to increase domestic food production: renting farmland in Eastern Russia.  According to RIA Novosti:

A delegation from North Korea, which is facing severe food shortages, has held talks with authorities of the Amur region in Russia’s Far East on leasing land to grow vegetables and grain, a regional official said on Thursday.

North Korea plans to rent several hundred thousand hectares of land in the Amur region, which has about 200,000 hectares of idle land in regional, municipal or private ownership.

“The North Korean authorities are planning an unprecedented agricultural project – to create a farm in the Far East to grow soybeans, potatoes, corn and other crops. Everything that Korean citizens need, because the issue of food shortages there are acute from time to time due to land shortages,” the official told RIA Novosti.

North Korean state media said the country’s chronic food problems have been exacerbated by heavy rains in June and July. A tropical storm washed away or inundated 60,000 hectares of land in farm regions.

Amur region minister of foreign economic relations Igor Gorevoi said the land must not be abandoned.

“We are also interested in investment in farm machinery and equipment. Another key condition is that the newly-formed Korean company must be registered in the Amur region, which means tax revenue for the budget,” he said.

The initial lease of the land, which is to be auctioned off, amounts to 50 rubles ($1.70) a year per hectare.

The Korean delegation plans to consider the terms of the lease next week.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, whose country faces increasing international isolation because of its nuclear program, visited Russia in August in his own armored train on a rare foreign trip and had talks with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. Russia then promised to send 50,000 tons of grain to Pyongyang.

It will be interesting to see if this project can be realized.

Additional Information:

Kim Jong-il recently met Russian president Medvedev in this area.

Russia is sending 50,000 tons of grain to the DPRK in flood relief.

Read the full story here:
North Korea to rent farm land in Russia’s Far East
RIA Novosti
2011-9-1

UPDATE 12 (2011-8-31): The North Koreans have made a short documentary of Kim Jong-il’s trip to Russia.  I have uploaded it to YouTube in three parts: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.  The North Koreans published footage of Kim’s trip through China on the evening news (2011-8-30: Part 1, part 2, part 3) and in a separate documentary (2011-9-8: Part 1, part 2, part 3).

UPDATE 11 (2011-8-29): When Kim Jong-il returned to Pyongyang his trip was hailed as a success. A banquet was held for him and he attended a performance of the State Merited Chorus.  According to Yonhap:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il attended a banquet held to congratulate him on his “successful” recent visits to Russia and China, the North’s state media said Monday.

The banquet was hosted by the Central Military Commission of the ruling Workers’ Party and the National Defense Commission, according to a brief dispatch by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), monitored in Seoul. It did not mention where or when the event took place.

KCNA has a little more on the banquet here and the chorus here.

Afterwards, Kim Jong-il returned to his never-ending work for the people. Just as he did following his previous trip to China, Kim visited the construction site of the Huichon Power Station.

UPDATE 10 (2011-8-27): According to Yonhap, Kim Jong-il’s train has crossed back into the DPRK.  Given the information provided, it appears that Kim entered the DPRK via the railroad crossing at Manpo (Manpho, 만포).  See the bridge in Google Maps here. According to Yonhap:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il returned home by train Saturday, wrapping up a week-long trip to Russia and China, during which he discussed the resumption of stalled six-party talks on his country’s nuclear ambitions.

Kim’s special train was seen crossing into North Korea via the Chinese border city of Jian around 5 p.m. local time (6 p.m. Korean time). The train had left the northeastern Chinese city of Daqing on Friday evening and made a stop in the city of Tonghua on Saturday morning.

According to KCNA, Kim Jong-un and Kim Kyong-hui were there to welcome him.  Kim Jong-un played the same role on Kim’s previous trip to China in May.

UPDATE 9 (2011-8-26): While Kim travels in Russia and China, Yonhap reports a KCNA announcement that the DPRK and Russia signed a protocol calling for economic cooperation between the two countries.  According to the article:

A Russian economic delegation, led by Minister of Regional Development Viktor Basargin, was in North Korea to sign “a protocol of the 5th Meeting of the DPRK (North Korea)-Russia Intergovernmental Committee for Cooperation in Trade, Economy, Science and Technology,” the North’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.

Trade Minister Ri Ryong-nam inked the protocol on behalf of North Korea, said the KCNA report, monitored in Seoul.

The report did not give any details of the protocol.

Also on Friday, the North’s premier, Choe Yong-rim, met with the Russian economic delegation at the Mansudae Assembly Hall in Pyongyang, the KCNA said in a separate report.

UPDATE 8 (2011-8-26): Xinhua reports on Kim’s activities in China. According to the article:

Top leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) Kim Jong Il visited northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province on Friday at the company of Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo.

…

During his stay in Heilongjiang, Kim visited the cities of Qiqihar and Daqing. In Qiqihar, Kim toured Qier Machine Tool Group Co., a large state-owned enterprise, and Mengniu Dairy, a leading Chinese dairy producer. In Daqing, he toured an urban planning exhibition hall and a residential district.

“I’ve seen new changes every time I came here,” he said. He wished that China would smoothly realize the goals set in its 12th Five-year Plan under the leadership of the CPC.

KCNA has a rather long (erm…detailed) update on Kim’s visit to China. Here is the report for August 25th:

He passed through the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region of China on August 25.

He arrived in Manzhouli of the region, the border railway station, that afternoon.

When the train pulled in the railway station, he was warmly greeted by Wang Jiarui, Sheng Guangzu, Hu Chunhua, secretary of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Regional Party Committee, Fu Taizeng, secretary general of the autonomous regional party committee, Luo Zhihu, secretary of the Hulun Buir City Party Committee, the mayor of Hulun Buir City, the secretary of the Manzhouli City Party Committee and other central and regional senior officials of China.

He exchanged cordial greetings with the senior officials present to greet him and had a talk with them.

Wang Jiarui said he was specially dispatched to conduct Kim Jong Il who is passing through Northeast China in the whole period of his visit upon the authorization of the collective leadership of China including Hu Jintao. He paid highest tribute to Kim Jong Il for having made a great contribution to boosting the friendship among countries and accomplishing the human cause of independence through his energetic external activities.

Kim Jong Il thanked Wang Jiarui and other senior central and local officials and people for their warm reception.

