North Korean Economy Watch

Foreign Trade Bank of Korea
FTB Building, Jungsong dong, Central District, Pyongyang, North Korea
Phone: +850 2 18111
Fax: +850 2 3814467

Dae-Dong Credit Bank  
Ansan-dong BoTongGang Hotel, Pyongchon, Pyongyang, North Korea
Phone: +850 2 3814866
Fax: +850 2 3814723
 
Credit Bank of Korea  
Chongryu 1-Dong, Munsu Street, Otan-dong, Central District, Pyongyang, North Korea 
Phone: +850 2 3818285
Fax: +850 2 3817806

Woori Bank  
Busok-Dong 1st Floor 101 Gaesunggongdan, Bondong-Ri, Gaesung City, Hwanghae-Do, North Korea
Phone: +8 850 9118
Fax: +8 850 9119

The International Industrial Development Bank  
Jongpyong-dong, Pyong chon District, Pyongyang, North Korea
Phone: +850 2 3818610
Fax: +850 2 3814427

Korea Daesong Bank  
Segori-dong, Gyongheung Street, Pyongyang, North Korea
Phone: +850 2 818221
Fax: +850 2 814576
 
Korea Daesong Bank  
Segori-dong, Gyongheung Street, Pyongyang, North Korea
Phone: +850 2 818221
Fax: +850 2 814576

Changgwang Credit Bank  
Saemaeul-1 Dong, Pyongchon District, Pyongyang, Korea (North)
Phone: +850 2 18111999 ext
Fax: +850 2 3814793

Bank of East Land  
BEL Building, Jonseung-Dong, Pyongyang, Korea (North)
Phone: +850 2 18111
Fax: +850 2 3814410

Korea Joint Bank  
Ryugyong 1 dong, Pothonggang District, Pyongyang, Korea (North)
Phone: +850 2 3818151
Fax: +850 2 3814410

Central Bank of Korea
58-1 Mansu-dong, Sungri str, Central District, Pyongyang, Korea (North)
Phone: +850 2 18111 Ext: 81
Fax: +850 2 3814624

This story from the Daily NK has an update on whats happening at Raijin as well as a history of the area:

Read whole story here:

In December 1991, Rajin and Seunbong cities were declared “Free Trade Economic Regions”, Rajin Port was planned to be expanded according to a 3-stage development scheme. The first stage consisted of infrastructure construction such as railroads, roads, and ports.  In the ten years since, the budgetary outlays have been insufficient.

In 1996, the Committee for Promoting NK Foreign Economic Cooperation published a report, “Reality and Outlook for Rajin- Sunbong Free Trade Economic Regions.” According to the report, the Rajin Port should first build capacity for large-sized containers.  In stage two, its loading-handling capacity should be improved from 300 million tons to 1,700 million tons.  The third stage, beginning in 2010, the port should have the capacity to manage 100 million tons.

From the Seould Times:  

Working conditions for North Korean workers in the Kaesong Industrial Park have been well publicized.  What is less known is that North Koreans are working all over the world in isolated conditions to earn hard currency for their governent.

Experts estimate that there are 10,000 to 15,000 North Koreans working abroad in behalf of their government in jobs ranging from nursing to construction work. In addition to the Czech Republic, North Korea has sent workers to Russia, Libya, Bulgaria, Saudi Arabia and Angola, defectors say.

Almost the entire monthly salary of each of the women here, about $260, the Czech minimum wage, is deposited directly into an account controlled by the North Korean government, which gives the workers only a fraction of the money.

To the extent that they are allowed outside, they go only in groups. Often they are accompanied by a guard from the North Korean Embassy who is referred to as their “interpreter.” They live under strict surveillance in dormitories with photographs of North Korea’s late founder Kim Il Sung and current leader Kim Jong Il gracing the walls. Their only entertainment is propaganda films and newspapers sent from North Korea, and occasional exercise in the yard outside.

Kim Tae San, a former official of the North Korean Embassy in Prague, helped set up the factories in 1998 and served as president of one of the shoe factories until he defected to South Korea in 2002.

