Archive for the ‘Transportation’ Category

North Korea strengthens internal travel restrictions to keep the coronavirus in check

Friday, February 28th, 2020

By: Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

Daily NK  has reported on the travel restrictions inside the county before, as this blog has covered here and here. This recent report goes into greater detail:

“The No. 2 departments in local Ministry of People’s Security [MPS] offices are placing further restrictions on the issuing of travel documents, and the authorities are cracking down on vans shuttling people around for money,” a Kangwon Province-based source told Daily NK today.

“No. 10 sentry posts [managed by the Ministry of State Security, or MSS] are cracking down on buses and other vehicles moving people. Even local police stations have setup temporary checkpoints to conduct crack downs on vehicles transporting people,” the source added.

It seems like we’re not talking about a blanket ban on travel across provincial borders per se. Rather, the state is banning and heavily restricting certain forms of transportation, especially unauthorized kinds (which otherwise are often  tacitly tolerated, not least through institutionalized bribery). This, too, impacts market trade since the transportation sector is crucial to shuttling goods around the country.

The authorities are thoroughly preventing any vehicles or people from transiting from the border region to the interior of the country and the other way around, sources told Daily NK.

Sources said that anyone who has entered the country from abroad but doesn’t have a document certifying they have been tested for the coronavirus are restricted from travelling. Merchants without proper travel documentation are also reportedly being targeted by the authorities. Even work units involved in construction projects are being restricted from moving around, sources said.

[…]

No. 2 departments in local MPS offices are restricting the issuance of travel documents to everyone unless they are on government orders, Daily NK sources further reported.

Even factory officials who need to travel to other places of the country to collect raw materials have been told to wait until “later” (after the COVID-19 crisis passes over), sources said.

The authorities are also carefully checking container trucks and the baggage compartments of buses for people hitching a ride in these hidden spaces, they added.

There are gaps, however, in the lock down on travel that the authorities are trying to implement.

“Some vehicles, including taxis, are cleverly selecting routes to avoid checkpoints,” the Kangwon Province-based source said.

“People are wearing masks just to avoid getting stopped by the authorities,” he added.

The border regions are of course especially targeted. The state knows it cannot fully close the border shut and thus needs internal controls to be forceful. The mention of certification of testing is interesting and implies that there are ways individuals can take action to test themselves. Perhaps it refers to the medical test teams reportedly dispatched to the border to China.

“There are a lot of ‘storm troopers’ in Kangwon Province who hail from all over the country, which means there’s a lot of people moving around,” the Kangwon Province-based source said. “The authorities can’t completely shutdown the province from the outside because the shock troops need to move supplies into the area for construction projects, but they are setting up multiple check points to block as much traffic as they can.”

The state still needs to continue running its daily affairs, and it’s unclear to what extent construction projects and other things that may be hampered by internal controls have been put on hold. This must be a bureaucratic nightmare to coordinate and often, one hand of the state doesn’t know what the other is doing.

Article source: Kang Mi Jin, “N. Korea further strengthens restrictions on domestic travel,” Daily NK, 27 February 2020, accessed 28 February, 2020.

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South Korea gets sanctions exemption for railway survey

Saturday, November 24th, 2018

Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

Reuters:

South Korea said on Saturday it had received sanctions exemptions from the U.N. Security Council for a joint survey of inter-Korean railways, the first step towards reconnecting rail and road links cut during the 1950-53 Korean War.

In April, the leaders of the two Koreas agreed to adopt practical steps to reconnect railways and roads as part of efforts to improve bilateral relationships.

“The sanctions exemption has big implications given that the project has garnered recognition and support from the United States and the international society,” South Korea’s presidential spokesperson Kim Eui-kyeom said.

He expressed hope of quick construction of the railways, which he said will take inter-Korean cooperation to a new level.

South Korea requested an exemption for deliveries of fuel and other equipment needed to conduct the railway survey in the North, Yonhap News Agency said.

Pyongyang is under wide-ranging U.N. sanctions for its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.

In October, the two Koreas agreed to carry out joint field studies on transport plans, with a ground-breaking ceremony in late November and early December.

But the plan was delayed amid stalled talks between Washington and Pyongyang following an unprecedented summit in June at which the two sides agreed to work toward nuclearization and peace on the Korean peninsula.