He, conducted by senior party and government officials of the autonomous region, toured Hailar District, Hulun Buir City of the region.

Commanding a bird’s-eye view of the night scenery, he got familiar with the history and culture of the region and the achievements made by its people in construction.

The Inner Mongolian Autonomous Regional Committee of the CPC gave a grand banquet in honor of Kim Jong Il visiting the region.

When he appeared in the banquet hall, women of the Mongolian tribe of the autonomous region presented him with a blue silk towel and liquor according to the customs peculiar to the nation, warmly welcoming him.

Hu Chunhua said that today they welcomed Kim Jong Il to the vast steppe where President Kim Il Sung was accorded enthusiastic welcome several times long ago, thereby seeing the desire of the party, the government and the people of the autonomous region come true at last.

Hu Chunhua noted that the traditional Sino-DPRK friendship will remain ever-green like the vast steppe along with history, expressing firm belief that the friendly Korean people would make fresh success in the efforts to improve the standard of people’s living and build a prosperous and powerful nation.

A specially prepared art performance was given in honor of Kim Jong Il.

The performers clearly reflected the boundless respect and reverence of the government and the people of the region for Kim Jong Il visiting China again for the development of the Sino-DPRK friendship.

Kim Jong Il conveyed a floral basket to the performers in congratulation of their successful performance and had a photo taken with them.

He was presented with a gift by Hu Chunhua on behalf of the party committee of the autonomous region.

He expressed thanks for the warm reception and cordial hospitality accorded him by the party, government and people of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region. He hoped the people of the region would achieve a fresh victory in their struggle for the prosperity and development of the country under the leadership of the CPC.

Here is the KCNA report for August 26th:

Kim Jong Il passed through Heilongjiang Province of China on August 26.

He arrived in Qiqihar City, Heilongjiang Province that morning.

When the train pulled in Qiqihar Railway Station, he was warmly greeted by Ji Bingxuan, secretary of the Heilongjiang Provincial Party Committee, Wang Xiankui, governor of Heilongjiang Province, the secretary of the Qiqihar City Party Committee, the mayor of Qiqihar City and other senior party and government officials of the province and the city.

He exchanged warm greetings with the senior officials present to greet him and had a talk with them.

Ji Bingxuan said it is great honor and pride to welcome again to their place Kim Jong Il on a long foreign tour for friendship among countries and warmly welcomed him on behalf of the party, the government and the people of Heilongjiang Province.

Kim Jong Il visited the Qiqihar Machine Tool Group Co. No. 2 that day.

After being briefed on its history by a senior official of the group, he went round several production processes to acquaint himself with its production, technological development and management in detail.

Then he visited the Qiqihar Branch Company of the Mengniu Dairy.

He went round the general control room, milk tank, packing shop and the products on display and wished the company greater progress in its work for the improvement of the standard of people’s diet and welfare.

Kim Jong Il also visited Daqing City that day.

He visited the urban planning exhibition hall in Daqing City and was briefed on the urban construction and long-term plan. Then he went round the housing construction district, a large bridge, Lake Liming Bridge now under construction and other places in the province.

The provincial party committee gave a banquet that evening in honor of Kim Jong Il visiting the province.

He was present at the banquet on invitation.

Ji Bingxuan said that the historic visit paid by Kim Jong Il to Heilongjiang Province again after the lapse of the three months is a striking demonstration of the Sino-DPRK friendship growing stronger day by day, adding that the provincial party, government and people would join the Korean people in playing a greater role in inheriting and developing the Sino-DPRK friendship generation after generation.

A special art performance was given in welcome of Kim Jong Il.

The performers successfully represented the excitement and joy of the Chinese people at welcoming again Kim Jong Il to meaningful Northeast China.

Kim Jong Il conveyed a floral basket to the artistes in congratulation of their successful performance.

He was presented with a gift by the provincial party and people’s government that day in welcome of him visiting the province.

He expressed thanks for the warm reception and cordial hospitality accorded to him by the party, government and people of Heilongjiang Province. He hoped the people of the province would achieve a fresh victory in their struggle for the prosperity and development of the country under the leadership of the CPC.

Here is the KCNA report for August 27th:

He arrived in Tonghua City, Jilin Province that morning.

When the train pulled in Tonghua Railway Station, he was warmly greeted by Sun Zhengcai, secretary of the Jilin Provincial Party Committee, Wang Rulin, governor of Jilin Province, Liu Baowei, secretary of the Tonghua City Party Committee, Tian Yulin, mayor of Tonghua City, and other senior party and government officials of the province and the city.

He exchanged warm greetings with the officials present there to receive him and visited the Tonghua Wine Co. Ltd., conducted by them.

He recollected with deep emotion the noble footprints left by President Kim Il Sung who was absorbed in thinking and made inquiry for the sake of the country and its people only when visiting the company nearly half a century ago.

He went round various places including the wine depot, its exhibition hall to learn in detail about the history of the company and its production system, storage of products and its taste. He wished the company greater progress in its work for the well-being of the people.

The party and government of the province hosted a grand banquet in honor of Kim Jong Il visiting the province.

He was present there on invitation.

Sun Zhengcai said that it was particular privilege and honor for his province to receive Kim Jong Il, the great leader of the Korean people, three times in a little more than one year. He offered the highest regard and warm welcome to Kim Jong Il on behalf of the party, government and people of the province.

Noting that all the Chinese people including the people of the province are rejoiced as over their own over the successes made by the Korean people recently in their efforts to significantly commemorate the centenary of birth of Kim Il Sung, Sun Zhengcai expressed expectation and belief that the Korean people would surely win a shining victory in the drive for building a prosperous and powerful socialist nation under the leadership of the Workers’ Party of Korea headed by Kim Jong Il.

Sun noted that the party, government and people of the province would join the Korean people in playing a bigger role in inheriting and developing the Sino-DPRK friendship generation after generation.

An art performance was given in welcome of Kim Jong Il.

The performance replete with the warm feelings of the DPRK-China friendship was acclaimed by the audience.

He was presented with a gift by the provincial party and people’s government that day in welcome of his visit to the province.

He expressed thanks for the warm reception and cordial hospitality accorded to him by the party, government and people of Jilin Province. He wished them a fresh success in their efforts for the prosperity of the country and the well-being of its people under the leadership of the CPC.

