[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Supporting Overseas Representative Officers Will Ease the Trade
Overseas Representatives Returning Home Subject to Surprise Investigations
Chinese Travelers under 24-hour Surveillance
A Bad Year for Squid Fishing
Selling Vegetables Instead With Lack of Squid This Year
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Supporting Overseas Representative Officers Will Ease the Trade
The overseas representative officers do not have a magic wand. They cannot create gold and silver by simply chanting, “Come out, gold; come out, silver.” One should not just impose each officer with the yearly contribution of 50,000 euros for the state’s food budget and badger them about not achieving the goal fast enough. They must find a way to stimulate the trade if they want the officers to secure more food. The aftereffects of inspection at the Ministry of Foreign Trade still continue to this day, and the most urgent issue now is to provide support for the officers working on the frontline of foreign trade. The ministry must have trust in its officials and let them make whatever deal with any business partner they may find. Trust must be given in order to demand loyalty from the officers; summoning them whenever they return to North Korea to conduct an investigation about their overseas activities only undermines their morale. At this point, it is necessary to examine whether the loyalty competition of the security officers is going too far, and if it is the case, stopping them from putting trade officials under too much scrutiny can help revitalizing foreign trade. The North and South Korean governments work together for economic cooperation as soon as possible, starting from the areas that are mutually beneficial. The mineral resources, or agricultural and fishery products of North Korea sold in large quantities to China at an absurdly low price is a disastrous loss for the nation. There are many ways for North and South Korea to coexist, and it is frustrating to see them perpetually in a confrontation that brings loss to both of them.
Overseas Representatives Returning Home Subject to Surprise Investigations
The officials at Overseas Representatives are put under surprise investigations upon their return to North Korea. An official who returned to Pyongyang the end of last month testified that when he arrived at Sinuiju, security officers who were waiting for him took him away for questioning.
“A black sedan came to the bridge, and asked me if I was so and so. When I said that was me, they told me to get in the car and I was taken to a government office building. I was taken into an empty room where a security officer suddenly asked me, “Okay, Comrade, I want you to tell me truth. How many South Korean people have you met until now?” When I said I had no idea what he was talking about, he suddenly became angry: “We know everything, Comrade, so it’s best to tell me everything when I’m in a good mood. Who did you meet, and how many times did you meet them?” I suddenly felt my heart sink. I wondered what they had heard about me, and because I could not pretend not to have met with any South Koreans, I said, “I met some South Korean people a couple of times at restaurants and tea shops.” I said I could not remember their names. When the security officer countered angrily that “it’s ridiculous to think that you don’t know their names after meeting with them several times,” I became angry. I too am in a position of responsibility and hold rank within the government, so I retorted, “Comrade, you are saying that I hung around South Koreans, but what are you basing these accusations on? Show me your evidence.”
The security officer responded by threatening to interrogate me somewhere else if I did not tell the truth. But seeing that they could not provide any evidence, I guessed that they were just putting on a show. With confidence, I replied, “I never met any South Korean people on purpose, nor have I hung around with them.” When the security officer countered with what I had said before about meeting South Koreans at tea shops and restaurants, I replied by saying: “I dined with some of them because they are working with fellow representatives of the Republic, and as for the others, I simply exchanged greetings with them while meeting colleagues in tea houses to discuss projects.” At this, the security officer threatened me again: “Are you crazy, Comrade? You clearly know that as a member of the party, you are forbidden from any unauthorized encounter with South Koreans, but not only did you meet with them on purpose, you also failed to report your contact with them. Think hard about who you met, and what you talked about, and tell me the truth!” In anger, I countered with the following: “Why are you really doing this? Comrades, you would not be saying these things if you knew about how people lived while they are overseas. If meeting with South Koreans is a problem, you would have to interrogate every single overseas restaurant manager and their employees about their daily encounters with South Koreans. Comrade, what in the world are you trying to do?” Some time after I told the security officer my place of work and rank, and that I would be filing a report to the main office, his attitude began to soften considerably. “Don’t misunderstand. I have just been asking these questions as a formality. You are not guilty of anything per se, but we have been ordered to thoroughly investigate all those living overseas who interact with South Koreans or who are involved in trade with the South. You told me yourself that you have been meeting South Koreans, so I was just asking these questions as a formality.”
Chinese Travelers under 24-hour Surveillance
Recently, the North Korean authorities have been putting some Chinese travelers who are in the country for a personal trip under a 24-hour surveillance. Among these Chinese travelers who entered North Korea this year, approximately 60 were arrested, and it is reported that some of them were released after admitting their charges and taking an oath to cooperate with the Security Department. An officer in the Central Party acknowledged that there are some Chinese (ethnically Korean) brokers who work as the informants for the Security Department. He said, “My understanding is that from April to the present, more than 100 people (North Korean defectors in China) were repatriated through the Chinese travelers who were released after agreeing to participate in the Security Department.” He said that even those who took the oath have probably paid more than 50,000 yuan in fine. He was reluctant to comment on the question whether the people who could not pay the fine, saying that “I do not know everything that the Security Department does. I do not know any further.” The inquiry was made through another officer, and it was found that there has been a series of deaths; a woman in her fifties was interrogated for espionage in the Security Department for more than 20 days and died from severe torture, and at least three people, including the woman, were dead.
A Bad Year for Squid Fishing
Winter is the season for squid fishing, but this year, the harvest is not as good as it used be. Some even say that there is no more squid in the ocean at all. Kim Kwang-oh (alias), a squid fisherman in Chungjin, North Hamgyong Province, says, “It seems that the harvest decreases every year. Squid fishing is the only way I can earn my living. However, starting from a few years ago, the number of days without any harvest has increased. It is very difficult to see even a single squid this year. This year’s harvest is less than one-fifth of the last year’s.”
One city official states, “It is true that the number of squids have decreased, and the matter is made worse by Chinese fishing boats whatever squids that are left in the ocean. Our fishermen’s boats and their equipments are old, and they don’t function well. They are also short on oil; things are just not great for them. In contrast, Chinese boats function well, so they fish better. The fishermen also pointed out that the government’s tougher restriction on going out to the sea is another reason for the difficulty in squid fishing. It has become more difficult to get a certificate for the sea access, because there have been cases of North Korean fishing boats crossing the sea border to South Korea. All these factors have played their part in making this year the worst year for the squid harvest, to the distress of fishing villages.
Selling Vegetables Instead With Lack of Squid This Year
Shim Minhui (alias), from Undok, North Hamkyung Province, is a brave 25-year old woman who is the breadwinner of the family. She was looking after her father who was suffering from a liver failure until his recent death, as well as earning living to sustain her mother and her older brother. She has made living by selling whatever item that makes a profitable business. Around this time of the year in the past, she normally sold a lot of squids, getting it from fishing villages in Chongjin, Hoeryong, or Onsong. However, she says that this year is different: “This year I can’t afford squids, because the price went up so much with the lack of squids in the ocean. Now that I have to sell something different, I started selling vegetables which I grew at home to the Sunam Market in Chongjin.”
She also sells her neighbors’ crops as well. She says she had sold eggplants that cost her somewhere around 200-250 won in kilogram at a price as high as 700 won at Sunam market. The high retail price is due to the heightened demand for vegetables in late fall for making the reserve of kimchi for wintertime and this year’s dismal vegetable harvest. Vegetables are sold for more than double their usual price, sometime even triple, as long as there is a supply. Cucumber, normally priced at 150 won, is sold at 500-600 Won these days; and a green pepper, normally priced at 300-350, is sold at 700-800 won.
With a smile, Ms. Shim said that she is almost done paying back the 300,000 Won loan she had. She also said that she feels like she can sustain her three-person family as long as she can cover the cost for the ride to and from Chongjin. When asked about maintaining her official job, she answered that she was okay with her bribe payment of 20,000 won to her boss every month. “Selling squid is more profitable than selling vegetables. According to the fishermen, the next year is not likely to be any better, and it’s a source of concern for me that I might have to find alternatives to selling squids again next year,”said Ms. Shim.
Friday, January 20, 2012
North Korea Today No. 430 November 23, 2011
[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Finding Confidence in the Regime Comes Before Banning South Korean Goods
Tough Crackdown on South Korean Goods
Young Women Sport Bolder Hairstyles and Fashion
Popularity of European goods in the Upper Class
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Finding Confidence in the Regime Comes Before Banning South Korean Goods
The news of tough crackdown on South Korean goods brought a scene from the flim J.S.A: Joint Security Area (2000) back to mind, in which the North Korean Sergeant Oh Kyongpil becomes friends with Sergeant Lee Suhyuk and his men from the South, and together they share the music and food from the South, listening to Kim Kwangsuk’s songs, and sharing Choco Pie. Lee tells Oh that he could have as many Choco Pies as he wants if he defects to South Korea. Upon this comment, Oh spits out the snack from his mouth, and tells Lee that his dream is to see the day that his country makes a better Choco Pie than that from the South. Although it was a scene from a movie, there was something admirable about the pride that the North Korean soldier had about his country. However, if that pride about one’s country is only a product of constant crackdowns and inspections, maybe it would not be so admirable after all. Even putting the crackdown on South Korean goods aside, from the way that the North Korean state scolds young women about the way they dress claiming that it reflects their poor ideological moral, it seems clear that the state feels insecure about maintaining the regime. Before admonishing young women, the North Korean state must find confidence in its own regime. The only way to do so is to seek economic development through the cooperation with the South. A South Korean Choco Pie factory built in the North and its products being exported to Russia is an entirely possible dream. In that case, the North Korean public will support the regime, notwithstanding whatever clothes or hairstyle that they choose to have.