Full article:
South Korea secures U.N. sanctions exemption for inter-Korean railway survey
Hyunjoo Jin
Reuters
2018-11-24

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Two Koreas start railway inspections

Sunday, October 21st, 2018

Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

South and North Korea are likely to start their joint on-site inspection as early as this week for a project to modernize and re-link railways across their border, government officials said Sunday.

At high-level talks last week, the two Koreas agreed to begin field surveys of the western Gyeongui railway in late October and the Donghae railway along their east coast in November.

“The Koreas are known to be discussing ways to conduct the inspection (on the North section) of the Gyeongui line starting late this week,” a government official said.

“The schedule is flexible, depending on consultations between the government and the United Nations Command (UNC) over the passage of the Military Demarcation Line,” he added.

In August, the Koreas failed to carry out a joint railway field survey as the U.S.-led UNC did not approve the plan, citing “procedural” problems, a move widely seen as U.S. objection to the inter-Korean railway project on the basis that it might hamper sanctions.

“As far as I’m concerned, Seoul’s consultations with Pyongyang as well as the UNC are smoothly under way,” the official said.

If launched, the joint inspection will involve the test operation of a train on the railway linking Seoul to the North’s northwestern city of Sinuiju.

After that, the Koreas will check the eastern railway on the North’s side that connects Mout Kumgang to its northeastern North Hamgyong province.

South and North Korea are looking to hold a ground-breaking ceremony for work on the rail and road systems along the eastern and western regions either in late November or early December.

Meanwhile, the two Koreas plan to hold working-level talks starting this week to implement agreements of the inter-Korean summit held in Pyongyang last month.

Full article/source:
Koreas to start joint inspection of western railway as early as this week
Yonhap News
2018-10-21

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South Korea, North Korea and Russia discuss railway cooperation

Sunday, July 15th, 2018

Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

Trilateral cooperation discussions on the cross-peninsular railway happened in Rason despite Russia’s earlier cancellation:

A group of representatives from South Korea’s presidential panel returned home Sunday after a trip to North Korea, where they discussed possible trilateral economic cooperation involving the two Koreas and Russia, its official said.

The Presidential Committee on Northern Economic Cooperation sent an 11-member team led by committee chairman Song Young-gil to the North’s northeastern border region of Rason. They stayed there for two days from Friday.

The team originally planned to attend a seminar hosted by Russia to discuss trilateral economic cooperation involving the two Koreas and Russia but canceled its participation. Instead it had discussions with North Koreans and Russians on the Rajin-Khasan project and other issues, the official said.

Rason, formerly known as Rajin and Sonbong, was designated as a special economic zone in 1991. The North has sought to develop the zone by drawing outside investment but faced setbacks amid its continued provocations.

The Rajin-Khasan project, in particular, is a logistics project aimed at transporting coal from Russia to the North by using a 54 km-long railway linking Khasan in Russia to the Rajin port of North Korea and then to South Korea by ship.

There have been test operations of the transport route three times, including the latest one in November 2015.

The trilateral cooperation project, however, has been put on hold as South Korea banned maritime transport from the North in early 2016 in the wake of the North’s nuclear and missile provocations.

South Korea and the United States have said that full-fledged economic cooperation with the North should wait until it carries out its promised “complete denuclearization.”

“The Rajin-Khasan project is not subject to U.N. sanctions but to sanctions imposed by the U.S. So we plan to draw up and propose a broad picture and make preparations for joint study until there is progress in denuclearization and discussion begins on lifting those sanctions,” the panel official said.

Article source:
Presidential panel discusses Rajin-Khasan cooperation during trip to N.K.
Yonhap News
2018-07-15

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Two Koreas agree on railway improvements

Wednesday, June 27th, 2018

Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

AP reports on talks between North and South Korea to improve North Korean railways, including a great overview of current railway systems in the country:

North Korea’s state media on Wednesday acknowledged inter-Korean discussions on “issues arising in reconnecting, updating and using the railways on the east and west coasts,” but did not describe that South Korea would be sending officials and experts to examine the country’s aging rail system.

The agreement Tuesday to start joint inspections of North Korea’s railways on July 24 was apparently as far as the rivals could go at the moment. The vows to upgrade the North’s railways and roads will remain purely aspirational until international sanctions against North Korea are lifted and the South is freed to take material steps.