He wrapped up his 8 000 km odd-long trip to the Far East and the Siberian regions of Russia and Northeast China and left for the homeland that day.

Before his departure, he exchanged warm farewell greetings with central leading officials including Wang Jiarui and Sheng Guangzu who conducted him with sincerity in the whole period of his visit and leading officials of the party and government of the province and the city including Sun Zhengcai and Wang Rulin.

When the train started from the border station, central and local leading officials of China warmly sent him off, waving their hands for a long while.

Passing through several cities and regions of China, he acquainted himself with construction projects, ideas and feelings, politics, economy, history, culture, etc. of the Chinese people more deeply and conducted unremitting and energetic external activities, making another great contribution to the development of the DPRK-China friendship.

UPDATE 7 (2011-8-25/26): According to Voice of America, Kim Jong-il has left Russia and is returning to the DPRK via China.  His train crossed the Russia-China border at Zabaikalsk (Забайкальск, See in Google Maps here). Yonhap reports that on the Chinese side of the border Kim’s Train was greeted in Manzhouli by senior Chinese Communist Party envoy Wang Jiarui and other officials. Kim attended a banquet and arts performance before heading to nearby Hulunbeier (See in Google Maps here).

UPDATE 6 (2011-8-24): Kim Jong-il meets with Medvedev at Sosnovyy Bor east of Ulan-Ude (Сосновый бор, See in Google Maps here). The topics discussed are linked below:

According to the Los Angeles Times:

Medvedev ordered a commission to evaluate the parameters of laying a gas pipe through North Korea, according to the president’s statement posted on the Kremlin website. The pipe would stretch for more than 1,100 km, 700 of which would run through North Korea and would pump 10 billion cubic meters of gas annually.

The two leaders also discussed a plan for Russia to extend power lines into North Korea to sell electricity from facilities like the Bureya hydroelectric plant. Before arriving to meet Medvedev, Kim visited the Bureya plant, where he swam in a pool filled with water from Lake Baikal. Afterward, the North Korean strongman was treated to such local cuisine as meat dumplings and fish prepared over an open fire, press reports said.

Accoridng to UPI:

North Korea is willing to return to the six-party talks and to consider a moratorium on nuclear testing, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Wednesday.

Medvedev and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il met in Sosnovy Bor, a garrison town in the Russian Republic of Buryatia in South Siberia, RIA Novosti reported.

Natalia Timakova, a spokeswoman for Medvedev, said Kim was prepared to resume nuclear talks without any preconditions. The talks were suspended two years ago, and Russia and China have said they are prepared to return to the table immediately while the United States, Japan and South Korea want North Korea to show good faith first.

Kim also agreed to allow Gazprom, the state-owned Russian natural gas company, to build a pipeline to South Korea through his country. The two leaders also discussed North Korea’s outstanding debt to the former Soviet Union and possible food aid from Russia.

RIA Novosti said some reports estimate the project could bring about $100 million a year in much-needed hard currency to Pyongyang.

“We’ve ordered our government bodies to establish a special commission … to outline the details of bilateral cooperation on gas transit through the territory of North Korea and the joining of South Korea to the project,” Medvedev was quoted as saying.

The Russian leader said technical work on the pipeline would start soon.

South Korea is one of the largest buyers of natural gas, with imports of liquefied natural gas from Russia alone totaling 1.5 million tons last year, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported. The report said North Korea reacted favorably to the project during the visit of Gazprom officials.

Accoridng to Bloomberg:

North Korea owes Russia $11 billion of debt that dates back to the Soviet period and the two countries have resumed talks to restructure the Asian state’s liabilities, Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak said.

Russia hasn’t lent money to North Korea since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 because the communist state hasn’t settled its debt, Storchak told reporters at a military base near Ulan-Ude, a Siberian city close to the border with Mongolia. North Korea also has yet to recognize Russia as the successor to the Soviet Union, he said.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed on a joint approach to debt restructuring with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il at their meeting near Ulan-Ude today, said a Kremlin official, who declined to be identified in line with government policy. Russia and North Korea restarted talks on the issue a month and a half ago after a long pause, the official said.

The resumption of negotiations is seen as a breakthrough by the Russian delegation attending today’s meeting, according to the official.

According to RIA Novosti, the DPRK is interested in renting farm land in Eastern Siberia.

According to UPI, the Russians and the DPRK plan to increase naval cooperation.

According to the Choson Ilbo, the North Koreans might have been interested in acquiring Russian aircraft.

Andrei Lankov is skeptical any of the economic projects will become operational.

Aidan Foster-Carter believes the pipeline will be built.

UPDATE 5 (2011-8-22): Kim arrives in Ulan-Ude (Улан-Удэ), and tours Lake Baikal and an aircraft factory. See the Ulan-Ude train station in Google Maps here. See Lake Baikal on Google Maps here. See the Ulan-Ude Aviation Plant in Google Maps here. According to a video later released by the DPRK, Kim Jong-il also visited the Lenin-head statue at the seat Ulan Ude’s government (See in Google Maps here) and the “Mega Titan” super market (мега титан, See in Google Maps here).  Though the visit to the aircraft factory is never mentioned in KCTV coverage of the visit, the Choson Ilbo reports that the DPRK’s air force chief, Gen. Ri Pyong-chol (리병철), was also on the trip–leading to speculation that the DPRK air force was shopping for new aircraft.

According to the AP:

Kim took a two-hour Baikal tour on a yacht guarded by two North Korean boats, the Inform Polis Online website reported quoting eye-witness accounts. The water in Baikal is ice-cold even in summertime, so Kim had to take a swim onshore — in a pool filled with Baikal water. The speaker of Buryatia’s legislature joined Kim in the swim, the news website reported.

On the shore, the North Korean leader was treated to traditional Buryat food including meat dumplings and Baikal fish prepared over an open fire.

Later on Tuesday, Kim went back to Ulan-Ude to visit a major aircraft factory, which among other things produces Sukhoi attack planes, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported from the plant.

…

The North Korean leader’s visit is shrouded in mystery. A few people managed to take photos of Kim at his previous stop on Sunday, but heavy police cordons kept the media and onlookers in Ulan-Ude away from the train station and the adjacent square.