Tough Crackdown on South Korean Goods
In Pyongyang, since Jaunary of this year there has been a crackdown on South Korean goods, films, and video clips. It seemed to come to an end in June, but it re-started again in September and it is continuing on. This time, the crackdown effort was focused on border areas where there are customs. An official from Pyongyang says that it is a measure initiated by the concern that South Korean culture may spread wider. Not a long ago, the Central Party stated that the most powerful threat to domestic political stability, next to the food shortage and economic crisis, is the spread of South Korean ideas, culture, and goods, and that for the next three years, the crackdown on South Korean goods must be taken as seriously as the crackdown on border crossers. The Central Party is also meticulous about regulating the public’s fashion and appearance, cracking down on “the phenomenon of exotic clothes and hairdos.” Choi Yoonjong from Kwanghwa-dong, Haeju, South Hwanghae Province was caught by an officer “wearing an indecently twisted shirt, and pants that hideously cling to the body,” and had to endure a sermon that lasted for a long time. Soyong Kim, who works at a textile mill in Sinuiju, North Pyongan province was admonished for her long hair worn loose, and baggy trousers without pleats. The offier scolded her: “Do you not understand that one’s clothes and hairstyle reflect the person’s ideological moral? How am I to think of your ideological moral, with your exotic clothes and hairstyle that reflect no national pride?” The Central Party states that “To open the doors to the future as a Strong and Prosperous Nation, everyone has to work with a revolutionary fervor, and even in choosing their clothes and hairstyle, they must do it while being conscious about the societal demands of our time.” The abovementioned official said that the reason that the North Korean government orders that the crackdown on South Korean goods should taken as seriously as the watch on border crossers is that it is concerned about the ideological effect of the Korean culture and goods that came in during the time of active North-South cooperation on the younger generation.
Young Women Sport Bolder Hairstyles and Fashion
The recent strengthening of clothing regulation can also be attributed to increase in women’s desire for self-expression. The Station 3 and the neighborhood unit lectures also express frustration toward the women who adamantly refuse to obey the societal dress code. “We were lectured about not wearing exotic clothes yesterday. They started the lecture saying that ‘we shall discuss about the evil trend engulfing the women nowadays,’ so I thought it would be about something really serious. Then, they talked about a woman who was caught growing her hair to her waist and dying it brown. After the lecture, older women seemed astonished at the strange things done by the youth, but younger women were complaining about the ridiculousness of these regulations. The lecturer seemed so frustrated that women wouldn’t get rid of their exotic hairstyle and clothes,” said Han Mi-ok, a recent graduate of Pyongyang University of Foreign Studies.
Han says such lectures are counterproductive because they give young women ideas about the latest trends in fashion. Young women take note of the examples of dress code violations as a way to find out what is in trend these days, using them as fashion inspiration. They are also put at ease knowing that there are those who make more bolder fashion choices.
“We come across many strangely dressed women during crackdowns. Their numbers have gone up. I usually patrol the Botong-kang area, and once I caught a woman wearing skin tight pants and black rimmed glasses that weren’t made in our country. At first I thought she was a foreigner so I let her go. But I took a second look at her and found out that she was indeed Korean. Other officers were deceived by her appearance too. She told me she lived in Moranbong. I admonished her, asking her if she was out of her mind, but she showed no signs of remorse, claiming other women dress like her too,” said a police officer in Pyongyang. Joo Miyong, a resident of Seosung was also caught wearing tight pants and a shirt with English writing. She was harshly scolded for lying the police that she’s from the overseas. The police officers claim that they were almost tricked into believing her at first, because she spoke in a Japanese accent. Still in doubt, they continued to question her until she eventually told the truth. “She was released with only a warning, but she would have faced harsher penalty if she pretended to be from South Korea,” added the police, and said that South Korean accent is widely spread among the young women as well.
Popularity of European goods in the Upper Class
The recent trade inspects has had the effect of changing the variety of imported goods in the North Korean market. The difficulty importing Chinese goods from the trade inspections created market for goods from other countries. According to Jang Haksung (alias), a traveling salesman supplying imported goods to business in the Jung district, Pyongyang, the ratio of goods from Europe and Southeast Asia has gone up with the difficulty in importing Chinese goods. European goods are expensive, but their high quality attracts mid- and high-level officials in Pyongyang into purchasing them. Goods from Thailand used to be considered as the better ones among those imported from Southeastern Asian countries, but the damage from the recent flood in Thailand put a halt to the import, causing a shortage in Thai goods. Jang added that the lower middle class households are the main consumers of Chinese goods, which are cheap but of a poor quality. Some middle class families purchase goods from Southeast Asia, while upper class families purchase European goods, which are the most expensive. European goods, even a simple bucket, have a better design, quality, and durability. They are, however, far too expensive, and only a few can afford them. According to a law enforcement officer in the market, there had been no order to restrict the circulation of goods from Europe or Southeast Asia, meaning that they are freely traded in local markets. However, compared to Chinese goods, there are fewer imports from these regions, making them not easy to find in markets. Some government officials voice the idea that the Central Party might be trying to expand the number of countries from which North Korea imports goods, as a measure to prevent Chinese good overtaking the domestic market, and to reduce the North Korean dependence on China in general. The analysis on this rise of European and Southeast Asian goods is that they are filling the gap created by the complete ban of South Korean products and the import of Chinese goods limited by the active trade inspection these days.
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Finding Confidence in the Regime Comes Before Banning South Korean Goods
Tough Crackdown on South Korean Goods
Young Women Sport Bolder Hairstyles and Fashion
Popularity of European goods in the Upper Class
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Finding Confidence in the Regime Comes Before Banning South Korean Goods
The news of tough crackdown on South Korean goods brought a scene from the flim J.S.A: Joint Security Area (2000) back to mind, in which the North Korean Sergeant Oh Kyongpil becomes friends with Sergeant Lee Suhyuk and his men from the South, and together they share the music and food from the South, listening to Kim Kwangsuk’s songs, and sharing Choco Pie. Lee tells Oh that he could have as many Choco Pies as he wants if he defects to South Korea. Upon this comment, Oh spits out the snack from his mouth, and tells Lee that his dream is to see the day that his country makes a better Choco Pie than that from the South. Although it was a scene from a movie, there was something admirable about the pride that the North Korean soldier had about his country. However, if that pride about one’s country is only a product of constant crackdowns and inspections, maybe it would not be so admirable after all. Even putting the crackdown on South Korean goods aside, from the way that the North Korean state scolds young women about the way they dress claiming that it reflects their poor ideological moral, it seems clear that the state feels insecure about maintaining the regime. Before admonishing young women, the North Korean state must find confidence in its own regime. The only way to do so is to seek economic development through the cooperation with the South. A South Korean Choco Pie factory built in the North and its products being exported to Russia is an entirely possible dream. In that case, the North Korean public will support the regime, notwithstanding whatever clothes or hairstyle that they choose to have.
Tough Crackdown on South Korean Goods
In Pyongyang, since Jaunary of this year there has been a crackdown on South Korean goods, films, and video clips. It seemed to come to an end in June, but it re-started again in September and it is continuing on. This time, the crackdown effort was focused on border areas where there are customs. An official from Pyongyang says that it is a measure initiated by the concern that South Korean culture may spread wider. Not a long ago, the Central Party stated that the most powerful threat to domestic political stability, next to the food shortage and economic crisis, is the spread of South Korean ideas, culture, and goods, and that for the next three years, the crackdown on South Korean goods must be taken as seriously as the crackdown on border crossers. The Central Party is also meticulous about regulating the public’s fashion and appearance, cracking down on “the phenomenon of exotic clothes and hairdos.” Choi Yoonjong from Kwanghwa-dong, Haeju, South Hwanghae Province was caught by an officer “wearing an indecently twisted shirt, and pants that hideously cling to the body,” and had to endure a sermon that lasted for a long time. Soyong Kim, who works at a textile mill in Sinuiju, North Pyongan province was admonished for her long hair worn loose, and baggy trousers without pleats. The offier scolded her: “Do you not understand that one’s clothes and hairstyle reflect the person’s ideological moral? How am I to think of your ideological moral, with your exotic clothes and hairstyle that reflect no national pride?” The Central Party states that “To open the doors to the future as a Strong and Prosperous Nation, everyone has to work with a revolutionary fervor, and even in choosing their clothes and hairstyle, they must do it while being conscious about the societal demands of our time.” The abovementioned official said that the reason that the North Korean government orders that the crackdown on South Korean goods should taken as seriously as the watch on border crossers is that it is concerned about the ideological effect of the Korean culture and goods that came in during the time of active North-South cooperation on the younger generation.
Young Women Sport Bolder Hairstyles and Fashion
The recent strengthening of clothing regulation can also be attributed to increase in women’s desire for self-expression. The Station 3 and the neighborhood unit lectures also express frustration toward the women who adamantly refuse to obey the societal dress code. “We were lectured about not wearing exotic clothes yesterday. They started the lecture saying that ‘we shall discuss about the evil trend engulfing the women nowadays,’ so I thought it would be about something really serious. Then, they talked about a woman who was caught growing her hair to her waist and dying it brown. After the lecture, older women seemed astonished at the strange things done by the youth, but younger women were complaining about the ridiculousness of these regulations. The lecturer seemed so frustrated that women wouldn’t get rid of their exotic hairstyle and clothes,” said Han Mi-ok, a recent graduate of Pyongyang University of Foreign Studies.
Han says such lectures are counterproductive because they give young women ideas about the latest trends in fashion. Young women take note of the examples of dress code violations as a way to find out what is in trend these days, using them as fashion inspiration. They are also put at ease knowing that there are those who make more bolder fashion choices.
“We come across many strangely dressed women during crackdowns. Their numbers have gone up. I usually patrol the Botong-kang area, and once I caught a woman wearing skin tight pants and black rimmed glasses that weren’t made in our country. At first I thought she was a foreigner so I let her go. But I took a second look at her and found out that she was indeed Korean. Other officers were deceived by her appearance too. She told me she lived in Moranbong. I admonished her, asking her if she was out of her mind, but she showed no signs of remorse, claiming other women dress like her too,” said a police officer in Pyongyang. Joo Miyong, a resident of Seosung was also caught wearing tight pants and a shirt with English writing. She was harshly scolded for lying the police that she’s from the overseas. The police officers claim that they were almost tricked into believing her at first, because she spoke in a Japanese accent. Still in doubt, they continued to question her until she eventually told the truth. “She was released with only a warning, but she would have faced harsher penalty if she pretended to be from South Korea,” added the police, and said that South Korean accent is widely spread among the young women as well.