The talks at the border village of Panmunjom were the latest to discuss ways to carry out peace commitments made by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in.

During their April 27 summit, when they issued a vague commitment to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula, Kim and Moon expressed a desire to modernize North Korea’s railways and roads and reconnect them with the South. The Koreas are to hold another meeting on Thursday to discuss roads.

South Korean officials say better transport would greatly improve North Korea’s economy by facilitating trade and tourism. It may also provide the South with cheaper ways to move goods in and out of China and Russia. However, some experts say updating North Korean trains, which creak slowly along rails that were first laid in the early 20th century, would require a massive effort that could take decades and tens of billions of dollars. It might be impossible to embark on such projects unless North Korea denuclearizes, which isn’t a sure thing.

THE WEST SIDE

In their summit, Kim and Moon called for “practical steps” toward the “connection and modernization” of railways and roads between South Korea’s capital, Seoul, and North Korea’s Sinuiju, a port town on its border with China, and also along the peninsula’s “eastern transportation corridor.”

During the meeting on April 27, Kim went against the grain of North Korean propaganda by describing the country’s transport conditions as poor and praising South Korea’s bullet train system, clearly communicating an eagerness to improve his country’s rail networks, according to comments provided by South Korea’s presidential office.

In Tuesday’s meeting, the Koreas agreed to start inspections of the North Korean portion of a railway that once connected Seoul and Sinuiju before moving on to railways in the eastern region.

Japan completed a 499-kilometer (310-mile) railway line connecting Seoul and Sinuiju in 1906, mainly to move soldiers and military supplies, before it annexed the peninsula in 1910. The Gyeongui line was separated in 1945 at the end of World War II, when the peninsula was liberated from Japanese colonial rule but also divided between a U.S.-controlled southern side and a Soviet-controlled north. The peninsula remains in a technical state of war after the 1950-53 Korean War ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty.

The Gyeongui line was temporarily reconnected during a previous era of rapprochement between the rivals in the 2000s. The Koreas in December 2007 began freight services between South Korea’s Munsan Station in Paju and North Korea’s Pongdong Station, which is near the border town of Kaesong. The South used the trains to move construction materials northbound, while clothing and shoes manufactured from a factory park jointly operated by the Koreas in Kaesong were sent southbound.

The line was cut again in November 2008 due to political tensions over North Korea’s nuclear program and the hard-line policies of a new conservative government in Seoul.

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THE EAST SIDE

Japan during its colonial rule completed a 193-kilometer (120-mile) rail line between North Korea’s Anbyon county and South Korea’s Yangyang along the peninsula’s eastern coast in 1937. The Koreas temporarily reconnected the cross-border part of the line between 2007 and 2008 to move South Korean tourists in and out of the North’s scenic Diamond Mountain resort. However, the project never advanced beyond a trial run before South Korea pulled out in June 2008 amid worsening ties.

South Korea has ambitions to significantly extend the eastern “Donghae” line so that it connects its southernmost port of Busan with North Korea’s northernmost industrial cities of Chongjin and Rajin. Seoul hopes the line will eventually link South Korea with Russia and the trans-Siberian railway. South Korea also hopes to eventually reopen a railway between Seoul and North Korea’s eastern coastal town of Wonsan which ran through the middle of the peninsula.

Article source:
Koreas agree to improve North’s railways, but work must wait
Kim Tong-Hyung
AP News
2018-06-27

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Kim Jong-un’s Wonsan boat at Tae-do in 2017

Monday, April 9th, 2018

With Planet Labs imagery, we are able to get improved and affordable access to some remote places in North Korea which allows us to keep better track of changes than is possible with just Google Earth or Google Maps. Here is a small example…

Analysis of the North Korean media indicates that Kim Jong-un spends a lot of time in Wonsan. As we all know, he has a family compound there that was visited by Dennis Rodman and his delegation. At this compound, we can observe several unique boats that are only seen in Wonsan (pictured below).

Kim Jong-un also stores some of these at a separate maintenance facility in central Wonsan (with some other boats that are at his disposal):

There are five of these particular boats as far as I am aware. They are approximately 50m-60m in length. From satellite imagery, it appears they are mostly differentiated by the amount of cover they provide. They may each offer different services, but I have not been able to see many ground-level photos of these boats. As best I can tell, they are not self-propelled and have to be pulled to new locations.

