Joseph Bermudez, military analyst for Jane’s Intelligence Review and author of The Armed Forces of North Korea, has published the fourth issue of his very fascinating KPA Journal.
Click here to download the full issue (PDF).
Topics include: Noto-Hanto infiltration, Pokpoong main battle tank, DPRK intelligence agencies.
Previous issues of KPA Journal can be downloaded here.
Here are some articles about it:
North Korea’s Kim Jong Il arrives in China, amid internal, external tensions
Washington Post
Lauren Keane
5/4/2010
Kim Jong-il Arrives in China
New York Times
Choe Sang-hun
5/3/2010
North Korean leader in China seeking cash, clout
Los Angeles Times
Barbara Demick and John M. Glionna
5/3/2010
North Korea’s Kim seeks lifeline in China
Reuters
Royston Chan
5/3/2010
Kim Jong-il Stops Off in Chinese Boomtown
Choson Ilbo
5/5/2010
Who Is with Kim Jong-il on His China Trip?
Choson Ilbo
5/4/2010
North Korea’s Kim ‘visits China’
BBC
5/3/2010
Here are some photos of his train.
According to Bloomberg:
United Nations food aid to North Korea will run out the end of next month following a drop in international donations after the country detonated a nuclear device, the World Food Program said.
“We have resources to carry us through to June,” Lena Savelli, a Beijing-based spokeswoman for the UN agency, said in a telephone interview today. “We quite urgently need more donors to come forward and give us resources.”
The agency is in talks with donors on how to extend the program as it seeks to continue operations, she said. Kim Jong Il’s regime has relied on outside aid to feed its 24 million people since the mid-1990s when famine caused by floods, drought and economic mismanagement is estimated to have killed as many as 2 million people.
The aid shortfall may put further pressure on Kim following a botched currency revaluation late last year and tougher UN Security Council sanctions after a second nuclear test in May 2009. The Council should also consider the totalitarian regime’s human rights violations to force changes, Vitit Muntarbhorn, UN special rapporteur on North Korea’s human rights, said in a May 1 interview in Seoul.
“It’s a very helpless situation, sadly, for the people,” he said. “Given that the Security Council is the law- enforcement organ of the United Nations, it’s incumbent upon them to take it up,” said Muntarbhorn, 57, whose six-year term as the official for North Korea, expires in June.
Read the full article here:
North Korea’s Food Aid Will Run Out Next Month, UN Agency Says
Bloomberg
Bomi Lim
5/3/2010
According to Reuters (via the Washington Post):
North Korea’s health system would be the envy of many developing countries because of the abundance of medical staff that it has available, the head of the World Health Organization said on Friday.
WHO Director-General Margaret Chan, speaking a day after returning from a 2-1/2 day visit to the reclusive country, said malnutrition was a problem in North Korea but she had not seen any obvious signs of it in the capital Pyongyang.
North Korea — which does not allow its citizens to leave the country — has no shortage of doctors and nurses, in contrast to other developing countries where skilled healthcare workers often emigrate, she said.
This allows North Korea to provide comprehensive healthcare, with one “household doctor” looking after every 130 families, said the head of the United Nations health agency, praising North Korea’s immunization coverage and mother and child care.
“They have something which most other developing countries would envy,” Chan told a news conference, noting that her visit was a rare sign of the communist state’s willingness to cooperate with outside agencies.
Chan’s comments marked a significant change from the assessment of her predecessor, Gro Harlem Brundtland, who said in 2001 that North Korea’s health system was near collapse.
Chan, who acknowledged that countries that she visits always try to look good while pointing to where they need help, met a series of North Korean officials, visited several hospitals, and also talked to Pyongyang-based diplomats, United Nations officials and representatives of the Red Cross.
The authorities acknowledge there is a problem with malnutrition, she said, but things have become better since famine in the 1990s and a series of natural disasters in 2001.
“Nutrition is an area that the government has to pay attention (to) and especially for pregnant women and for young children,” Chan said.
NO SIGNS OF OBESITY
Chan spent most of her brief visit in Pyongyang, and she said that from what she had seen there most people had the same height and weight as Asians in other countries, while there were no signs of the obesity emerging in some parts of Asia.