Anna Ogorodnik, a photographer from Ulan-Ude, told the Associated Press by phone that nearby streets were full of riot police. The station square looked clean and deserted after authorities had tugged away cars and local buses.

The windows of the station building overlooking the tracks were plastered with sheets of paper and station employees had been ordered to stay indoors, Ogorodnik said.

The photographer said she had been detained after trying to take pictures. She was released after she had presented her journalist ID.

The station square remains cordoned off and Kim’s train is still at the station, Ogorodnik said.

It is Kim’s first visit to his country’s Cold War ally in nine years.

Russian military officials arrived in the North Korean capital on Monday for a five-day visit. The Russian Defense Ministry said the talks will focus on the renewal of military cooperation between the countries, possible joint exercises “of a humanitarian nature” and an exchange of friendly visits by Russian and North Korean ships, ITAR-Tass reported from Pyongyang.

UPDATE 4 (2011-8-23): Writing in the Asia Times, Sunny Lee offers some political context of the trip as well as offering an estimated sum the DPRK can expect to earn if it agrees to the pipeline deal:

Cash-strapped North Korea, committed to staging a great national display of prosperity next year to mark the 100th anniversary of Kim Il-sung’s birthday, is likely to welcome any such deal. If realized, it could expect to earn more than US$500 million a year in handling charges over the gas pipeline alone. Russia is also interested in linking the Trans-Siberian Railways to both Koreas, with the aim of reviving the Far Eastern region’s economy.

The Daily NK puts that number signficantly lower:

For North Korea, the gas pipeline could provide a stable income of approximately $100 million-$150 million. Compared to the Kaesong Industrial Complex, which requires more than 47,000 workers and earns North Korea just $50 million, it is a very attractive figure.

UPDATE 3 (2011-8-21): Kim Jong-il arrives in Russia’s Amur region (Bureya, Бурея) on Sunday August 21 and tours Bureiskaya Power Station. See the Bureya Train Station in Google Maps here. See the Bureiskaya Power Station in Google Maps here.  According to the AFP:

North Korea’s reclusive leader Kim Jong Il and his wife received a red carpet welcome Sunday in Russia’s Amur region where they toured a giant power station ahead of talks with President Dmitry Medvedev.

It was the second day of Kim’s week-long visit to the Russian Far East and Siberia, a rare trip out of his country battling isolation and hunger.

Earlier on Sunday his special armoured train arrived at the small Bureya station in the Amur region and smiling Russian women dressed in red national costumes offered the high-profile guest a loaf of bread and salt, in accordance with Russian tradition.

The 69-year-old leader looked serious and slightly tired as flag-waving locals greeted him at the station.

Sporting sunglasses and his trademark khaki-coloured military-style suit, Kim broke off a piece of bread as the Kremlin’s regional envoy Viktor Ishayev and a throng of local officials looked on.

“He is rather simple, seems to be a genial man,” gushed a young Russian woman in the national dress, speaking later in televised remarks.

After the short welcome ceremony Kim got into an armoured Mercedes, which he brought with him on the train, to visit a nearby hydro-power station.

He appeared to take a keen interest in the 2,000 megawatt-strong Bureiskaya power station as Ishayev and the local governor gave him a tour of the plant.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, citing pictures taken at the plant, said 47-year-old Kim Ok — a former secretary known as Kim’s fourth wife — was accompanying the leader on the journey.

At the power station — the largest in Russia’s Far East — Kim was treated to a spectacular show of the water being discharged into the river, a local law enforcement official said.

He watched the water release from the safety of a white tent pitched at the station, next to a table with snacks, pies and a watermelon, and was also shown a film about the plant translated into Korean, the official said.

“Inexhaustible is the strength of the Russian people who occupied Bureya nature,” the official Korean Central News Agency quoted Kim as saying in the visitor’s book.

A Russian official familiar with the matter told AFP Kim had planned to visit the station earlier in the summer when he had been expected to hold a bilateral summit with Medvedev in or near Vladivostok.

A Kremlin official was quoted as saying at that time that Kim had cancelled due to media leaks about the visit.

Yelena Vishnyakova, a spokeswoman for state-run RusHydro which operates the power plant, said her company was not currently holding any talks with North Korea about any possible construction of power stations.

While Kim toured the power station, his entourage cleaned and polished his armoured train parked at Bureya, a tiny economically depressed town near the city of Blagoveshchensk on Russia’s eastern fringes.

After returning from the station he continued his journey along the famed Trans-Siberian railway.

According to the Washington Post, the Russia has proposed selling surplus electricity produced by this power station to both North and South Korea.

The New York Times also covered the trip to the power station.

UPDATE 2 (2011-8-20): The Washington Post offers some political and economic context of the trip:

Kim’s trip, Pyongyang said, came at the invitation of Medvedev, whose government in recent weeks has pushed North Korea to cooperate on plans to connect a railway and a gas pipeline that would run from Russia through the divided Korean Peninsula.

North Korea has remained largely a no-go zone for massive foreign projects, with outside economic investment allowed only in special development zones. But if North Korea goes along with the gas pipeline project — in which Russian exporter Gazprom will annually send 10 billion cubic meters of gas to South Korea for three decades — it stands to collect handling fees. It would also allow the North a measure of influence in Seoul’s economy.

…

Some North Korea analysts say that Kim has grown wary of depending so heavily on China, particularly as North Korea prepares for the 100th anniversary next year of the birth of founder Kim Il Sung. The North has promised to build a strong and prosperous economy to mark the occasion, but such a display is largely at the mercy of foreign aid.

“North Korea has had no choice but to deepen its dependence on China, so they now need some counterbalance,” said Yun Duk-min, a professor at Seoul’s Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security. “Kim Jong Il uses such tactics. This is using Russia to check Chinese influence.”

UPDATE 1 (2011-8-20): KCNA takes the unusual step of confirming KJI is out of the country (rather than waiting until he has returned). According to KCNA:

Kim Jong Il Passes through Khasan Railway Station, Russia
Pyongyang, August 20 (KCNA) — Kim Jong Il, general secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea and chairman of the National Defence Commission of the DPRK, passed through Khasan, the border railway station of Russia this morning on his way to pay an unofficial visit to Siberia and the Far East Region of the Russian Federation at the invitation of Dmitri Anatoliyevich Medvedev, president of the Russian Federation.