 

  

Based on Google Earth imagery I was under the impression that these deck boats were simply transferred back and forth between the two locations mentioned above (Kim compound and storage facility), but with planet imagery, we can see that they are used more widely.

According to imagery form Planet Labs, two of these deck boats were deployed to Tae-do in the summer of 2017.

The first boat shows up in Planet Labs imagery of Tae-ri (below) on May 24, 2017, and it is visible until August 30, 2017.

The second boat appears in Planet Labs imagery at the same location on September 7, 2017 and is gone by September 13, 2017.

So it appears (superficially) that either Kim Jong-un left one of his leisure craft docked off the island to use whenever he felt like “getting away,” or perhaps it is being used by senior personnel in the military as a “perk.”

As for the island itself, Kim is never reported to have made a guidance visit to it. It is most well known for hosting a small naval ship repair unit, so there may always be some service personnel within view of the boat.

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Pyongyang Bike Share

Wednesday, March 28th, 2018

UPDATE 1 (2018-3-30): A couple of recent visitors to North Korea have reached out to claim that the bike service still has yet to be put into use. I will update this post when I learn more.

ORIGINAL POST (2018-3-26):

 

Pictured Above (Russian Embassy): Two bike rental stations on Kwangbok Street and the Taehung Bicycle Rental and Storage Station (대흥 자전거 임대소 보관소) on Youth Street.

The Pyongyang Times (2018-3-8) has published an article on the new Pyongyang bike share program:

People riding brightly-coloured bikes along Kwangbok Street present an unusual scene in Mangyongdae District, Pyongyang.

Small yet cosy stations with blue roofs are seen in several places of the street, with lines of cute bicycles arranged and people bustling especially at rush hours.

They are part of service centres run by the Pyongyang bike-sharing company.

This year the company has started the bike rental service.

An online service management system, the bike-sharing system is expected to be one of the favoured public traffic service systems.

Customers need to buy cards to hire bikes at any of the stations.

They can pass the cards through card readers at any stations, input passwords to unlock the bikes and use them. They pay fees when they return them to any of the stations.

Bike-sharing is an environment-friendly and energy-saving service that suits the local conditions as it helps reduce urban pollution by vehicles and save fuel.

The stations generate electricity needed for service activities by utilizing solar energy.

“Bike-sharing is widely adopted by many countries as part of global efforts to reduce pollution,” said Myong Si Man, director of the company. “Our system helps not only satisfy the growing demand for traffic means but also promote public health. We plan to widen the coverage of bike-sharing service to other parts of the city and upgrade the method of service.”

Riding bike is good for health and some elders in the district share bikes just for an exercise, he added.

Stylish Ryomyong-brand bikes are helpful to ensuring clean environment of Pyongyang and providing convenience for passengers. It now adds a special touch of beauty to the city.

This is not the first mention in the North Korean media. In July of last year Tongil News reported the first bikes were brought in to the rental stations on the 1st of July 2017 and services were due to begin in late July 2017. According to this South Korean source, however, the service did not actually begin until January 15, 2018 (consistent with the claim in this PY Times article).

According to Tongil News,  the bikes are called Ryomyong (려명) bikes and come from a North Korean/Chinese joint venture called Phyongjin Bicycle Cooperative Company (평진자전거합영회사) located in Sosong District (서성구역), Pyongyang. The payment cards needed to rent the bikes are called Ryomyong Cards and need to be bought with a Jonsong Card at one of the five locations on Kwangbok-street. The overall operation is overseen by the Pyongyang Bicycle Rental Office (평양자전거임대관리소).

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Namyang’s post 2016 flood recovery

Wednesday, March 21st, 2018

New Google Earth imagery shows for the first time the scale of the construction work taken in Namyang District of Onsong County in North Hamgyong Province.

In September of 2016, areas of North Korea along the Tumen River experienced severe devastation from flooding. One of these areas was Namyang, across the river from the Chinese city of Tumen.