But she said conditions could be different in the countryside.
News reports said earlier this year that North Koreans were starving to death and unrest was growing as last year’s currency revaluation caused prices to soar.
Chan, who described her visit as “technical and professional” — in other words avoiding politics — said the North Korean government’s readiness to work with international agencies, such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, was encouraging.
The Global Fund requires countries it works with to provide sound data, account for resources contributed and allow access by officials, she noted.
“I can confirm that at least in the area of health the government is receptive to engagement with international partners,” she said.
“They are receptive to requests for increasing transparency — have a better quality data — and being held accountable for the resources flowing into the country to improve health.”
North Korea, whose human rights record has been strongly condemned by U.N. experts, is refusing to return to six-party talks about its nuclear program, which has led to U.N. sanctions being imposed after a nuclear test in May last year.
Tension is increasing with South Korea, with which the North fought a war in 1950-53, after the sinking of a South Korean naval vessel last month for which Seoul increasingly suspects Pyongyang.
But Chan praised a joint project between North and South Korea to improve women’s and children’s health, which she said was promoting dialogue and trust between the two rivals.
Last month, the WHO said North Korea has reduced deaths from surgery and among women in childbirth under the South Korea-funded program.
The Wall Street Journal calls out Ms. Chan:
Greetings, comrades. World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan has returned from Pyongyang with wonderful news. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is making great strides in health care, with one “household doctor” for every 130 households. Thanks to on-the-spot guidance from Dear Leader Kim Jong Il, North Korean doctors selflessly choose not to emigrate and have even conquered the decadent West’s problem of obesity!
All right, we exaggerate. But only the part about the Dear Leader. Ms. Chan’s surreal statements last Friday, as reported by several wire services, really did include praise for North Korean health care and the lack of obesity. “They have something which most other developing countries would envy,” the global health administrator gushed. In her guided tours, she saw few signs of malnutrition, and the people in Pyongyang were the same height and weight as other Asians.
That’s hardly consistent with the reports of other visitors, or the accounts of North Koreans fleeing starvation—a trend on the upswing again after a poor harvest and harsh winter. Even Ms. Chan’s predecessor described the North’s health-care system as near collapse in 2001, and since then the North has continued to depend on foreign aid to feed one-third of its population. As for the abundance of doctors, the North’s declaration on the WHO website ought to arouse suspicion: “During the period 2001-2003, the number of doctors was increased by 104 percent, the nurses 125 percent and the midwives 107 percent.”
It appears Ms. Chan is either winking at the reality to maintain contact with the North or she allowed herself to be fooled. Her own organization’s doctors have described appalling conditions in North Korean hospitals, such as the lack of running water and electricity.
But then this is nothing new for the WHO. In the 1970s, the United Nations agency promoted Mao Zedong’s vision of “barefoot doctors” to serve the rural poor—even as China’s health-care system was collapsing, along with the rest of society, under the strain of the Cultural Revolution. Today the WHO has become a cheerleader for Cuban health care. As long as a totalitarian state gives plenty of poorly trained people the title of doctor, fudges its health statistics and takes visiting officials on tours of Potemkin hospitals, the U.N. seems happy to give its seal of approval.
Ms. Chan’s testimony can be read here.
Hat tip to a reader.
Read the full story here:
North Korea has plenty of doctors: WHO
Reuters
Jonathan Lynn
4/30/2010
According to the Daily NK:
The chairman of North Korea’s State Development Bank, Jeon Il Chun visited China on April 8, reportedly to try and bring Chinese investment to Daebong Mine, located near Hyesan, Yangkang Province.
Daebong Mine is one of North Korea’s major gold mines, managed under the auspices of the No. 39 Department of the Central Committee, a special department charged with raising funds for Kim Jong Il’s personal use. Jeon Il Chun is the person in charge of the No. 39 Department.
Attempts to sell shares in a gold mine directly controlled by the 39 Department, Kim Jong Il’s own private safe, to China seem to indirectly imply that Kim is suffering from a debilitating foreign currency supply crisis.