He was greeted at Khasan Railway Station by Viktor Ishayev, presidential envoy to the Far East Region of the Russian Federation, who came to Khasan to conduct him.

He was also greeted by Sergey Darikin, governor of Maritime Territory, Valery Sukhinin, Russian ambassador to the DPRK, Irina Skorobogatova, deputy governor of Maritime Territory, and other senior officials of Moscow, maritime territory, city and district.

When the train pulled in the station, the senior officials got on the train and offered greetings to him.

Medvedev, who has paid deep attention to the Russia-DPRK friendship, dispatched them to greet Kim Jong Il, Viktor Ishayev and other senior officials said, warmly welcoming him to Russia upon the authorization of its President.

Kim Jong Il’s current visit to Russia will mark a historic occasion in putting the Russia-DPRK friendly and cooperative relations onto a fresher and higher stage, they noted.

He said he was very pleased to see for himself the achievements made by the diligent and resourceful Russian people through his current visit, thanking the senior officials of Moscow and local areas and people for warmly greeting him.

He was presented with a souvenir by Sergey Darikin on behalf of the Maritime Territorial Government and people.

After a while, he left for his destination amid send-off by senior officials of Russia.

Prior to it, he left the country to pay an unofficial visit to Siberia and the Far East Region of the Russian Federation.

He is accompanied by Kim Yong Chun, member of the Political Bureau of the WPK Central Committee and minister of the People’s Armed Forces, Kang Sok Ju, member of the Political Bureau of the WPK Central Committee and vice-premier of the Cabinet, Jang Song Thaek, alternate member of the Political Bureau of the WPK Central Committee and vice-chairman of the NDC, Kim Yang Gon, Pak To Chun and Thae Jong Su, alternate members of the Political Bureau and secretaries of the WPK Central Committee, Ju Kyu Chang, alternate member of the Political Bureau and department director of the WPK Central Committee, Pak Pong Ju, first vice department director of the WPK Central Committee, O Su Yong, chief secretary of the North Hamgyong Provincial Committee of the WPK, Kim Kye Gwan, first vice-minister of Foreign Affairs, Kim Yong Jae, DPRK ambassador to Russia, and Sim Kuk Ryong, consul general of the DPRK Consulate General in Nakhodka of Russia.

His visit to Russia, another event in achieving world peace and security and the human cause of independence, will mark a historic occasion in boosting the DPRK-Russia friendship given steady continuity generation after generation and putting strong impetus to the drive of all the servicepersons and people to build a thriving socialist nation.

ORIGINAL POST (2011-8-20): Kim Jong-il has made a “surprise” trip to Russia.  According to the AFP:

North Korea’s reclusive leader Kim Jong-Il on Saturday arrived in his armoured train in Russia and plans to meet President Dmitry Medvedev, the Kremlin said.

During the visit, his first since 2002, Kim is expected to meet with the Kremlin chief for talks in Siberia to discuss North Korea’s nuclear programme, bilateral economic projects and a worsening food crisis in the isolated state.

“A meeting between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Kim Jong-ll will be the main event of the visit,” the Kremlin said in a statement, saying Kim would also visit the Far Eastern and Siberian regions.

The Kremlin did not release further details but a local official in the Far East told AFP Kim’s train crossed the border earlier in the day.

…

Kim, who is known to dislike air travel due to security concerns, arrived in Khasan district after crossing the Tumangan river at 12 pm local time (0100 GMT), Naryzhny said.

He said he was unaware of the North Korean leader’s programme in Russia, adding he did not leave his train upon arrival.

____________

Additional Information:

1. Here is a post on recent DPRK-Russia exchanges leading up to the visit.

2. Here and here are recent stories on DPRK laborers in Russia.

38 North
Andray Abrahamian
2011-8-29

A bus bumps and bruises its way along the unpaved road, carrying would-be investors to Rason’s First Rason International Trade Exhibition which ran from August 21-25, 2011, in Sonbong. The windows are open, until a crimson humvee barrels past, its powerful suspension dancing on the road, leaving behind a plume of beige dust. The bus windows snap shut, the still air quickly gets hot and more than one of the passengers wishes we were Chinese high-rollers, being whisked to the Emperor Casino and Hotel, which sits beautifully on Korea’s East Sea, overlooking Bipa Island and flanked by lush green mountains and crystal waters.

The passengers of the humvee-part of the casino’s fleet-will long be checked in and gambling their fortunes away by the time we complete our two and a half hour journey. However, it won’t always be this way. Rason’s 50km road to the border is finally being upgraded. Indeed, the 2.5 hour journey took 3.5 hours in June. Since then, the road has been widened, the first stage of the construction plan, allowing for traffic to flow both directions more easily and smaller passenger vehicles to overtake the more cumbersome truckers who ply the road.

Its construction is an important sign in the development of the Rason Special Economic Zone. Rason, an amalgamation of the names of the area’s two biggest cities, Rajin and Sonbong, could theoretically be a vibrant hub for both logistics and manufacturing. It is located in the far Northeast of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, bordering Russia and China. It has abundant, cheap labor and the region’s northernmost ice-free port. It has been a legal entity since the early 1991, but has struggled to reach its potential in the face of ambivalence from Pyongyang and difficult geopolitical circumstances.

Local administrators have bold plans for this experiment in economic opening-up and to develop as the Rason Municipal People’s Committee has imagined, an efficient road link with China’s Northeastern provinces is vital. For about a decade, improvements to the road have been “under discussion” and “coming soon,” but it is now undeniably underway. Work began in May of this year…READ MORE HERE

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
2011-8-24

Kim Jong Il’s visit to Moscow on August 20 is sparking interest for the future of economic cooperation between the two countries.

According to the KCNA, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev expressed interest to increase trilateral cooperation between the ROK-DPRK-Russia in the gas, energy, and railroad sectors. In the message sent from Medvedev to mark the 66th anniversary of independence from Japanese colonial rule, “plans to expand cooperation with the DPRK and the ROK in gas, energy, and railroad industry” were emphasized.