Here are Planet Labs images that give a sense of the scale of the damage during the flood:

August 28, 2016

September 7, 2016

September 17, 2016

Here are Google Earth images of Namyang before and after the flooding:

This construction project was monitored from China. Here are a couple of the pictures that were taken (Photo Credit: Getty)

 

Looking at the satellite imagery of the renovated Namyang, there are a few interesting changes. First, the Namyang market was destroyed in the flood and I am not sure where the new one is (or if there is a new one).

Second, a small revolutionary site was moved farther from the river so it will not be washed away again:

Third, we can see construction of the new Namyang-Tumen Bridge underway (but apparently stalled):

The image on the left is 2015-9-13. The image on the right is 2018-1-31. The new bridge is approximately 510m in length and will be able to support traffic in both directions simultaneously.  It is the third border bridge to be renovated/built after the Dandong-Sinuiju Bridge and the Rason-Hunchun (Quanhe-Wonjong) Bridge. This bridge was announced in 2014 and was supposed to be completed by 2016.

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The Pyongyang Trolley Bus Factory manufactures new model

Tuesday, March 20th, 2018

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)

Having been upgraded and modernized, the Pyongyang Trolley Bus Factory, a company located in the Pyongchon district of Pyongyang and a manufacturer of one of the most typical means of public transportation in the capital of North Korea, is accelerating the production of a new type of vehicle, the Tokyo-based Choson Sinbo reported from Pyongyang on March 15.

According to the Tongil News report on March 15, the factory has been recently turning out the basic model of connected trolley buses known as the Chollima-091, which can accommodate a large number of passengers.

However, the company has newly introduced the Chollima-316, a smaller trolley bus compared to the older Chollima-091 model. The Chollima-316 has a smaller passenger capacity, but they are designed for safer operation and greater passenger comfort.

The new trolley buses have 24 seats with a boarding capacity of 80 passengers, although are said to be able to accommodate a maximum of 120 people if needed.

The Pyongyang Trolley Bus Factory is also said to have developed and introduced a new type of electric motor, which is said to assure the stable operation of the trolley buses even at low voltage.

Reportedly, the new motor allows for a power savings of up to 40 percent compared to the old model, along with substantial reduction in vibration and noise. Other features include a lower first step for passengers’ boarding convenience.

Last year, for the first time in North Korea, the factory developed and completed a test run of a trolley bus equipped with a dual power system that runs on both battery and electricity.

Having the battery as a power source ensures that the bus can operate even in contingencies such as a blackout, disconnected wire, or road accident.

Accompanied by his wife Ri Sol-ju, Chairman Kim Jong-un visited the factory in early February this year and rode the Chollima-316 trolley during a test drive. He reportedly commented after the ride that “Having taken a ride in the trolley, I felt comfortable and have faith in it.” He was also impressed with its features. “It has good shock absorbers, is free of vibration and noise, and it has a good speed,” he added.

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A small update on the Nampho leadership boat

Thursday, March 1st, 2018

Contemporary North Korea watchers (including myself) first noticed this boat in a Google Earth satellite image dated 2015-10-4. I mentioned it in articles for RFA (2016-2-3) and NK News.

A check of historical imagery of the Nampho area also reveals the boat docked there on 2013-11-4.

The boat is quite large (appx 50m in length). At the time of publication, I speculated that it might be stored at a large boat house in north-eastern Pyongyang with some other leadership boats. Though this is the largest boat house I am aware of on the Taedong River, I am still not sure if this is the case.

 

Subsequent imagery shows the boat berthed on Chol-do at KPA Navy Unit 123 (2016-5-31).

Despite the boat’s size, it does not appear on any other public (Google Earth) satellite imagery as far as I am aware.

Although its current purpose remains a mystery, it was recently featured on KCTV. According to the footage, the boat is actually quite old, and it used to be one of Kim Il-sung’s.

So despite only being recently “discovered” by the open source community, the boat appears to have been around for some time, and it does not appear to violate the UNSC prohibition on the export of luxury goods to North Korea. It may be one of Kim Jong-un’s boats (he may have inherited it), but it is possible it has been “handed down” to some other agency (for use by senior navy personnel for example) at some point when the Kim family upgraded their transportation options. The evidence for this latter theory is that the boat’s location does not coincide with any of Kim Jong-un’s guidance trips. However, this is not definitive evidence since Kim makes public appearances that are not reported in the official media, or are reported to have taken place on different days than they actually occurred.

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