One Daily NK source in China who is well-acquainted with North Korean affairs reported that while Jeon was in China, he met with the management of three or four Chinese enterprises which already have investments in North Korea, and suggested investment conditions under which the North could transfer some of its mineral rights to them and receive capital investments in return.
The source said, “For now, as far as I know, executive managers of the No. 39 Department have been in contact with Chinese enterprises. Since the Workers’ Party is trying to sell shares in a gold mine, it seems the funding of the Party might be serious.”
“It is not clear whether or not this attempt was done on Kim Jong Il’s instructions, but attracting foreign investment in a gold mine is not a commonplace affair,” the source pointed out, adding that an investor has not yet been put in place.
What is the Daebong Mine for?
The Daebong Mine is a relatively large gold mine on the border of Woonheung and Gapsan in Yangkang Province. Until 2001, a Yangkang provincial foreign currency earning enterprise and the foreign currency earning department of the People’s Safety Agency jointly managed it. However, in May, 2002, it became a No. 39 Department affiliated enterprise.
The No. 39 Department has been raising private funds for the leader and Party operations under the Finance and Accounting Department of the Central Committee since the mid-1970s. According to defectors, it has the highest authority and the largest funds of all North Korea’s foreign currency earning enterprises. Especially, it has the ability to mobilize tremendous financial resources since it manages and controls supplies of gold and silver and rare non-ferrous metals.
A source from Yangkang Province explained, “According to Chongjin University of Mining and Metals and Kim Chaek University of Technology, the purity of the gold from the Daebong Mine is more than 76 percent, while production from Hoichang and Eunsan in South Pyongang Province is 63 percent and 61 percent respectively. More than 150kg of solid gold is produced annually, so this mine is known as the ‘loyalty mine’.”
“People say that the government earns four or five million dollars a year through this mine. Neither Yangkang Provincial Committee nor Hyesan Municipal Committee is involved with the business of the mine.”
The source added, “Since the No. 39 Department deals with the mine, only those discharged soldiers with good family backgrounds are dispatched there by the Central Committee. In October of last year, around 200 discharged soldiers with good family backgrounds came to the mine.”
Almost all the gold produced in the Daebong Mine is stored in Swiss and Austrian banks in gold bars.
Click here to see what I believe is the mine’s location.
Read the full article here:
No. 39 Department Hawking Shares in Key Gold Mine
Daily NK
5/3/010
Lee Sung Jin
According to the Korea Herald:
Twenty-four South Koreans — 18 employees of Hyundai Asan Corp. and six of its partner firms such as Emerson Pacific — returned home yesterday following 36 Chinese employees who left the resort on Sunday.
This leaves only 16 people to look after the resort — 12 Hyundai Asan employees and four of Emerson Pacific’s golf course.
North Korea last week told all but 16 employees of the South Korean companies operating in the Mount Geumgang resort to leave after announcing that it “seized” or “froze” South Korean real estate assets within the tourist zone.
The Seoul government has repeatedly said that it will take firm countermeasures against the North’s “illegal and unjust actions that are fundamentally detrimental to inter-Korean relations” in consideration of various circumstances.
…
The Seoul government is reportedly weighing several options including cutting inter-Korean trade or tightening control over goods entering the North.
North Korea last week attached “confiscation” stickers on facilities owned by the South Korean government and the state-funded Korea Tourism Organization such as the spa center and a building for reunions of families separated by the border.
They also “froze” tourism assets owned by private companies such as Hyundai Asan, sticking notes on the doors and keyholes of hotels, duty free shops and restaurants that have been dormant for nearly two years.
The Seoul government suspended tours to the Mount Geumgang resort after a South Korean tourist was shot dead there in July 2008.
Read the full article here:
S. Korean workers leave N.K. resort
Korea Herald
Kim So-hyun
5/3/2010
Last week, NK Leadership Watch wrote about the funeral of Kim Jung-rin. Using a video of the funeral I was able to map out the procession and solve a mystery I have wondered about for some time: Where does the DPRK hold state funerals?