The cooperation projects are evaluated to have “great economic and political significance contributing to the stability in Northeast Asia and denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”

In July 4, the KCNA reported that the delegates from the Russian energy giant Gazprom headed by Chairman Alekhsandr Ananenkov visited Pyongyang to discuss energy cooperation, although details of the visit was not elaborated. Ananenkov was reported to have met with North Korean officials in gas and oil industriesto discuss bilateral cooperation in these areas.

Russia has also expressed interest in linking gas pipelines to export natural gas to South Korea via inter-Korean railroad system.

A spokesperson of the foreign ministry of the DPRK reported on the recent visit from the vice-foreign minister and chief representative of Russia on Six-Party Talks, Aleksei Borodavkin, this past March. In the statement, the Russian government expressed concerns for improving inter-Korean relations and stressed prospects of the tripartite economic cooperation projects with North and South Korea including the construction of railways, gas pipeline, and a transmission line linking the three countries. The DPRK also expressed support for the upcoming economic cooperation projects.

In result, the main agenda in the bilateral economic cooperation between Russia and North Korea entails railway, gas pipeline, and transmission line construction.

President Lee Myung-bak has met with the Russian president Medvedev in September 2008 in Moscow. At the summit, the two presidents reached an agreement to pursue projects to export Russian PNG or pipeline natural gas to South Korea through a pipeline via North Korea from 2015.

Immediately following the summit, South Korea’s Korea Gas Corporation (KOGAS) and Russia’s Gazprom signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to jointly study the possibilities of constructing a long-distance pipeline running from Vladivostok. Under the contract, Russia will send at least 7.5 million tons of natural gas annually for a period of 30 years through a pipeline to South Korea via North Korea.

This joint study between ROK-Russia is expected to serve as a momentum in bringing diverse economic cooperation between North and South Korea as well.

While it is still premature to judge the long-term outlook for such trilateral economic cooperation, its effects are anticipated to contribute to stability and peace in the Northeast Asian region.

Additional Information: here is a summary of the recent Kim Jong-il — Medvedev summit.

According ot the Choson Ilbo:

In the scorching afternoon heat last Thursday, two Asian laborers sat in front of a grocery store near a building site in Vladivostok, Russia, cooling themselves with mugs of draft beer. When asked if they were North Koreans, the men asked, “Are you from South Korea?”

One of the laborers, who was in his 40s, then said there were around 50 workers from all over North Korea, including Pyongyang and Nampo, at this particular site alone, and they can be seen at practically every construction site in Vladivostok.

The entire Siberian city has turned into a building site in preparation for the 2012 APEC Summit as roads are being widened and hotels and apartments built. The projects have created booming conditions for North Korean laborers. They can easily be spotted at practically any construction site, cheap restaurant or near housing projects. One North Korean laborer in his 50s said, “We earn US$500 a month if we work from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. Aside from missing our families, things are not that difficult.”

There are an estimated 3,000 North Korean laborers in Vladivostok. One source there said, “In the past, most of the North Korean laborers worked at logging sites near Khabarovsk, but now most of them work at building sites here.” City officials expect around 3,000 more North Koreans to arrive.

But they are getting stripped of their hard-earned money by the regime. They are sent to Vladivostok by North Korean companies tasked with raising foreign currency and must send a set portion of their earnings back to the North. When their three- to five-year contracts expire, they return home.

One South Korean resident in Russia said, “Even in winter, when there is no work, North Korean workers are threatened by their government minders, who extort money by telling them it is up to them whether they want to stay in Russia or go back to the North and starve.”

For these laborers, money comes before loyalty to the regime. Some with more experience working abroad earn extra cash on the side by working as handymen in Russian homes after they make their payments to North Korean officials.

Recently, there have been rumors that North Korean workers are having to be especially careful. Seven North Koreans working in Vladivostok were apparently sent back to the North after they were caught watching South Korean movies on DVD. One South Korean resident in the city said, “North Korean laborers are allowed to watch porn, but they get in big trouble if they watch South Korean movies.” The resident said North Korean laborers refused to watch South Korean movies even if they are free.

“North Korean laborers send back up to $1,000 a month,” an ethnic Korean merchant in China said. “Things must be better than living in North Korea, but they don’t seem to make enough money compared to the hard work they do.” He said North Korean workers are notorious for never buying anything.

Read the full story here:
Vladivostok Teeming with N.Korean Laborers
Choson Ilbo
2011-8-18

Pictured Above (Google Earth): Tynda Logging Camp in Russia. See in Google Maps here.

According to the Daily NK:

Kim, a defector who arrived in South Korea in 2008 after working for 30 years in the North Korean forestry sector, explained to The Daily NK on the 5th, “North Korea’s operations in Russia are now just enough to send timber to North Korea on the birthdays of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il; they provide little real benefit in terms of foreign currency earning.”

In essence, Kim went on, “North Korea is just running the Forestry Mission to maintain its relationship with Russia.”

Following a 1967 agreement between the two countries, logging has at times played a key role in North Korea’s hard currency earning efforts, with more than 20,000 North Korean laborers being involved in forestry operations in Russia by the start of the 1990s.

Under the agreement, Russia agreed to provide the trees, equipment and power, while North Korea would provide the labor, and both countries shared the timber.

However, the deal is no longer beneficial to the North Korean state, as Kim explained in more detail, saying, “At the moment, Russia takes 72% and North Korea 28% of what is felled by these North Korean laborers, but most of the money North Korea earns from selling it on to Chinese trade companies goes on the laborers’ wages, accommodation, food and administration of the Forestry Mission. Now that Russia is a market economy with constantly rising prices, there is hardly any hard currency left to send back to the North Korean authorities.”

“Recently, China has been offering the Russians more money for these felling operations, so the North Korean laborers have no choice but to go home,” Kim added, continuing, “In addition, the scale of the workforce and operations has been decreasing recently partly because those groups of workers who protest about wage delays and whatever else are all dispatched back to North Korea.”

“In the past there used to be trade missions in Tynda and Khabarovsk, but now they is only the one in Tynda, with seven logging businesses underneath it,” he said. “The Khabarovsk trade mission has recently been closed down, and there are now a total of just nine logging operations underway in all of Russia.”