It also was Kim’s job to collect the salaries and distribute the money to workers. He said 55% was taken off the top as a “voluntary” contribution to the cause of the socialist revolution. The women had to buy and cook their own food. Additional sums were deducted for accommodation, transportation and such extras as flowers for the birthdays of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il.

The women even had to pay for the propaganda films they were forced to watch. By the time all the deductions were made, each received between $20 and $30 a month. They spent less than $10 of it on food, buying only the cheapest local macaroni.

“They try to save money by not eating,” said Kim, the former embassy official. He says that his wife, who accompanied him on visits to the factory, was concerned that women’s menstruation stopped, their breasts shriveled and many experienced acute constipation. “We were always trying to get them to spend more on food, but they were desperate to bring money home to their families.”

Czech officials say the North Koreans are model workers.

“They are so quiet you would hardly know they are here,” said Zdenek Belohlavek, labor division director for the district of Beroun, which encompasses Zelezna and Zebrak, a larger town where about 75 North Korean seamstresses stitch underwear.

Belohlavek displayed a thick dossier of photos and vital statistics of the women, most of whom were born between 1979 and 1981. All their paperwork is in perfect order, and the factories appear to be in full compliance with the law, he said.
 

Australia Broadcasting Corporation (Reuters)
3/29/2006

North Korea hinted at seeking compensation from Australia for seizing and sinking the Pong Su, that was used to transport drugs, according to a state media report.

Last week, two Australian fighter jets bombed and sank the impounded North Korean cargo ship in what Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said was a strong message to Pyongyang about its suspected involvement in drug running.

The official KCNA news agency cited a relatively obscure pro-North Korean group as saying Australia needs to compensate North Korea.

“The Australian authorities should make an honest apology to it according to the results of the trial and compensate to the ship and its crewmen for the human, material and mental damage done to them,” KCNA reported the Federation of Koreans in the United States as saying in a commentary.

There was no official demand for compensation from North Korea but analysts have noted that since the government controls the media, it only permits approved comments to appear.

The 4,000-tonne ship the Pong Su had been impounded since 2003, when it led the Australian navy on a 1,100 kilometre chase off the south-eastern coast after being spotted unloading part of a 150 kilogram shipment of heroin at a secluded beach.

Eight crew members were charged with drug smuggling.

The captain and three officers were sent back to North Korea earlier this month after being found not guilty of aiding the drug operation. Four other men have been found guilty of drugs charges relate to the case.

The United States has said it suspects North Korea of engaging in illicit activities such as counterfeiting and drug trafficking as a way to secure funds for its anaemic economy.

KCNA
3/24/2006

A commissioning ceremony of the Dock No. 2 of the Ryongnam Ship Repairing Factory took place on the spot on Friday. With the building of the large computer-aided dock capable of repairing tens of thousands of tons of several ships simultaneously at the factory the capacity of ship repairing has remarkably increased and firmer material and technological foundations have been laid to develop the shipping industry of the country as required by the new century. A message of thanks sent by the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea to officials and builders of the Ministry of Land and Marine Transport who performed great labor feats in the construction of Dock No. 2 was conveyed at the ceremony. The message said that the officials and builders of the ministry who turned out as one true to the behests of President Kim Il Sung on further increasing the capacity of the factory and the militant tasks of the WPK performed the great labor feats in completing the construction of Dock No. 2 in a big and bold way with their own efforts in a short span of time.

It highly appreciated the officials and builders of the ministry for displaying intense loyalty to the Party and the leader and patriotic devotion and successfully building Dock No. 2 as a monumental edifice of the Songun era.

Speeches were made at the ceremony.

Present there were Vice-Premier of the Cabinet Ro Tu Chol, Minister of Land and Marine Transport Kim Yong Il and other officials concerned.

BBC
3/23/2006

Video of the ship’s destruction on Youtube

A North Korean cargo ship that was used to smuggle heroin into Australia has been sunk by an Australian fighter jet.

An F-111 aircraft bombed the Pong Su during target practice on Thursday at a secret location offshore, police said.

Australian troops seized the ship in 2003 after spotting it unloading part of a huge heroin shipment at a beach.

The Australian government said the bombing was a warning to North Korea to halt its involvement in drug smuggling – an allegation Pyongyang rejects.