First, below is a map of the likely funeral procession. It starts in Potonggang District and travels to the Patriotic Martyr’s Cemetery in the north of the city. It is probably safe to assume that most state funerals these days follow the same route. I only offer one caveat, however, it is possible state funeral processions drive past Kamsusan Memorial Palace rather than taking the most direct route:
Click image for larger version.
Below is an image of the building where the funeral was held. I am told by a North Korean defector that it is called Sojang Hall (서장구락부). It is managed by the State Funeral Committee. Its coordinates are 39° 2’13.73″N, 125°44’14.74″E.
Click image for larger version
I did some quick research with the indispensable Stalin Search Engine and put together a list of officials who have received state funerals since 1996 (all Central Committee members): Kim Jung Rin, Hong Song Nam, Pak Song Chol, Yon Hyong Muk, Ri Tu Ik, Ri Jong Ok, Kim Pyong Sik, Jon Mun Sop, Kim Kwang Jin, Choe Kwang.
There is apparently another kind of prestigious funeral in the DPRK called a “People’s Funeral,” however, I can only find one individual who received one: Ri In Mo. Indeed it appears that the “People’s Funeral” was created specifically to honor him. Read more in KCNA here, here, and here.
Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
NK Brief No. 10-04-28-1
2010-04-28
The price of rice in North Korean markets, steadily declining until the end of March, saw an upswing in April. Rising prices indicate early concerns over food shortages expected during the lean crop season of May-June.
Recently, in the Nammun Market of Hyeryeong City (Satellite image here), rice that sold for 300 Won/Kg at the end of March was priced at 500 Won/Kg, and when there were no special rations delivered on the ‘Day of the Sun’, Kim Il Sung’s birthday (April 15), rumors spread that no state rations would be forthcoming, driving market prices up further.
Pyongyang itself was not immune to the rising prices. As rations were handed to Pyongyang residents in March, rice fell to as low as 200 Won/Kg in the Seongyo Market (Satellite image here), but by April 15, it had climbed back to 300 Won/Kg with rumors of upcoming shortages.
In the past, rice prices have fluctuated due to rumors of rations and/or food shortages, but since the latest currency reform, prices have been much more susceptible to people’s emotional concerns. Daily NK has been watching rice prices in Hyeryeong’s Nammun Market since February, and concluded that as rumors of price increases spread, price tags in markets shot up, at which time sellers felt the urge to dump their goods, bringing prices back down.
Immediately following last year’s currency reforms, North Korean authorities ordered the closing of markets. These markets reopened on February 5. Authorities had also dictated that rice be sold for 24 Won/Kg, but the time markets reopened, a ‘compromise plan’ allowed prices to climb to 240 Won/Kg. Within a month (March 7), prices shot up to 1,500 Won, only to crash back down weeks later (April 2) to 300 Won. Such drastic price fluctuations indicate a limited availability of food in the markets. This kind of seesawing prices reflects a lack of trust in authorities. As residents lost faith in North Korean authorities, they tried to sell their holdings, but differences in domestic prices, exchange rates, and black markets meant severe price instability.
From December to January, restrictions on the use of foreign currency, along with a sharp drop-off in rice trading, really drove up prices. However, authorities’ restrictions on foreign currency began to waiver, and this, combined with the launch of investigations into illegal hording of food supplies by businesses and foreign trading companies, led to an influx of rice into markets, bringing prices back down.
Now, with the future of rations in question even in Pyongyang and other major cities, rice prices are again on the rise. With many people predicting that economic conditions and food supplies will be lean in the near future, market prices will likely continue to increase. In North Korea, the price of rice is an important index, reflecting economic stability.
According to Yonhap:
Trade between South and North Korea nearly doubled last month compared with a year ago amid a nascent economic recovery in the South, a government report showed Wednesday.
Inter-Korean trade jumped 88.5 percent from a year ago to US$204.03 million in March, according to the report by the Korea Customs Service. Compared with two years ago, before the South Korean economy was hit by the global financial crisis, trade between the two Koreas rose 29.7 percent in the reported month.