Popularity of European goods in the Upper Class
The recent trade inspects has had the effect of changing the variety of imported goods in the North Korean market. The difficulty importing Chinese goods from the trade inspections created market for goods from other countries. According to Jang Haksung (alias), a traveling salesman supplying imported goods to business in the Jung district, Pyongyang, the ratio of goods from Europe and Southeast Asia has gone up with the difficulty in importing Chinese goods. European goods are expensive, but their high quality attracts mid- and high-level officials in Pyongyang into purchasing them. Goods from Thailand used to be considered as the better ones among those imported from Southeastern Asian countries, but the damage from the recent flood in Thailand put a halt to the import, causing a shortage in Thai goods. Jang added that the lower middle class households are the main consumers of Chinese goods, which are cheap but of a poor quality. Some middle class families purchase goods from Southeast Asia, while upper class families purchase European goods, which are the most expensive. European goods, even a simple bucket, have a better design, quality, and durability. They are, however, far too expensive, and only a few can afford them. According to a law enforcement officer in the market, there had been no order to restrict the circulation of goods from Europe or Southeast Asia, meaning that they are freely traded in local markets. However, compared to Chinese goods, there are fewer imports from these regions, making them not easy to find in markets. Some government officials voice the idea that the Central Party might be trying to expand the number of countries from which North Korea imports goods, as a measure to prevent Chinese good overtaking the domestic market, and to reduce the North Korean dependence on China in general. The analysis on this rise of European and Southeast Asian goods is that they are filling the gap created by the complete ban of South Korean products and the import of Chinese goods limited by the active trade inspection these days.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
North Korea Today No. 429 November 16, 2011
[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Tough Crackdown on Border Crossers is Not the Answer
Extreme Sea Border Control Against North Korean Refugees
“Tight Control Was Foreseen after the Execution of Ryu Gyeong”
Capital Punishment Now Possible on Food Crimes
Overcoming the World Food Crisis with Willpower?
A Fierce Competition over Offices at the Ministry of Foreign Trade After the Inspection
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Tough Crackdown on Border Crossers is Not the Answer
After the frequent occurrences of sea border crossers these days, the North Korean government now allows on-the-spot execution for defection attempts. Every year the crackdown on cell phone users and border crossers was an important task. This year, with the tightened border control on the land, there has been an increase of people who attempt to cross the sea border with the replacement of the border patrol and regional security officers. It is especially noteworthy that that there have been a substantial number of defectors from Hwanghae-province, where the food crisis this year is at its worst, because it signifies that if the food crisis issue remains unresolved, border crossing in a mass scale such as the one during the mid- and late 1990s can happen again. A scenario as such is the North Korean government’s worst nightmare. However, it is impossible to overcome the crisis by relying on the power of the gun. The only reason that hundred thousands of people attempted to cross the river during the Arduous March was that they wanted to live. No military power can deter the will to live. The only fundamental solution is to supply food. The North Korean government must immediately stop shooting its own people, and make all possible efforts at securing food supply. The South Korean government must take note of the sufferings of people who cross the border risking their lives, and make sure that there will be no more tragic deaths as such.
Extreme Sea Border Control Against North Korean Refugees
After experiencing frequent occurrences of defection attempts on the sea this year, the North Korean government intensified its border control to maximum. The government delivered a strict order that any ship that attempts to go out to the sea without permission from the Security Department or the Guard Command must be seized, and people in the ship who do not obey the orders or try to flee can be executed on the spot. In addition to the sea border, the areas in vicinity to the land border are tightly controlled to allow no border crossing.
One of the officers in the central government said, “Border control centers were notified that if necessary, guards can execute people who try to cross the border on the spot and file an official report afterwards.” The reason behind the drastic measure is that the number of family-unit border crossers has been going up, and there is a concern that an even greater number of people will try to escape when the river freezes. The central government delivered orders to the local governments to devise strategies to prevent border crossing and make a weekly report on the progress.
The biggest victims of the stricter border control are smugglers, who used to cross the border relatively easily, with their connections with officers in the Security Department and the Guard Command. Choi Jungkeum (alias), who has traded South Korean movie DVDs illegally in Hyesan, Ryanggang province for a long time, said that the current border situation “gives [him] chills.”
Smugglers like Choi Jungkeum have struggled to build connections with new officers in the Security Department and the border patrol who came to replace the old ones after the round of inspections last August, and they find the new officers harsher and less flexible than the old ones in terms of organizational operation, regulations and human relationships. With their harsh and merciless approaches, people hardly dare think of crossing the border these days. Another smuggler, Cho Hyuk (alias) said that it is not an exaggeration to say that nine out of ten previous officers in the Security Department went to prison, and the rest were suspended or sent to remote areas. He also said that “The new officers are working so hard that smugglers like me, cell phone users, and border crossers – we are all paralyzed with fear.” Almost 3,000 people who used cell phones in North Hamkyong’s border areas were arrested and investigated. There are more than 10,000 people who were investigated for charges including corruption, smuggling, assistance in border crossing, contact with South Korean culture and people, and drug trafficking, and more than 3,000 were sent to re-education centers and disciplining centers. People found with major crimes charges in local security departments are handed over to the General Guard Headquarters for further in-depth investigations.
“Tight Control Was Foreseen after the Execution of Ryu Gyeong”
With intensifying government control in border areas, it seemed that some officers of the Central Party were disturbed by the extent of strictness in recent policies. They have expressed their concerns over the fact that the firm determination of the highest leadership to deter border crossing at any cost may overheat the competition between the newly appointed Safety Bureau officers to demonstrate their loyalty. They think that the reign of terror may be effective for a short while, but rampant firing of gun in a long run may provoke people to revolt. Some argue that the seed for a future revolt has already been planted with the secret execution of Ryu Gyeong, the former Vice Minister of the National Security Agency (Colonel General of North Korean People’s Army) in January, 2011, and the downfall of people in his inner circle. The execution of Ryu, also known as “The Ryu Gyeong Affair,” was not just about the execution of one high-ranking officer; rather, it symbolized the generational shift within the center of political power in North Korea. Ryu was the symbol of those who used to maintain and manage the state system on the front line, such as the officers of the People’s Safety Agency and the National Security Agency, who were swept away in a flash with his execution.
A Central Party officer said: “After the Ryu Gyeong Affair, the Security Department and Safety Bureaus nationwide were investigated thoroughly, and the party began a general purge, starting with high-rank regional officers. To prevent people from noticing what was going on and then running away to a foreign country, they suspended the targeted officers from their dutie and tightened the surveillance to make sure that they remained in their region. Their subordinates were transferred to other regions, so that they would not be there to cause trouble when their superiors were removed - nipping a potential rebellion in the bud. Charged with various offenses, those who had faithfully worked for 30 years under Ryu Gyeong’s administration in important positions were eliminated, and the officers in the Security who were thought to be affiliated with this faction were also discharged. By executing Ryu Gyeong, they discharged the old workers in Security Departments nationwide, and thus accomplished a fast generational shift. It seems like the newly ascended officers are eager to immediately surpass the accomplishments made during the days of Ryu Gyeong. Although it is tough work, investigation on North Korean defectors and mobile phone users is an area where one can achieve the most outstanding result if it is done properly. With the power of immediate punishment given to the new leadership, the world will be at their disposal.” He expected that the tightened control will continue for a while.
Capital Punishment Now Possible on Food Crimes
In addition to allowing on-the-spot execution for border crossing, the Central Party has also warned that food crimes can also result in capital punishment. Food crimes include theft and illegal transaction of agricultural crops. A Central Party official remarked that there is a nationwide inspection on ideological discipline, and out of one hundred offenses on the list, thirty of them are classified as political crime. Political crime includes corruption, border crossing, usage of cell phone, smuggling, long-term absenteeism, lack of participation in the labor force, circulating illegal DVDs including South Korean movies, circulating South Korean goods, and drug dealing. Among these crimes, usage of Chinese cell phones in particular is investigated by the Security Headquarters. “Permitting capital punishment for food crimes is the expression that they will now be considered as serious an offense as political crimes”, said the Central Party official. On the other hand, the Central Party has repeatedly ordered not to waste even one grain during threshing. The point that the government tries to make is that this is an important year for opening the doors for being a Strong and Prosperous nation, and in order to resolve the food crisis, threshing should be done has to be as quickly as possible, and not even a single grain should go to waste in the process.
Overcoming the World Food Crisis with Willpower?
North Korean government authorities have been emphasizing the importance of crop harvest and rice threshing, and they have tried to convince the public that the current food crisis is caused not just by domestic problems, but by the world food crisis. Associating domestic food crisis with world food crisis has been going on for several years now, but Central Party officials say that the association is particularly emphasized this year. On government official said, “It means that the food shortage this year is that bad. But it’s been several years since we started blaming external conditions for the domestic food crisis, and now people are fed up with it, making the state’s promotional work difficult.” A government official who just gave a lecture on the topic at a cooperative farm in Sariwon, North Hwanghae Province, said that people don’t even listen to a word he says these days. The public sentiment seems to be that they are fed up with such lectures, especially with their very livelihood at risk at this point. Although people do accept the idea the current food crisis is related to the world food crisis to some degrees, the reaction from the public is cold when comes to the exertion that they must persist and finish threshing successfully by using sheer mental force. “Maybe it’s just the way I feel about the audience reaction, but in any case, I don’t want to continue this kind of lecture anymore,” he complained.
Following is an excerpt from his lecture:
“The current food crisis that has been affecting the whole world is very serious. Even countries that normally export grains control the distribution of grains and limit the export. The current reality proves to us that we have to be self-sustainable in terms of food with strong agriculture on our land. We cannot emphasize the importance of the thresh process enough in this time of a worldwide crisis. To ensure a timely completion of threshing, we must make sure that the threshing machines run well. Work shifts should be arranged thoroughly to prevent any misalignment. It is also important to prevent the loss of electricity by with regular examination and maintenance. All these projects should be led by the strong willpower of the people.
Many collective farms, including Dongbong Cooperative in Ham South Hamkyung’s Hamju country, are continuing to thresh in the face of fuel shortage by burning woods and using the gas from it to run the threshing machine. These collective farms in various places have been fully exerting the revolutionary spirit of self-sustenance in the midst of difficulties. We have to learn from these cooperatives, and do out absolute best on every threshing floor. The only way to solve the food crisis for our people will be to strengthen our farming and fill up the grain reserve of out fatherland.”