“It is appropriate that we publicly demonstrate our outrage at what has happened by sinking this ship,” Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said.

Captain cleared

“We are concerned about possible links between the North Korean ship and the North Korean government.”

The Pong Su’s cargo of heroin, worth about US$115 million (£66 million), would have provided four million hits of the drug on Australian streets, Mr Downer said.

Earlier this month, an Australian jury cleared the captain of the Pong Su and three officers of involvement in an international drug ring.

But four crew members who were involved in transporting the heroin from ship to shore pleaded guilty to drug charges.

Two have been sentenced to 22 and 23 years in prison and the other two are awaiting sentence.

The 3,500-tonne Pong Su was used to smuggle in more than 125 kilograms of heroin.

High-sea chase

It had anchored off the town of Lorne in Victoria state while the cargo was carried ashore by dinghy.

It was seized in April 2003 after a four-day chase by the Australian navy.

Earlier this week, the freighter was towed out of Sydney Harbour to a location 140km (90 miles) off the coast of eastern Australia, the Australian Federal Police said.

The fighter jet then dropped the bomb that sank the ship, the police added.

Although North Korea has denied any link to the smuggling operation, Mr Downer said it was hard to imagine a shipping company acting on its own in Pyongyang’s Stalinist-style economy.

“I mean this isn’t, after all, a private sector economy where private companies are doing things on their own accord,” Mr Downer said.

“North Korea has been involved in illicit drug trade, North Korea has been involved in illicit financial dealings, and North Korea has been involved in the illicit trade in WMD (weapons of mass destruction) technology over quite some years,” he added.

Australia and the United States have said the case of the Pong Su strengthens their suspicions that Pyongyang deals in drugs to help support its failing economy.

North Korea does not get its drugs/ship back.

From the BBC:

A North Korean cargo ship that was used to smuggle heroin into Australia has been sunk by an Australian fighter jet.

An F-111 aircraft bombed the Pong Su during target practice on Thursday at a secret location offshore, police said.

Australian troops seized the ship in 2003 after spotting it unloading part of a huge heroin shipment at a beach.

The Australian government said the bombing was a warning to North Korea to halt its involvement in drug smuggling – an allegation Pyongyang rejects.

“It is appropriate that we publicly demonstrate our outrage at what has happened by sinking this ship,” Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said.

The Pong Su’s cargo of heroin, worth about US$115 million (£66 million), would have provided four million hits of the drug on Australian streets, Mr Downer said.

Earlier this month, an Australian jury cleared the captain of the Pong Su and three officers of involvement in an international drug ring.

But four crew members who were involved in transporting the heroin from ship to shore pleaded guilty to drug charges.

Two have been sentenced to 22 and 23 years in prison and the other two are awaiting sentence.

The 3,500-tonne Pong Su was used to smuggle in more than 125 kilograms of heroin.

From the Washington Times:

South Korea plans to open a job training center in the North to improve the skills of North Koreans who work in South Korean-owned companies. 

The training center, to open in June, each year will offer training in 13 areas of work to 4,000 employees of midsized companies, the state-funded Human Resources Development Service of Korea said in a statement.

“The center will conduct job training and supply a quality workforce to our companies which will move in the Kaesong Industrial Complex,” it said.

South Korea’s government has allocated $16.4 million to construct the training center in the industrial zone, The Korea Herald reported Thursday. 

Currently, 11 South Korean companies employ 6,000 North Korean workers and 600 South Korean workers in the zone, according to the Ministry of Labor.

The ministry expects that some 300 firms will eventually recruit 90,000 North Korean workers when the first-stage development of the inter-Korean complex is completed in 2007, the newspaper reported.

From the Times of London:
3/9/2006
Michael Sheridan

ALL baby triplets in North Korea are being removed from their parents and placed in bleak state orphanages where they are fed by foreign aid.

The policy has prompted concern among diplomats and aid officials, who have witnessed sets of babies kept in special “triplet rooms” in orphanages across the country.

“There is no doubt that the policy is compulsory and universal,” said a seasoned diplomatic visitor to North Korea who has seen the rooms. He said he had not noticed family members visiting the children in his many calls at the orphanages. Conditions when foreigners are allowed to enter appear to be spartan but clean, according to several witnesses.