South Korea imports a range of labor-intensive goods such as clothes and watches from the joint Kaesong industrial complex in North Korea, as well as seafood and some agricultural produce. North Korea imports textiles such as cotton and other staple fabrics, along with electronics products including computers and machinery.
South Korea’s outbound shipments to the North came to $84.36 million while its imports from the communist country amounted to $119.67 million. This marked the highest trade deficit for the South in 17 months at $35.31 million, the report said.
The surge came on the back of an economic turnaround in the South. Inter-Korean trade did not seem to be affected by ongoing political tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
During the first quarter of this year, two-way trade soared 64.3 percent from a year earlier to $526.72 million, it said.
Bilateral trade has increased steadily over the past decade from $328.65 million in 1999 to $651.68 million in 2002 and surpassing the $1 billion mark for the first time in 2005.
Inter-Korean trade reached $1.79 billion in 2007 and peaked at $1.82 billion the following year before falling slightly to $1.66 billion last year.
Read the full story here:
Inter-Korean trade nearly doubles to $200 mln in March
Yonhap
4/28/2010
Stars and Stripes (h/t NKnews.org)
Jon Rabiroff and Hwang Hae-rym,
4/29/2010
Kim Na-rae regularly travels three miles into enemy territory inside North Korea to work as a clothing embroidery designer — ignoring threats that the leadership there will someday turn Kim’s homeland into a “sea of fire.”
She is one of the 1,000 or so South Koreans who routinely venture across the Demilitarized Zone into North Korea to work at the Kaesong Industrial Complex, even though the two countries are technically at war and come close to resuming hostilities a couple of times each year.
Last week, South Korean President Lee Myung-bak met with two former presidents, Chun Doo-hwan and Kim Young-sam, who reportedly suggested shutting down Kaesong in response to North Korea’s suspected role in the March 26 sinking of the Cheonan, a South Korean warship.
The square-mile-plus complex — home to about 120 South Korean companies and more than 43,000 workers — was developed under former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung’s “Sunshine Policy” of promoting North-South relations and business opportunities.
It was launched during the administration of former President Roh Moo-hyun.
However, long-term plans to expand the complex to more than 25 square miles, 2,000 companies and 600,000 workers are frequently stalled by continuing friction between the North and the South.
The future of the 5-year-old complex is once again in doubt.
In a statement released in early April through the official Korean Central News Agency, the North said it would “entirely re-evaluate” its involvement in the Kaesong Industrial Complex if relations continue along a confrontational path.
Last week, South Korean media reports — citing an unnamed South Korean Unification Ministry official — said North Korean military officials who inspected the complex expressed concerns the South could use high-rises there to spy on the North or sneak troops into the country through the complex’s water system. The inspection intensified speculation the North might end or suspend its participation in the complex.
In a dispute last week, the North confiscated five buildings owned by South Korea at Diamond Mountain — a jointly operated tourist resort in North Korea that, much like the industrial complex, was designed to benefit South Korean businesses and the North Korean economy.
The North said it was seizing the buildings as compensation for losses it has sustained since the South stopped sending tours in 2008 after a North Korean soldier shot a South Korean tourist who reportedly wandered near a restricted area. The North said the shooting was accidental.
During its short history, the industrial complex “seems to hang there in limbo … swinging back and forth depending on the political winds at the time,” according to David Garretson, an international relations professor at the University of Maryland’s University College in South Korea.
For her part, Kim said she plans to continue working, trying to shut out the political posturing.
“I was very nervous and afraid about going into North Korea at first,” she said. “But I’ve found out [North Koreans] are more pure and naive than South Koreans. They don’t easily get angry. They just work hard.”
Cheap labor
When the complex opened in December 2004, benefits for both countries were clear.
The impoverished North would open a flow of cash into the country through land leases and wages that factories paid to tens of thousands of North Korean workers.
Businesses in the South would get access to low-paid workers for the labor-intensive production of clothes, electronics equipment, kitchen appliances and more.
If not for Kaesong, those businesses would have to look to open factories in such countries as Vietnam, Cambodia or Indonesia, according to Ok Sung-seok, president of the Nine Mode Co. and vice-chairman of the Kaesong Industrial Park Corporations Association.