A Fierce Competition over Offices at the Ministry of Foreign Trade After the Inspection
With the generational change among high-ranking officials that followed the inspection at the Ministry of Foreign Trade now complete, the replacement of lower-ranking managers has begun. New faces have been appearing, with previous officials being discharged or relocated into less important offices. The competition for the position handling foreign currencies in particular is fierce. It is especially the case for trading companies located in Pyongyang, because it is easy to go overseas from these places. Many try to get a spot, even an entry-level position, in these companies, by utilizing personal connections and paying an enormous sum for bribes. Meanwhile, the new officials in important offices at the Ministry of Foreign Trade accept a bribe and try to fill lower-level manager positions with their own people. Although the old officials were discharged with the pretext of corruption charges, corruption is rampant in hiring new people. An official who was replaced during the inspection of the Ministry of Foreign Trade said, “This proves that new generation of officials with their passionate display of loyalty are in fact not that much different from us. It wasn’t about getting rid of corruption. It was about the generation replacement by their own people.”
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Tough Crackdown on Border Crossers is Not the Answer
Extreme Sea Border Control Against North Korean Refugees
“Tight Control Was Foreseen after the Execution of Ryu Gyeong”
Capital Punishment Now Possible on Food Crimes
Overcoming the World Food Crisis with Willpower?
A Fierce Competition over Offices at the Ministry of Foreign Trade After the Inspection
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Tough Crackdown on Border Crossers is Not the Answer
After the frequent occurrences of sea border crossers these days, the North Korean government now allows on-the-spot execution for defection attempts. Every year the crackdown on cell phone users and border crossers was an important task. This year, with the tightened border control on the land, there has been an increase of people who attempt to cross the sea border with the replacement of the border patrol and regional security officers. It is especially noteworthy that that there have been a substantial number of defectors from Hwanghae-province, where the food crisis this year is at its worst, because it signifies that if the food crisis issue remains unresolved, border crossing in a mass scale such as the one during the mid- and late 1990s can happen again. A scenario as such is the North Korean government’s worst nightmare. However, it is impossible to overcome the crisis by relying on the power of the gun. The only reason that hundred thousands of people attempted to cross the river during the Arduous March was that they wanted to live. No military power can deter the will to live. The only fundamental solution is to supply food. The North Korean government must immediately stop shooting its own people, and make all possible efforts at securing food supply. The South Korean government must take note of the sufferings of people who cross the border risking their lives, and make sure that there will be no more tragic deaths as such.
Extreme Sea Border Control Against North Korean Refugees
After experiencing frequent occurrences of defection attempts on the sea this year, the North Korean government intensified its border control to maximum. The government delivered a strict order that any ship that attempts to go out to the sea without permission from the Security Department or the Guard Command must be seized, and people in the ship who do not obey the orders or try to flee can be executed on the spot. In addition to the sea border, the areas in vicinity to the land border are tightly controlled to allow no border crossing.
One of the officers in the central government said, “Border control centers were notified that if necessary, guards can execute people who try to cross the border on the spot and file an official report afterwards.” The reason behind the drastic measure is that the number of family-unit border crossers has been going up, and there is a concern that an even greater number of people will try to escape when the river freezes. The central government delivered orders to the local governments to devise strategies to prevent border crossing and make a weekly report on the progress.
The biggest victims of the stricter border control are smugglers, who used to cross the border relatively easily, with their connections with officers in the Security Department and the Guard Command. Choi Jungkeum (alias), who has traded South Korean movie DVDs illegally in Hyesan, Ryanggang province for a long time, said that the current border situation “gives [him] chills.”
Smugglers like Choi Jungkeum have struggled to build connections with new officers in the Security Department and the border patrol who came to replace the old ones after the round of inspections last August, and they find the new officers harsher and less flexible than the old ones in terms of organizational operation, regulations and human relationships. With their harsh and merciless approaches, people hardly dare think of crossing the border these days. Another smuggler, Cho Hyuk (alias) said that it is not an exaggeration to say that nine out of ten previous officers in the Security Department went to prison, and the rest were suspended or sent to remote areas. He also said that “The new officers are working so hard that smugglers like me, cell phone users, and border crossers – we are all paralyzed with fear.” Almost 3,000 people who used cell phones in North Hamkyong’s border areas were arrested and investigated. There are more than 10,000 people who were investigated for charges including corruption, smuggling, assistance in border crossing, contact with South Korean culture and people, and drug trafficking, and more than 3,000 were sent to re-education centers and disciplining centers. People found with major crimes charges in local security departments are handed over to the General Guard Headquarters for further in-depth investigations.
“Tight Control Was Foreseen after the Execution of Ryu Gyeong”
With intensifying government control in border areas, it seemed that some officers of the Central Party were disturbed by the extent of strictness in recent policies. They have expressed their concerns over the fact that the firm determination of the highest leadership to deter border crossing at any cost may overheat the competition between the newly appointed Safety Bureau officers to demonstrate their loyalty. They think that the reign of terror may be effective for a short while, but rampant firing of gun in a long run may provoke people to revolt. Some argue that the seed for a future revolt has already been planted with the secret execution of Ryu Gyeong, the former Vice Minister of the National Security Agency (Colonel General of North Korean People’s Army) in January, 2011, and the downfall of people in his inner circle. The execution of Ryu, also known as “The Ryu Gyeong Affair,” was not just about the execution of one high-ranking officer; rather, it symbolized the generational shift within the center of political power in North Korea. Ryu was the symbol of those who used to maintain and manage the state system on the front line, such as the officers of the People’s Safety Agency and the National Security Agency, who were swept away in a flash with his execution.
A Central Party officer said: “After the Ryu Gyeong Affair, the Security Department and Safety Bureaus nationwide were investigated thoroughly, and the party began a general purge, starting with high-rank regional officers. To prevent people from noticing what was going on and then running away to a foreign country, they suspended the targeted officers from their dutie and tightened the surveillance to make sure that they remained in their region. Their subordinates were transferred to other regions, so that they would not be there to cause trouble when their superiors were removed - nipping a potential rebellion in the bud. Charged with various offenses, those who had faithfully worked for 30 years under Ryu Gyeong’s administration in important positions were eliminated, and the officers in the Security who were thought to be affiliated with this faction were also discharged. By executing Ryu Gyeong, they discharged the old workers in Security Departments nationwide, and thus accomplished a fast generational shift. It seems like the newly ascended officers are eager to immediately surpass the accomplishments made during the days of Ryu Gyeong. Although it is tough work, investigation on North Korean defectors and mobile phone users is an area where one can achieve the most outstanding result if it is done properly. With the power of immediate punishment given to the new leadership, the world will be at their disposal.” He expected that the tightened control will continue for a while.
Capital Punishment Now Possible on Food Crimes
In addition to allowing on-the-spot execution for border crossing, the Central Party has also warned that food crimes can also result in capital punishment. Food crimes include theft and illegal transaction of agricultural crops. A Central Party official remarked that there is a nationwide inspection on ideological discipline, and out of one hundred offenses on the list, thirty of them are classified as political crime. Political crime includes corruption, border crossing, usage of cell phone, smuggling, long-term absenteeism, lack of participation in the labor force, circulating illegal DVDs including South Korean movies, circulating South Korean goods, and drug dealing. Among these crimes, usage of Chinese cell phones in particular is investigated by the Security Headquarters. “Permitting capital punishment for food crimes is the expression that they will now be considered as serious an offense as political crimes”, said the Central Party official. On the other hand, the Central Party has repeatedly ordered not to waste even one grain during threshing. The point that the government tries to make is that this is an important year for opening the doors for being a Strong and Prosperous nation, and in order to resolve the food crisis, threshing should be done has to be as quickly as possible, and not even a single grain should go to waste in the process.
Overcoming the World Food Crisis with Willpower?
North Korean government authorities have been emphasizing the importance of crop harvest and rice threshing, and they have tried to convince the public that the current food crisis is caused not just by domestic problems, but by the world food crisis. Associating domestic food crisis with world food crisis has been going on for several years now, but Central Party officials say that the association is particularly emphasized this year. On government official said, “It means that the food shortage this year is that bad. But it’s been several years since we started blaming external conditions for the domestic food crisis, and now people are fed up with it, making the state’s promotional work difficult.” A government official who just gave a lecture on the topic at a cooperative farm in Sariwon, North Hwanghae Province, said that people don’t even listen to a word he says these days. The public sentiment seems to be that they are fed up with such lectures, especially with their very livelihood at risk at this point. Although people do accept the idea the current food crisis is related to the world food crisis to some degrees, the reaction from the public is cold when comes to the exertion that they must persist and finish threshing successfully by using sheer mental force. “Maybe it’s just the way I feel about the audience reaction, but in any case, I don’t want to continue this kind of lecture anymore,” he complained.
Following is an excerpt from his lecture:
“The current food crisis that has been affecting the whole world is very serious. Even countries that normally export grains control the distribution of grains and limit the export. The current reality proves to us that we have to be self-sustainable in terms of food with strong agriculture on our land. We cannot emphasize the importance of the thresh process enough in this time of a worldwide crisis. To ensure a timely completion of threshing, we must make sure that the threshing machines run well. Work shifts should be arranged thoroughly to prevent any misalignment. It is also important to prevent the loss of electricity by with regular examination and maintenance. All these projects should be led by the strong willpower of the people.
Many collective farms, including Dongbong Cooperative in Ham South Hamkyung’s Hamju country, are continuing to thresh in the face of fuel shortage by burning woods and using the gas from it to run the threshing machine. These collective farms in various places have been fully exerting the revolutionary spirit of self-sustenance in the midst of difficulties. We have to learn from these cooperatives, and do out absolute best on every threshing floor. The only way to solve the food crisis for our people will be to strengthen our farming and fill up the grain reserve of out fatherland.”