The numbers of loggers has shrunk to “4,000 in Khabarovsk and 2,000 in other remote areas; a total that does not exceed 6,000,” Kim stated.

Even the remaining forestry mission in Tynda is not large, with a president, chief engineer and vice-director working in parallel with a Party chief secretary, organizational secretary and propaganda secretary. Although each secretary has two or three workers under him, even with the National Security Agency staff that keeps tabs on the activities of the workers included in the total, the mission remains small.

Elsewhere, however, there are actually tens of thousands of North Korean laborers in Russia working in fields including construction, agriculture and mining, including around 30% of the 6,000 nominally said to be involved in logging.

The activities of military-run enterprises are on the increase, too. Kim explained, “Following cooperation between the Russian Air Force and the North Korean Air Force Command, there are now farming operations going on around air fields. If you include the General Reconnaissance Bureau, North Korea has sent at least a few tens of thousands of people to Russia.”

Given the ever increasing number of laborers running away from their assigned workplaces, Kim speculated there could also be as many as 600 or more defectors residing in Russia.

“In 2006 the Ministry of Forestry sent some cadres all over Russia to try and lure defectors back home, but these people had grown accustomed to living in Russia and nobody listened. There were 598 at that time, so it’s probably even higher by now,” Kim said.

One other key reason why North Korea has been unsuccessful in its attempts to retrieve the defectors is that the Russian authorities take a sympathetic view of their plight. According to Kim, “Russia does not forcibly repatriate defectors in the same way as China, so they are able to marry and work there. The Russian police have been treating defectors as humanitarian refugees since 2005, aware that forcibly repatriated defectors risk public execution and that their families face punishment, too.”

Naturally though, surveillance and control of the laborers is as severe as it has always been at the logging sites. Every week the workers are forced to participate in Party-led activities including mutual criticism sessions. The authorities are trying to limit the number of defectors by encouraging them to spy on one another, and the NSA has an intricate system of investigation to maintain order. Nevertheless, workers are sufficiently unhappy with their situation that defections continue to occur.

According to the Russians, there were 32,000 North Koreans working in the country in 2010. Here is a link to the source of this number and previous posts on North Koreans logging in Russia.

Read the full story here:
Logging in Russia: Not What It Used to Be
Daily NK
Kim Yoinh-hun
2011-8-8

Andrei Lankov writes in the Korea Times:

The present author was born in the former Soviet Union and is frequently asked which period of Soviet history the current North Korea is reminiscent of?

I usually say that this question has no straightforward answer. The problem is that depending on what area you look, the associations are remarkably different. The developments in North Korea are not that different from those of the USSR, but in different areas the time seems to flow with a different speed.

North Korea’s official ideology and propaganda continues to be uncannily similar to late Stalinist Soviet culture, to the period of the late 1940s. The North Koreans are still served the same fare of ossified Leninism and strong nationalism, heavily spliced with eulogies to the leaders’ wisdom and benevolence.

It appears as if North Korean propaganda, as well as its official ideology, has been frozen in time since the late 1960s. One can take an article from Rodong Shinmun of, say, 1972 and then compare it with an article published yesterday only to find no major differences in language, style and reasoning.

At the same time, the general mood among educated urban North Koreans is quite similar to the mood which prevailed among the same social milieu in Moscow and Leningrad of the 1960s. People are still afraid to talk politics and most of them do not entertain serious doubts about the fundamentals of the system. They tend to believe that their economic problems have been created by a combination of natural disasters, collapse of the ‘socialist markets’ and, of course, an economic blockade maintained by the greedy U.S. imperialists and their shameless lackeys.

However, very few educated North Koreans nowadays buy the official propaganda message wholesale. They know that the official media lies, and sometimes lies quite shamelessly. While being more or less loyal subjects of their state, they entertain significant (and growing) skepticism about its institutions and the official pronouncements of its leaders.

It seems that social fear, once powerful and omnipresent, is diminishing. The North Korean state remains highly repressive, but the level of repressiveness is in steady decline. Nowadays North Koreans can do many things which would almost definitely have landed them in prison some 20 years ago ― in some cases, even mildly critical statements about the system are now tolerated.

Of course, open dissent is still unthinkable, but genuine enthusiasm is almost impossible to find. This is a picture, clearly reminiscent of the USSR of, say, year 1965 (albeit the North Korean state remains far more repressive than the Soviet Union used to be during Brezhnev’s rule).

The economic situation is different again. In economic terms, present day North Korea is similar to Russia in the early 1990s, the turbulent days that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. At that time a large number of the Soviet people discovered that their official salaries would not suffice if they wanted to stay alive, so they began to look for additional sources of income. Ex-Soviet officials busily stole state property, whilst less lucky commoners relied on an assorted variety of small businesses, household workshops and subsistence farming.

This is very similar to present-day North Korea, even though the collapse of the socialist economy in North Korea led to far more damaging consequences than was the case in Russia –after all North Korea experienced a disastrous famine, while few if any Russians starved to death in the early post-Soviet period.

In North Korea, the collapse of the state-run economy and rationing system plunged a majority of the population into the world of the grass-roots market economy. No reliable statistics are available, but researchers tend to agree that roughly three-quarters of average household income in North Korea is now derived from private economic activities of different kinds.

Like their early post-Soviet peers, North Korean officials are always on the lookout for a nice bribe. They also don’t mind quietly transforming state property into their own personal property– many North Korean enterprises ostensibly still owned by the government are actually private nowadays. Meanwhile other North Koreans sell, buy, smuggle, farm unofficial plots, run individual workshops or find employment with such workshops.

So, we have a curious picture. Ideology still pretends that almost nothing has changed in the last 50 years (it’s telling that the official media has never mentioned the market economy, as if it doesn’t exist). The political consciousness is less dominated by the state, but still remains under its control.

However, the North Korean state has almost completely lost control of the economic life of its people. This picture has no parallels in the history of the Soviet Union or, for that matter, in the histories of other ex-communist countries, even though all its elements (if taken separately) would appear familiar to the people with Soviet-era experience.

Read the full story here:
Comparison of NK and USSR
Korea Times
Andrei Lankov
2011-6-19

According to Yonhap:

The number of North Koreans officially visiting China reached 28,600 in the first three months of the year, up 35 percent from the same period last year, a news report said Wednesday.