Kaesong factories now produce goods worth more than $250 million a year. North Korean workers there make about $65 a month, but can earn as much as $90 by working overtime in addition to their regular 45-hour workweeks, Ok said.
South Koreans work primarily in managerial positions, and their pay varies depending on their employer. Most work three or four days a week, and while some return to their homes each day, many stay overnight between workdays in dormitorylike accommodations.
Canadian Navy Lt. Cmdr. Hugh Son, the United Nations Command Military Armistice Commission’s corridor control officer, said Kaesong workers have told him there are no armed North Korean guards manning the complex, but there is always “a presence” of security personnel.
Kwak Sang-bae, president of the Chung Song Trade Co. at Kaesong, said every business in the complex has a North Korean government official assigned to oversee and represent North Korean workers.
To Ok, the arrangement at Kaesong goes beyond commerce.
“I’ll never forget the touching moment of seeing South Koreans and North Koreans working together, side by side … when my factory first opened,” he said. “Cultivating and spreading the spirit of freedom to the Kaesong people is very inspiring.”
Ok fears further growth in factories could be jeopardized “because of the latest aggravated, unstable situation between the two Koreas.”
Convoy crossings
Because relations between the two Koreas have been tense even in the best of times, transportation between South Korea and the industrial complex is complicated.
For the project to begin, both countries had to clear what is now the Western Transportation Corridor — a yearlong effort that, on the South Korea side alone, required the removal of 1,700 land mines, Son said.
Now 20 DMZ convoys cross each day, with workers from the South going back and forth and materials heading North and manufactured goods heading South. Everybody must clear customs and immigration in both countries, going both ways, and no one is allowed to cross the DMZ without being granted clearance at least three days in advance, Son said.
After manifests are checked and immigration and customs are cleared, vehicles heading north line up for inspection. South Korean and U.N. vehicles then escort them as a convoy from the southern boundary of the DMZ to a point close to the Military Demarcation Line — the official border between the two countries and the midpoint of the DMZ.
After the convoy crosses the border, two North Korean military jeeps take over escorting duties to the industrial complex.
The corridor has been closed to vehicles on occasions when tensions between the two countries have been high. Son said the last time was for two days during the 2009 U.S.-South Korea Key Resolve/Foal Eagle exercise, an annual event the North routinely condemns as an act of aggression.
Small talk
Ok said North Korean and South Korean workers at the complex are free to talk with each other about anything, except politics or government.
“We usually talk about our families, like how your children study well at school, or about our lives,” he said. “Listening to them, I cannot help thinking that there is a huge difference in the standards of living between us.
“And the lack of food makes them not grow tall enough. They are generally shorter than us.”
Kwak said that when his company opened a men’s clothing factory in the complex in 2007, Moon Pies were handed out to all the workers.
None of the North Koreans ate their snack.
“Instead, they put these very small pies into their pockets to bring home so they could give them to their children, even though they were hungry themselves,” he said. “I got choked up.”
Nationalism does sometimes find its way into conversations.
Yu Eun-jae, who is in charge of distribution for a cell phone parts manufacturer in the complex, said he stopped sharing details of his personal life at work, because a North Korean worker kept saying how far superior his country’s education system is compared to South Korea’s.
“ ‘Going to universities in North Korea is free,’ ” the worker would say, according to Yu. “ ‘How can you send your children to universities that are so expensive in South Korea?’ ”
Kwak said he believes North Korean workers at the Kaesong factories enjoy an atmosphere of freedom they would not find in state run businesses in the North.
Still, he added, “I am afraid and worried that we could be in danger if hostilities get worse. But, as a businessman, I am trying to do my best under the circumstances.”
Garretson doesn’t believe either country will “pull the plug” on the complex, because too much would be lost for both sides.
“It is a point where they meet, so there’s going to be friction,” he said.
The complex for both sides “is very profitable. At the same time, the communication is there for both sides,” said Son, the Canadian lieutenant commander with the U.N.
“I’m ethnically Korean … and I hope things work out,” he said. “I would love to come back here one day and take a tour of North Korea.”