A Fierce Competition over Offices at the Ministry of Foreign Trade After the Inspection
With the generational change among high-ranking officials that followed the inspection at the Ministry of Foreign Trade now complete, the replacement of lower-ranking managers has begun. New faces have been appearing, with previous officials being discharged or relocated into less important offices. The competition for the position handling foreign currencies in particular is fierce. It is especially the case for trading companies located in Pyongyang, because it is easy to go overseas from these places. Many try to get a spot, even an entry-level position, in these companies, by utilizing personal connections and paying an enormous sum for bribes. Meanwhile, the new officials in important offices at the Ministry of Foreign Trade accept a bribe and try to fill lower-level manager positions with their own people. Although the old officials were discharged with the pretext of corruption charges, corruption is rampant in hiring new people. An official who was replaced during the inspection of the Ministry of Foreign Trade said, “This proves that new generation of officials with their passionate display of loyalty are in fact not that much different from us. It wasn’t about getting rid of corruption. It was about the generation replacement by their own people.”
North Korea Today No. 428 November 9, 2011
[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
Grain Losses While Threshing
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
A significant loss of grains in the process of threshing is said to be present. The effort to minimize grain loss has started in the context of reduced crop prospects due to the damages from the flood that hit rice producing areas. However, questions remain over how effective an effort that’s limited only to ideological disciplining of the workers could be. Station 3, which exposes in detail and sternly criticizes who did what wrong in which farm focuses on heightening the sense of ownership among farmers in order to halt the loss of grains. Farmers, in turn, ask the government why electricity is not provided. While criticizing workers for not demonstrating enough sense of ownership, the government is failing to fulfill its own responsibility. Working on their own private plots on a priority basis in order to avoid hunger is the reality faced by farm workers. If farming on private plots is banned, there will be more stealing and smuggling of grains from the threshing process. A fundamental solution for ensuring the supply of food is needed. There is a way: permitting private farming will do it. The South Korean government and the international community, seeing the willingness on the part of the North Korean government to resolve the food shortage, will provide agricultural supplies and technology. The food shortage in North Korea can only be resolved by a fundamental restructuring of the society aimed for an increased food production.
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
With the harvest season coming to an end, the threshing process has started. Not only is the significant reduction in crop from the last year’s worrisome, but also posing a problem is the loss of grains in the period between harvest and threshing. Farm workers, regular citizens mobilized for agricultural production, soldiers – everyone in the sight is fighting tooth and nail to pilfer and smuggle as much rice as possible. To move sheaves of rice, cars are a necessity, and farms that cannot afford vehicles or shipping charges resort to using ox carts. Using an ox cart means rice sheaves are left in the field for days and stolen easily as a result. Even when there are guards on watch for the rice day and night, the rice gets stolen in any case by the guards themselves. When it rains, the situation is even worse, and it is not uncommon that rice gets wet from rain and goes bad.
The North Korean government has emphasized the importance of threshing via Station 3, and made pointed criticism toward specific cases, making a focused effort to warn people. Station 3 is the cable radio broadcast, which deals with internal propagandas with special importance, national issues that the government does not want to be revealed to the outside world, and foreign affairs explained to North Korean citizens. In contrast to the Korean Central Broadcasting Station (Station 1) and Radio Pyongyang (Station 2) directed mostly toward South Korean audience, Station 3 is only for the North Korean audience. The following is an excerpt from Station 3’s criticism on Dong-am Cooperative Farm in Sunchon, South Pyong-an Province, where sheaves of rice that did not get moved to the threshing floor got wet from rain, causing loss of grains:
“A few days ago, at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon City, we were surprised to see the amount of crops harvested by the work unit 4. It had rained since the night before in the field, and we saw all rice paddies filled with water to ankle level. The rice plants, with or without supports, were flooded and destroyed from the wind and rain. The situation at the threshing floor was far worse. The threshing machines were outside under the rain, disabling threshing altogether despite the fact that electricity was available. The lack of a plan for preparation caused the rain to flood the rice plants. When we asked the managers of the threshing floor about where the workers were, they said that the workers were given a break since there was no work to be done because of the rain. The rain had already stopped at that point, and it was well after 3 p.m., but there were no workers on the site except for two security men. It was clear to us that at Unit 4, there was no one who cared about the fact that the rice sheaves were drowned in rice paddies, and the threshing machines and harvested rice were wet from rain.
We would like to question Lee Chansil, the head of the work unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm, for his actions. We citizens are harvesting with our minds set on the goal of making a strong and prosperous country; why aren’t those workers doing the same? Neither the lack of workers nor distance was a problem in this case.
We have inspected four work units at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon city. At the nearby 6th Ryonpo Collective Farm, sheaves of rice were already moved to the side of the road to avoid getting wet from rain, and they were stacked up and covered. Also, they applied a double plastic thin film in order to keep the rain in the field of threshing. The different attitudes of Mr. Lee Chansil at Unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon, and Mr. Chun Sangbong at the Unit 6 at Ryonpo, make a striking contrast. It is not even the case that they are in different cities. They are located next to each other, but the difference is huge. The difference between the two work units shows that Mr. Lee and the workers at Unit 4 at Dong-am are working unwillingly not with a sense of ownership. This is the time when we need to put forth our best efforts, but some people regard their labor as a burden, and not with a revolutionary fervor, and thus they lost our hard-earned grains from rain without feeling any remorse.
In the end, the leader of the work unit, Mr. Lee, did not have any sense of ownership for the grains and the threshing floor, and thus had no interest in saving the grains from getting wet from rain and mud. On the other hand, we think the problem also lies in the management at Dong-am, including its head manager, Mr. Moon Hyangsik. If managers at each work unit could have been extremely careful and prepared for the rain, things would have been different. In particular, Unit 4 is very noticeable being located right beside the road, so it is obvious that workers did not even give it a glimpse at the field while it was raining heavily.
Workers at Dong-am collective farm at Sunchon city should renew their resolve. A powerful nation can be only achieved victoriously through the mind power and patriotic resolution from workers to be the owners of the country. Farm workers must consider themselves as problem solvers, so they need to do their best. We need to attain victory through grain production as one with high spirit and resolution.
Grain Losses While Threshing
Grain losses continue even after the sheaves are moved to the threshing floor from the field. Although farming villages are supposed to have priority in getting electricity during the threshing season, the lack of machines and poor supply of electricity slows down the threshing process. During the slow threshing process, there are many who steal rice by sheave. On Station 3, listeners were reminded of the importance of the threshing process with Anheung Farm and Daeyang Farm of Pyongyang’s Sunan district pointed out as bad examples.
“One way the lack of ownership manifests itself in Unit 3 of Anheung Farm is the rough treatment of rice sheaves during threshing. Because of negligence in picking out the ears of rice from straw stacks after threshing, 10 to 12 ears of rice gets left on average on a stack of straws. Despite such a big loss of grains, the workers in this unit, without any remorse, proceeded to use the straw stack with ears of rice still on it for other purposes, and piles it on top of manure for composting. In Daeyang Farm, the process of threshing was equally rough. Unit 2 at Daeyang also had more than ten ears of rice left on a stack of straws, which the unit nevertheless sent to the livestock and the vegetable farming unit.
This phenomenon at Anheung and Daeyang demonstrates how the members of these farms are not trying their hardest at filling up out nation’s rice reserve. Could you say that those workers at Anheung Farm, who do nothing about more than ten ears of rice being left on a straw stack, are working patriotically to ensure the supply of rice for our nation? There is no loss of grains more regrettable than to lose them from the negligence during harvest after long and hard spring and summer days of raising rice plants. However, at Anheung and Daeyang, such a loss does not seem to be minded, which casts doubt on the prospect of making this year’s harvest into a success. The failings at Anheung and Daeyang is partly to be blamed on the unit workers not fulfilling their duty, but a more fundamental problem lies in the shortcomings of the managers at the farm. If the managers made sure to take a proactive role for the harvest, and prepared the farm workers mentally with good planning and leadership, a disaster as such would not have happened. In other words, if the managers had set a good example, the harvest would not have been the way it is now (...)”
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
The North Korean government is also having trouble with farmers who have no sense of ownership in its collective farms. Through Station 3, the government has fiercely criticized the farmers winding up their workday on their own before the end of a work shift at a collective farm in Rajinpo, Yonan County, South Hwanghae Province, in the peak of the threshing season. The government made a resentful statement: “How can all farmers possibly leave their working place before the end of their shift? What could they have possibly been thinking?” The government also stated with anger that the farmers should have stayed at work until the electricity was back, rather than just leaving, risking missing the chance of utilizing the threshing machine when the power comes back. The bottom line was that every worker should work with a sense of responsibility in collective farms. The government delivered a warning that the farmers will have to use a treadle thresher if they continue not to put in their best effort.
Whenever criticized as such by the government, workers express their agony. “We know that there is nothing wrong in what the government says, but with everyone suffering from hunger pangs, who is going to use all their energy up in collective farms instead of tending their own private plots? Even though the government promises a preferential supply of electricity to the threshing floors, we have more days without electricity than with electricity. Nobody knows when the electricity is going to come back. In such uncertain circumstances, who will just stay and wait for the electricity? Don’t you think that it makes sense that we work in our own private plots if there is no electricity instead of just waiting for it to come back?” The workers would give their best effort if they get to keep whatever they harvested themselves at collective farms, but the ration that they get usually isn’t even sufficient for half a year’s food, and using that to pay back the food debt incurred during the spring season, there is not much to be left. Naturally, people put most of their energy and time into cultivating their private plots. One collective farm worker says that the best that the government can do is to allow private plots for the farm members, and that no amount of criticism and disciplining through Station 3 would change anything. The following is quoted from Station 3:
“Those who threshed grain beforehand should have worked with a determination to keep threshing until the rotational shift arrives. Nevertheless, the farm members’ state of mind has been so lackadaisical to the point that the entire members of the threshing group just stopped their work and went home. Currently, every worker in the country is greatly helping and leading each other in order to fully open the gate of the strong and prosperous nation for those who come after them; in such a circumstance, how can Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County show such a pathetic attitude with their terrible teamwork, and by going home carelessly even though the next shift did not come and not coming to work on time for their shift? Furthermore, even though we are in a difficult situation with the power shortage, the state is trying to secure electricity in the farming areas by all means these days to ensure that this year’s crop will be harvested as soon as possible; under such circumstance, how can they do such a pathetic job on threshing floors? How can you act so nonchalantly about threshing, instead of trying to maximize the use of the limited time when electricity is available? Have you already forgotten about the times when we toiled using the treadle thresher during the Arduous March? Also, you can still using the treadle thresher while waiting for electricity, and try to make a more efficient use of time to get as much threshing done as you can.