More than half of them visited China to work in either factories or restaurants, while 6,000 people visited China for conferences or businesses, the Voice of America reported, citing Chinese government data.

The VOA also said 700 North Koreans toured China for sightseeing, while fewer than 100 North Koreans visited China to meet relatives or friends and 7,300 visitors had other purposes. The report did not elaborate.

The data did not include information on North Koreans staying illegally in China after defecting, the VOA said.

Tens of thousands of North Korean defectors are believed to be hiding in China, a major land route through which many North Korean defectors travel to Thailand and other Southeast Asian countries before resettling in South Korea.

According ot the Choson Ilbo:

Chinese tourists will start visiting Russian and North Korean cities without visas on Wednesday under a formal agreement between Beijing and the two countries. The tour course starts in the Chinese border city of Hunchun in the lower reaches of the Duman (Tumen) River and goes on to eastern Russia and the Rajin-Sonbong special economic zone in North Korea.

A group of 21 tourists left Changchun, the capital of northeast China’s Jilin Province, on Tuesday for the Hunchun. Travelers will then visit Slavyanka, Vladivostok and Khasan, the official Xinhua news agency said. They then go to North Korea by train and tour the cities of the Duman River and the Rajin-Sonbong area.

The four-day tour starts every Wednesday and costs 2,300 yuan (approximately W390,000). Only Chinese travelers are eligible for the visa-free arrangement.

Read the full stories below:
Number of N. Korean visitors to China rises in first quarter
Yonhap
4/27/2011

Chinese Tourists Visit Russia, N.Korea Visa-Free
Choson Ilbo
4/28/2011

Pictured above on Google Earth: hill-side farming plots in the DPRK

Lankov writes in the Korea Times:

Every visitor to North Korea who has passed through mountainous areas in the country has seen some peculiarities of the modern North Korean landscape.

Somewhere high in the mountains one can see small fields of strange, irregular shapes which look quite different from the orderly, rectangular shapes of the cooperative farm fields. If asked about these fields, North Korean minders will probably avoid giving a straight answer. This is understandable ― even though the existence of such fields is tacitly accepted by the authorities, from a purely ideological view, which minders are obliged to present, these fields are not supposed to exit.

We are referring to sotoji, private plots, which have been spreading across North Korea over the last 15 years and now play a major role in food production in North Korea.

It would be only a minor exaggeration to say that in his policies, Kim Il-sung tended to be more Stalinist than Joseph Stalin himself. He took the state-run economy to its natural (or unnatural) extreme and collective farming was no exception. Once upon a time, the North Korean peasantry was herded into so-called “agricultural cooperatives.” The description of these institutions as cooperatives is actually misleading because they were essentially state-run farms, where farmers had basically no influence over management or income distribution.

But North Korea has one important peculiarity: unlike Stalin’s Soviet Union, in North Korea farmers were not allowed to cultivate even small private plots. In the Soviet Union a farming family would be allowed a plot which might have been as large as a few thousand square meters. In North Korea, the maximum size of an individual plot was limited to a paltry 100 square meters – barely enough to grow some pepper and spice and clearly not enough to make any meaningful economic difference.

This was done on purpose ― North Korean policy planners assumed that farmers, being deprived of any alternative means of existence, would work more efficiently in state-owned fields. In agricultural cooperatives farmers essentially worked for their daily ration ― one full day of work was rewarded with 700g of grain (similar to the ration of the average worker in a city).

This system was never especially efficient but for a few decades it managed to exist and function somehow. However the collapse of the North Korean economy in the early 1990s produced a devastating blow to state-run agriculture. In 1995 and 1996 the harvests were around half of what was necessary to keep the North Korean population alive, so many North Koreans starved to death (the exact numbers are disputed but it seems that between 500,000-1,000,000 perished) and the survivors began to look for ways to make a living outside the state-run-economy. Predictably enough, farmers did what one would expect them to do ― they began to develop their own food production.

Unlike their Chinese counterparts, the North Korean elite refused to disband the state-run agricultural cooperatives. Therefore farmers had no choice but to acquire land on their own, outside of what would be normally considered arable land. Usually they went to the mountains, since all arable land in the valleys had long been cultivated within state-run farms.

In some cases, farmers would make agreements with local forestry departments whose officials agreed to turn a blind-eye to unlawful activities in protected forest areas. In some other cases the local authorities tolerated and even encouraged the sotoji cultivators.

A quick look through satellite images of North Korea shows the widespread nature of the sotoji phenomena. In some counties near the Chinese border, the percentage of land under the cultivation of sotoji owners roughly equals that under cultivation by state-run farms. In other areas the level of private production may be smaller but it seems clear that private food production makes a major contribution to North Korea’s food supply today.

Indeed, in the above-mentioned borderland counties, sotoji fields seem to produce as much as 60 percent of all food sold on the local market. This might be an exception because the current county in question is covered by mountains and contains a lot of places where people can hide from police. Nonetheless sotoji produced food is found widely in the country’s markets.

In the last 15 years or so, North Koreans have developed a large and successful private economy of which the sotoji phenomenon is an important part. However their cultivators are not high on the newly emerging social ladder. Sotoji are usually tilled by people who do not have the money, skills or inclination to start a more conventional business. Some of them are essentially market-orientated enterprises which make profit but the majority lose money.

Nonetheless, the random new shapes of North Korean mountains nowadays are yet another reminder of how much the country has changed over the last two decades.

Read the full story here:
Sotoji — small private plot
Korea Times
Andrei Lankov
2011-4-24

Accoridng to KBS:

A Russian company is facing charges of operating a gambling room in the North Korean embassy in Moscow.

The company, which leased the second and third floor of the embassy’s administrative building, has allegedly been running the illegal operation since December.

The North Korean embassy denied the allegations when reports surfaced last week. But signs of a gambling operation were detected in a recent investigation by the Russian Foreign Ministry.

The Russian Foreign Ministry issued letters of protest to ambassadors from North Korea and Belarus and demanded the casino immediately shutdown to prevent further violation of Russian law and bilateral agreements.

Read the full story here:
Russia Protests NK Embassy’s Casino Operation
KBS
2011-4-21