Food supplies to orphanages are a priority for both the United Nations relief agencies and the North Korean authorities. Local officials have assured inquirers that the babies are being given privileges to relieve their parents of the anxiety of feeding three mouths while the impoverished Stalinist nation endures an eighth year of food shortages.

But diplomatic experts who understand the Korean language and culture cast doubt on the official explanation.

They believe the true reason is linked to some of the most bizarre aspects of Kim Jong-il’s dictatorship. The number three is auspicious in Korean mysticism and triplets are revered for exceptional good fortune. Some believe they may be destined for power and great achievements, which would account for the regime’s desire to keep them under observation.

Diplomats and international aid officials also doubt that poverty is the explanation, because not even triplets born to high-ranking party members are exempt. “It may be officially atheistic and Stalinist but essentially North Korea operates a state religion infused with superstition, astrology and a personality cult which glorifies Kim as a unique individual,” said the veteran diplomat. “You don’t take any chances with rivals in that system.”

Power conferred by blood descent is also important in Korea’s Confucian tradition. The North Korean capital, Pyongyang, was rebuilt by its communist rulers along principles of Chinese geomancy, with “power lines” linking the purported birthplace of the previous dictator, Kim Il-sung, with the purported tomb of Tangun, founder of the Korean race. As heir to the world’s only communist dynasty, the younger Kim exploits every such tradition to exalt himself, while keeping a careful watch on his clan network of intermarried army and party men.

Children of the elite are usually taken from their parents by the age of two and placed in party-controlled schools to break family bonds and to consecrate their devotion to Kim. Foreign observers believe the triplets are kept together and transferred to these schools when old enough.

The segregation of triplets has provoked debate among UN aid agencies and non-governmental organisations delivering help to North Korea.

Although there appear to be no reasons to fear for the physical safety of the triplets, regular visitors to North Korean orphanages report desperate scenes of isolation and sadness.

On a recent visit a member of a foreign delegation entered a room to see infants placed several to a cot, all rocking backwards and forwards.

“Our people were stunned into silence,” the delegate said. A paediatrician outside North Korea who assessed evidence collected on the visit diagnosed severe emotional trauma.

Witnesses said they had noticed better nursing attention and care for triplets in the special rooms. “But none of those infants knows what affection is,” said one visitor. “Our staff try to cuddle them for a few minutes but then, of course, we have to leave.”

Up to 300 sets of triplets a year are believed to be born in North Korea. In an official statement to the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva, North Korea said: “Triplets are supplied by the state free of charge with clothing, bedding, a one-year supply of dairy products and a pre-school subsidy, and special medical workers take charge of such mothers and children and care for their health.”

The UN’s World Food Programme has reported a sharp improvement in children’s health in North Korea thanks to foreign aid. Since 1998 cases of acute malnutrition in children under seven have fallen from 16% to 9%, and the number of underweight children has decreased from 61% to 21%.

As tension mounts between North Korea and the United States over Pyongyang’s nuclear programme, however, aid officials fear that any military clash could put at risk their ability to feed the children.

There is little doubt of the regime’s cold-hearted approach to paediatrics. In 1998, Médecins sans Frontières pulled out of North Korea, alleging that aid agencies were denied access to so-called 9-27 camps in which sick and disabled children had been dumped under a decree issued by Kim to “normalise” the country.

UN agencies are still arguing for access to closed districts in the northeast of the country, where prison camps and military facilities are located.

From NK Zone:

North Korea has changed its middle school examinations from all-day essay writing events to a multiple choice and “fill in the blank” format,Xinhua news agency reports. 

It says “the totally new exam system will test the results of the students’ study more scientifically”, will make the exams shorter and will “reduce subjective factors in taking the exam and will test the results of the students’ study more fairly”.

Quoting the Korea Central New Agency, it says the changes were discussed by education officials, scholars and teachers over several years and that foreign languages, computer science and practical subjects will also be tested orally.

It provides no further details, but given how little is known about the NK education system, I thought this was worth mentioning.
The Library of Congress gives an outline of education in NK here and a South Korean professor has written an article here.