Choi Youngbin, the Chief of the Management Committee at Gwanyoung Collective Farm in Songhwa County, and Oh Dongsik, the Chief of the Management Committee at Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County, demonstrate poor ideological moral and bad work behavior. We must ask them whether they have any patriotic spirits at all to have a good harvest and resolve the food problem. We must ask whether the people like them who caused disruptions in the threshing work because they cannot even do a single organizational work are worthy to be managers. The reason that Choi Youngbin and Oh Dongsik failed in their leadership is simple. It is because they have a poor ideological moral; harvesting this year’s crop well is an important task in resolving this year’s food problem, but they did not take the matter as that of life and death in supporting the future of Socialsm; instead, they just saw it as routine farm work, and in the hope to do the least amount of work possible, did not even do the organizational work properly. We all must learn the important lesson from these bad examples. The quality of organization and leadership in harvest determines the crop yield. Those whose names were mentioned above must keep in mind that they are in charge of their respective farms and do their hardest to collect the crops into the nation’s grain storage without wasting a single grain, by scrupulous organizational work and a firm sense of ownership. Every worker in the agricultural sector of each region must put effort to improve the farm work organization so that they can contribute to resolving the nation’s food problem by reaping a splendid harvest this year.”
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
The consequences of stricter border patrols have affected the Chinese farming villages along the border between North Korea and China. Every fall, North Koreans have traditionally sneaked across the border into China to earn wages. However, this year almost all border crossings into China have ended. During the harvest season Chinese farmers usually hired North Koreans to work as farmhands to compensate for the lack of Chinese labor. It is not that no one crossed the border this year, but there was a dramatic reduction in the number of people doing so, less than 20 percent of the previous years. Like China, North Korea is also mobilizing its farmers for border patrol, making the border security much stricter. The Chinese farmers have expressed regret about the lack of North Koreans coming in for work. Jo Jung-geum Jo (alias), an ethnic Korean with Chinese citizenship living in Changbai, said “After working them for a couple of days we paid them a few hundred yuan and they said ‘we’ll be back next year’ and they went back home happily. They were tremendously happy even if we gave them clothes that we no longer wear at home. They worked so enthusiastically that we almost wanted them to stay and continue working for us. This year it has been hard to find laborers to the end of the harvest season. Last year, they came in groups of two or three, or in larger groups of five or six, going from a house to another, working. But this year hardly anyone had North Koreans coming in at all. Many said that they had difficulty finding help for their farms. Choi Sunghee, an ethnic Korean woman who says that she has hired North Koreans many times, said that she had trouble finding them this year. She also said, “If we gave them old clothes, bean paste, red chili paste, or rice, they were so happy that their families would not have to starve, but I don’t know how they’re going to make it through this winter. We were more worried about how those people will survive than the work we have left to do at home. So we often find ourselves glancing over the other side of the river. Over the years, we grew very fond of them. When we think of all the suffering they will have to go through just across the river, we feel sorry for them.”
Now that the harvest season is over, there has been a large decrease in workers. One person who has been helping the North Koreans for a long time said, “There have been more Kottjebis (street beggars from North Korea) this year. The kids cross the river looking like ghosts and their nutrition has gotten visibly worse. I think that these days there are more North Koreans who don’t plan on going back to North Korea after crossing the river. There is so much crackdown and hardship over there these days that no one wants to go back.”
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
According to one government official in Hyesan, Ryanggang Province, the main reason for the difficulty in crossing the border to China during the harvest season was due to a complete confiscation of cellular phones from security agents. A strict border security and new security agents who replaced the previous agents made it hard to cross the border, and moreover, seizing cellular phones from agents has eliminated the tool by which border security guards and defectors used to arrange safe times to cross the border, especially when coming back to North Korea. The official said, “Every year many people had gone to China to earn money during the planting season and the harvest season and then came back, but this fall, there weren’t many who did so. I heard from them that they earned 200 Yuan and were able to live through the winter on it. I am not sure how people will survive this winter since they couldn’t go.”
He also said, “The Chinese usually overlook North Koreans working illegally unless someone intentionally reports them to the authoritie so that they wouldn’t have to pay them, but, in most cases, they didn’t report them because they were in need of their labor. However, North Koreans didn’t even try to go to China this fall because of new border security agents and the prospect of severe punishment. I wanted to help them to cross the border, but it was impossible without a cellular phone to find out when the best time to let them cross the border was. People are very upset by the fact that they lost a valuable income source. ”
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
Grain Losses While Threshing
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
A significant loss of grains in the process of threshing is said to be present. The effort to minimize grain loss has started in the context of reduced crop prospects due to the damages from the flood that hit rice producing areas. However, questions remain over how effective an effort that’s limited only to ideological disciplining of the workers could be. Station 3, which exposes in detail and sternly criticizes who did what wrong in which farm focuses on heightening the sense of ownership among farmers in order to halt the loss of grains. Farmers, in turn, ask the government why electricity is not provided. While criticizing workers for not demonstrating enough sense of ownership, the government is failing to fulfill its own responsibility. Working on their own private plots on a priority basis in order to avoid hunger is the reality faced by farm workers. If farming on private plots is banned, there will be more stealing and smuggling of grains from the threshing process. A fundamental solution for ensuring the supply of food is needed. There is a way: permitting private farming will do it. The South Korean government and the international community, seeing the willingness on the part of the North Korean government to resolve the food shortage, will provide agricultural supplies and technology. The food shortage in North Korea can only be resolved by a fundamental restructuring of the society aimed for an increased food production.
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
With the harvest season coming to an end, the threshing process has started. Not only is the significant reduction in crop from the last year’s worrisome, but also posing a problem is the loss of grains in the period between harvest and threshing. Farm workers, regular citizens mobilized for agricultural production, soldiers – everyone in the sight is fighting tooth and nail to pilfer and smuggle as much rice as possible. To move sheaves of rice, cars are a necessity, and farms that cannot afford vehicles or shipping charges resort to using ox carts. Using an ox cart means rice sheaves are left in the field for days and stolen easily as a result. Even when there are guards on watch for the rice day and night, the rice gets stolen in any case by the guards themselves. When it rains, the situation is even worse, and it is not uncommon that rice gets wet from rain and goes bad.
The North Korean government has emphasized the importance of threshing via Station 3, and made pointed criticism toward specific cases, making a focused effort to warn people. Station 3 is the cable radio broadcast, which deals with internal propagandas with special importance, national issues that the government does not want to be revealed to the outside world, and foreign affairs explained to North Korean citizens. In contrast to the Korean Central Broadcasting Station (Station 1) and Radio Pyongyang (Station 2) directed mostly toward South Korean audience, Station 3 is only for the North Korean audience. The following is an excerpt from Station 3’s criticism on Dong-am Cooperative Farm in Sunchon, South Pyong-an Province, where sheaves of rice that did not get moved to the threshing floor got wet from rain, causing loss of grains:
“A few days ago, at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon City, we were surprised to see the amount of crops harvested by the work unit 4. It had rained since the night before in the field, and we saw all rice paddies filled with water to ankle level. The rice plants, with or without supports, were flooded and destroyed from the wind and rain. The situation at the threshing floor was far worse. The threshing machines were outside under the rain, disabling threshing altogether despite the fact that electricity was available. The lack of a plan for preparation caused the rain to flood the rice plants. When we asked the managers of the threshing floor about where the workers were, they said that the workers were given a break since there was no work to be done because of the rain. The rain had already stopped at that point, and it was well after 3 p.m., but there were no workers on the site except for two security men. It was clear to us that at Unit 4, there was no one who cared about the fact that the rice sheaves were drowned in rice paddies, and the threshing machines and harvested rice were wet from rain.
We would like to question Lee Chansil, the head of the work unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm, for his actions. We citizens are harvesting with our minds set on the goal of making a strong and prosperous country; why aren’t those workers doing the same? Neither the lack of workers nor distance was a problem in this case.
We have inspected four work units at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon city. At the nearby 6th Ryonpo Collective Farm, sheaves of rice were already moved to the side of the road to avoid getting wet from rain, and they were stacked up and covered. Also, they applied a double plastic thin film in order to keep the rain in the field of threshing. The different attitudes of Mr. Lee Chansil at Unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon, and Mr. Chun Sangbong at the Unit 6 at Ryonpo, make a striking contrast. It is not even the case that they are in different cities. They are located next to each other, but the difference is huge. The difference between the two work units shows that Mr. Lee and the workers at Unit 4 at Dong-am are working unwillingly not with a sense of ownership. This is the time when we need to put forth our best efforts, but some people regard their labor as a burden, and not with a revolutionary fervor, and thus they lost our hard-earned grains from rain without feeling any remorse.
In the end, the leader of the work unit, Mr. Lee, did not have any sense of ownership for the grains and the threshing floor, and thus had no interest in saving the grains from getting wet from rain and mud. On the other hand, we think the problem also lies in the management at Dong-am, including its head manager, Mr. Moon Hyangsik. If managers at each work unit could have been extremely careful and prepared for the rain, things would have been different. In particular, Unit 4 is very noticeable being located right beside the road, so it is obvious that workers did not even give it a glimpse at the field while it was raining heavily.
Workers at Dong-am collective farm at Sunchon city should renew their resolve. A powerful nation can be only achieved victoriously through the mind power and patriotic resolution from workers to be the owners of the country. Farm workers must consider themselves as problem solvers, so they need to do their best. We need to attain victory through grain production as one with high spirit and resolution.
Grain Losses While Threshing
Grain losses continue even after the sheaves are moved to the threshing floor from the field. Although farming villages are supposed to have priority in getting electricity during the threshing season, the lack of machines and poor supply of electricity slows down the threshing process. During the slow threshing process, there are many who steal rice by sheave. On Station 3, listeners were reminded of the importance of the threshing process with Anheung Farm and Daeyang Farm of Pyongyang’s Sunan district pointed out as bad examples.
“One way the lack of ownership manifests itself in Unit 3 of Anheung Farm is the rough treatment of rice sheaves during threshing. Because of negligence in picking out the ears of rice from straw stacks after threshing, 10 to 12 ears of rice gets left on average on a stack of straws. Despite such a big loss of grains, the workers in this unit, without any remorse, proceeded to use the straw stack with ears of rice still on it for other purposes, and piles it on top of manure for composting. In Daeyang Farm, the process of threshing was equally rough. Unit 2 at Daeyang also had more than ten ears of rice left on a stack of straws, which the unit nevertheless sent to the livestock and the vegetable farming unit.
This phenomenon at Anheung and Daeyang demonstrates how the members of these farms are not trying their hardest at filling up out nation’s rice reserve. Could you say that those workers at Anheung Farm, who do nothing about more than ten ears of rice being left on a straw stack, are working patriotically to ensure the supply of rice for our nation? There is no loss of grains more regrettable than to lose them from the negligence during harvest after long and hard spring and summer days of raising rice plants. However, at Anheung and Daeyang, such a loss does not seem to be minded, which casts doubt on the prospect of making this year’s harvest into a success. The failings at Anheung and Daeyang is partly to be blamed on the unit workers not fulfilling their duty, but a more fundamental problem lies in the shortcomings of the managers at the farm. If the managers made sure to take a proactive role for the harvest, and prepared the farm workers mentally with good planning and leadership, a disaster as such would not have happened. In other words, if the managers had set a good example, the harvest would not have been the way it is now (...)”
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
The North Korean government is also having trouble with farmers who have no sense of ownership in its collective farms. Through Station 3, the government has fiercely criticized the farmers winding up their workday on their own before the end of a work shift at a collective farm in Rajinpo, Yonan County, South Hwanghae Province, in the peak of the threshing season. The government made a resentful statement: “How can all farmers possibly leave their working place before the end of their shift? What could they have possibly been thinking?” The government also stated with anger that the farmers should have stayed at work until the electricity was back, rather than just leaving, risking missing the chance of utilizing the threshing machine when the power comes back. The bottom line was that every worker should work with a sense of responsibility in collective farms. The government delivered a warning that the farmers will have to use a treadle thresher if they continue not to put in their best effort.
Whenever criticized as such by the government, workers express their agony. “We know that there is nothing wrong in what the government says, but with everyone suffering from hunger pangs, who is going to use all their energy up in collective farms instead of tending their own private plots? Even though the government promises a preferential supply of electricity to the threshing floors, we have more days without electricity than with electricity. Nobody knows when the electricity is going to come back. In such uncertain circumstances, who will just stay and wait for the electricity? Don’t you think that it makes sense that we work in our own private plots if there is no electricity instead of just waiting for it to come back?” The workers would give their best effort if they get to keep whatever they harvested themselves at collective farms, but the ration that they get usually isn’t even sufficient for half a year’s food, and using that to pay back the food debt incurred during the spring season, there is not much to be left. Naturally, people put most of their energy and time into cultivating their private plots. One collective farm worker says that the best that the government can do is to allow private plots for the farm members, and that no amount of criticism and disciplining through Station 3 would change anything. The following is quoted from Station 3:
“Those who threshed grain beforehand should have worked with a determination to keep threshing until the rotational shift arrives. Nevertheless, the farm members’ state of mind has been so lackadaisical to the point that the entire members of the threshing group just stopped their work and went home. Currently, every worker in the country is greatly helping and leading each other in order to fully open the gate of the strong and prosperous nation for those who come after them; in such a circumstance, how can Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County show such a pathetic attitude with their terrible teamwork, and by going home carelessly even though the next shift did not come and not coming to work on time for their shift? Furthermore, even though we are in a difficult situation with the power shortage, the state is trying to secure electricity in the farming areas by all means these days to ensure that this year’s crop will be harvested as soon as possible; under such circumstance, how can they do such a pathetic job on threshing floors? How can you act so nonchalantly about threshing, instead of trying to maximize the use of the limited time when electricity is available? Have you already forgotten about the times when we toiled using the treadle thresher during the Arduous March? Also, you can still using the treadle thresher while waiting for electricity, and try to make a more efficient use of time to get as much threshing done as you can.
Choi Youngbin, the Chief of the Management Committee at Gwanyoung Collective Farm in Songhwa County, and Oh Dongsik, the Chief of the Management Committee at Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County, demonstrate poor ideological moral and bad work behavior. We must ask them whether they have any patriotic spirits at all to have a good harvest and resolve the food problem. We must ask whether the people like them who caused disruptions in the threshing work because they cannot even do a single organizational work are worthy to be managers. The reason that Choi Youngbin and Oh Dongsik failed in their leadership is simple. It is because they have a poor ideological moral; harvesting this year’s crop well is an important task in resolving this year’s food problem, but they did not take the matter as that of life and death in supporting the future of Socialsm; instead, they just saw it as routine farm work, and in the hope to do the least amount of work possible, did not even do the organizational work properly. We all must learn the important lesson from these bad examples. The quality of organization and leadership in harvest determines the crop yield. Those whose names were mentioned above must keep in mind that they are in charge of their respective farms and do their hardest to collect the crops into the nation’s grain storage without wasting a single grain, by scrupulous organizational work and a firm sense of ownership. Every worker in the agricultural sector of each region must put effort to improve the farm work organization so that they can contribute to resolving the nation’s food problem by reaping a splendid harvest this year.”
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
The consequences of stricter border patrols have affected the Chinese farming villages along the border between North Korea and China. Every fall, North Koreans have traditionally sneaked across the border into China to earn wages. However, this year almost all border crossings into China have ended. During the harvest season Chinese farmers usually hired North Koreans to work as farmhands to compensate for the lack of Chinese labor. It is not that no one crossed the border this year, but there was a dramatic reduction in the number of people doing so, less than 20 percent of the previous years. Like China, North Korea is also mobilizing its farmers for border patrol, making the border security much stricter. The Chinese farmers have expressed regret about the lack of North Koreans coming in for work. Jo Jung-geum Jo (alias), an ethnic Korean with Chinese citizenship living in Changbai, said “After working them for a couple of days we paid them a few hundred yuan and they said ‘we’ll be back next year’ and they went back home happily. They were tremendously happy even if we gave them clothes that we no longer wear at home. They worked so enthusiastically that we almost wanted them to stay and continue working for us. This year it has been hard to find laborers to the end of the harvest season. Last year, they came in groups of two or three, or in larger groups of five or six, going from a house to another, working. But this year hardly anyone had North Koreans coming in at all. Many said that they had difficulty finding help for their farms. Choi Sunghee, an ethnic Korean woman who says that she has hired North Koreans many times, said that she had trouble finding them this year. She also said, “If we gave them old clothes, bean paste, red chili paste, or rice, they were so happy that their families would not have to starve, but I don’t know how they’re going to make it through this winter. We were more worried about how those people will survive than the work we have left to do at home. So we often find ourselves glancing over the other side of the river. Over the years, we grew very fond of them. When we think of all the suffering they will have to go through just across the river, we feel sorry for them.”
Now that the harvest season is over, there has been a large decrease in workers. One person who has been helping the North Koreans for a long time said, “There have been more Kottjebis (street beggars from North Korea) this year. The kids cross the river looking like ghosts and their nutrition has gotten visibly worse. I think that these days there are more North Koreans who don’t plan on going back to North Korea after crossing the river. There is so much crackdown and hardship over there these days that no one wants to go back.”
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
According to one government official in Hyesan, Ryanggang Province, the main reason for the difficulty in crossing the border to China during the harvest season was due to a complete confiscation of cellular phones from security agents. A strict border security and new security agents who replaced the previous agents made it hard to cross the border, and moreover, seizing cellular phones from agents has eliminated the tool by which border security guards and defectors used to arrange safe times to cross the border, especially when coming back to North Korea. The official said, “Every year many people had gone to China to earn money during the planting season and the harvest season and then came back, but this fall, there weren’t many who did so. I heard from them that they earned 200 Yuan and were able to live through the winter on it. I am not sure how people will survive this winter since they couldn’t go.”
He also said, “The Chinese usually overlook North Koreans working illegally unless someone intentionally reports them to the authoritie so that they wouldn’t have to pay them, but, in most cases, they didn’t report them because they were in need of their labor. However, North Koreans didn’t even try to go to China this fall because of new border security agents and the prospect of severe punishment. I wanted to help them to cross the border, but it was impossible without a cellular phone to find out when the best time to let them cross the border was. People are very upset by the fact that they lost a valuable income source. ”
North Korea Today No. 427 November 2, 2011
[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
Grain Losses While Threshing
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
A significant loss of grains in the process of threshing is said to be present. The effort to minimize grain loss has started in the context of reduced crop prospects due to the damages from the flood that hit rice producing areas. However, questions remain over how effective an effort that’s limited only to ideological disciplining of the workers could be. Station 3, which exposes in detail and sternly criticizes who did what wrong in which farm focuses on heightening the sense of ownership among farmers in order to halt the loss of grains. Farmers, in turn, ask the government why electricity is not provided. While criticizing workers for not demonstrating enough sense of ownership, the government is failing to fulfill its own responsibility. Working on their own private plots on a priority basis in order to avoid hunger is the reality faced by farm workers. If farming on private plots is banned, there will be more stealing and smuggling of grains from the threshing process. A fundamental solution for ensuring the supply of food is needed. There is a way: permitting private farming will do it. The South Korean government and the international community, seeing the willingness on the part of the North Korean government to resolve the food shortage, will provide agricultural supplies and technology. The food shortage in North Korea can only be resolved by a fundamental restructuring of the society aimed for an increased food production.
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
With the harvest season coming to an end, the threshing process has started. Not only is the significant reduction in crop from the last year’s worrisome, but also posing a problem is the loss of grains in the period between harvest and threshing. Farm workers, regular citizens mobilized for agricultural production, soldiers – everyone in the sight is fighting tooth and nail to pilfer and smuggle as much rice as possible. To move sheaves of rice, cars are a necessity, and farms that cannot afford vehicles or shipping charges resort to using ox carts. Using an ox cart means rice sheaves are left in the field for days and stolen easily as a result. Even when there are guards on watch for the rice day and night, the rice gets stolen in any case by the guards themselves. When it rains, the situation is even worse, and it is not uncommon that rice gets wet from rain and goes bad.
The North Korean government has emphasized the importance of threshing via Station 3, and made pointed criticism toward specific cases, making a focused effort to warn people. Station 3 is the cable radio broadcast, which deals with internal propagandas with special importance, national issues that the government does not want to be revealed to the outside world, and foreign affairs explained to North Korean citizens. In contrast to the Korean Central Broadcasting Station (Station 1) and Radio Pyongyang (Station 2) directed mostly toward South Korean audience, Station 3 is only for the North Korean audience. The following is an excerpt from Station 3’s criticism on Dong-am Cooperative Farm in Sunchon, South Pyong-an Province, where sheaves of rice that did not get moved to the threshing floor got wet from rain, causing loss of grains:
“A few days ago, at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon City, we were surprised to see the amount of crops harvested by the work unit 4. It had rained since the night before in the field, and we saw all rice paddies filled with water to ankle level. The rice plants, with or without supports, were flooded and destroyed from the wind and rain. The situation at the threshing floor was far worse. The threshing machines were outside under the rain, disabling threshing altogether despite the fact that electricity was available. The lack of a plan for preparation caused the rain to flood the rice plants. When we asked the managers of the threshing floor about where the workers were, they said that the workers were given a break since there was no work to be done because of the rain. The rain had already stopped at that point, and it was well after 3 p.m., but there were no workers on the site except for two security men. It was clear to us that at Unit 4, there was no one who cared about the fact that the rice sheaves were drowned in rice paddies, and the threshing machines and harvested rice were wet from rain.
We would like to question Lee Chansil, the head of the work unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm, for his actions. We citizens are harvesting with our minds set on the goal of making a strong and prosperous country; why aren’t those workers doing the same? Neither the lack of workers nor distance was a problem in this case.
We have inspected four work units at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon city. At the nearby 6th Ryonpo Collective Farm, sheaves of rice were already moved to the side of the road to avoid getting wet from rain, and they were stacked up and covered. Also, they applied a double plastic thin film in order to keep the rain in the field of threshing. The different attitudes of Mr. Lee Chansil at Unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon, and Mr. Chun Sangbong at the Unit 6 at Ryonpo, make a striking contrast. It is not even the case that they are in different cities. They are located next to each other, but the difference is huge. The difference between the two work units shows that Mr. Lee and the workers at Unit 4 at Dong-am are working unwillingly not with a sense of ownership. This is the time when we need to put forth our best efforts, but some people regard their labor as a burden, and not with a revolutionary fervor, and thus they lost our hard-earned grains from rain without feeling any remorse.
In the end, the leader of the work unit, Mr. Lee, did not have any sense of ownership for the grains and the threshing floor, and thus had no interest in saving the grains from getting wet from rain and mud. On the other hand, we think the problem also lies in the management at Dong-am, including its head manager, Mr. Moon Hyangsik. If managers at each work unit could have been extremely careful and prepared for the rain, things would have been different. In particular, Unit 4 is very noticeable being located right beside the road, so it is obvious that workers did not even give it a glimpse at the field while it was raining heavily.
Workers at Dong-am collective farm at Sunchon city should renew their resolve. A powerful nation can be only achieved victoriously through the mind power and patriotic resolution from workers to be the owners of the country. Farm workers must consider themselves as problem solvers, so they need to do their best. We need to attain victory through grain production as one with high spirit and resolution.
Grain Losses While Threshing
Grain losses continue even after the sheaves are moved to the threshing floor from the field. Although farming villages are supposed to have priority in getting electricity during the threshing season, the lack of machines and poor supply of electricity slows down the threshing process. During the slow threshing process, there are many who steal rice by sheave. On Station 3, listeners were reminded of the importance of the threshing process with Anheung Farm and Daeyang Farm of Pyongyang’s Sunan district pointed out as bad examples.
“One way the lack of ownership manifests itself in Unit 3 of Anheung Farm is the rough treatment of rice sheaves during threshing. Because of negligence in picking out the ears of rice from straw stacks after threshing, 10 to 12 ears of rice gets left on average on a stack of straws. Despite such a big loss of grains, the workers in this unit, without any remorse, proceeded to use the straw stack with ears of rice still on it for other purposes, and piles it on top of manure for composting. In Daeyang Farm, the process of threshing was equally rough. Unit 2 at Daeyang also had more than ten ears of rice left on a stack of straws, which the unit nevertheless sent to the livestock and the vegetable farming unit.
This phenomenon at Anheung and Daeyang demonstrates how the members of these farms are not trying their hardest at filling up out nation’s rice reserve. Could you say that those workers at Anheung Farm, who do nothing about more than ten ears of rice being left on a straw stack, are working patriotically to ensure the supply of rice for our nation? There is no loss of grains more regrettable than to lose them from the negligence during harvest after long and hard spring and summer days of raising rice plants. However, at Anheung and Daeyang, such a loss does not seem to be minded, which casts doubt on the prospect of making this year’s harvest into a success. The failings at Anheung and Daeyang is partly to be blamed on the unit workers not fulfilling their duty, but a more fundamental problem lies in the shortcomings of the managers at the farm. If the managers made sure to take a proactive role for the harvest, and prepared the farm workers mentally with good planning and leadership, a disaster as such would not have happened. In other words, if the managers had set a good example, the harvest would not have been the way it is now (...)”
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
The North Korean government is also having trouble with farmers who have no sense of ownership in its collective farms. Through Station 3, the government has fiercely criticized the farmers winding up their workday on their own before the end of a work shift at a collective farm in Rajinpo, Yonan County, South Hwanghae Province, in the peak of the threshing season. The government made a resentful statement: “How can all farmers possibly leave their working place before the end of their shift? What could they have possibly been thinking?” The government also stated with anger that the farmers should have stayed at work until the electricity was back, rather than just leaving, risking missing the chance of utilizing the threshing machine when the power comes back. The bottom line was that every worker should work with a sense of responsibility in collective farms. The government delivered a warning that the farmers will have to use a treadle thresher if they continue not to put in their best effort.
Whenever criticized as such by the government, workers express their agony. “We know that there is nothing wrong in what the government says, but with everyone suffering from hunger pangs, who is going to use all their energy up in collective farms instead of tending their own private plots? Even though the government promises a preferential supply of electricity to the threshing floors, we have more days without electricity than with electricity. Nobody knows when the electricity is going to come back. In such uncertain circumstances, who will just stay and wait for the electricity? Don’t you think that it makes sense that we work in our own private plots if there is no electricity instead of just waiting for it to come back?” The workers would give their best effort if they get to keep whatever they harvested themselves at collective farms, but the ration that they get usually isn’t even sufficient for half a year’s food, and using that to pay back the food debt incurred during the spring season, there is not much to be left. Naturally, people put most of their energy and time into cultivating their private plots. One collective farm worker says that the best that the government can do is to allow private plots for the farm members, and that no amount of criticism and disciplining through Station 3 would change anything. The following is quoted from Station 3:
“Those who threshed grain beforehand should have worked with a determination to keep threshing until the rotational shift arrives. Nevertheless, the farm members’ state of mind has been so lackadaisical to the point that the entire members of the threshing group just stopped their work and went home. Currently, every worker in the country is greatly helping and leading each other in order to fully open the gate of the strong and prosperous nation for those who come after them; in such a circumstance, how can Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County show such a pathetic attitude with their terrible teamwork, and by going home carelessly even though the next shift did not come and not coming to work on time for their shift? Furthermore, even though we are in a difficult situation with the power shortage, the state is trying to secure electricity in the farming areas by all means these days to ensure that this year’s crop will be harvested as soon as possible; under such circumstance, how can they do such a pathetic job on threshing floors? How can you act so nonchalantly about threshing, instead of trying to maximize the use of the limited time when electricity is available? Have you already forgotten about the times when we toiled using the treadle thresher during the Arduous March? Also, you can still using the treadle thresher while waiting for electricity, and try to make a more efficient use of time to get as much threshing done as you can.
Choi Youngbin, the Chief of the Management Committee at Gwanyoung Collective Farm in Songhwa County, and Oh Dongsik, the Chief of the Management Committee at Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County, demonstrate poor ideological moral and bad work behavior. We must ask them whether they have any patriotic spirits at all to have a good harvest and resolve the food problem. We must ask whether the people like them who caused disruptions in the threshing work because they cannot even do a single organizational work are worthy to be managers. The reason that Choi Youngbin and Oh Dongsik failed in their leadership is simple. It is because they have a poor ideological moral; harvesting this year’s crop well is an important task in resolving this year’s food problem, but they did not take the matter as that of life and death in supporting the future of Socialsm; instead, they just saw it as routine farm work, and in the hope to do the least amount of work possible, did not even do the organizational work properly. We all must learn the important lesson from these bad examples. The quality of organization and leadership in harvest determines the crop yield. Those whose names were mentioned above must keep in mind that they are in charge of their respective farms and do their hardest to collect the crops into the nation’s grain storage without wasting a single grain, by scrupulous organizational work and a firm sense of ownership. Every worker in the agricultural sector of each region must put effort to improve the farm work organization so that they can contribute to resolving the nation’s food problem by reaping a splendid harvest this year.”
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
The consequences of stricter border patrols have affected the Chinese farming villages along the border between North Korea and China. Every fall, North Koreans have traditionally sneaked across the border into China to earn wages. However, this year almost all border crossings into China have ended. During the harvest season Chinese farmers usually hired North Koreans to work as farmhands to compensate for the lack of Chinese labor. It is not that no one crossed the border this year, but there was a dramatic reduction in the number of people doing so, less than 20 percent of the previous years. Like China, North Korea is also mobilizing its farmers for border patrol, making the border security much stricter. The Chinese farmers have expressed regret about the lack of North Koreans coming in for work. Jo Jung-geum Jo (alias), an ethnic Korean with Chinese citizenship living in Changbai, said “After working them for a couple of days we paid them a few hundred yuan and they said ‘we’ll be back next year’ and they went back home happily. They were tremendously happy even if we gave them clothes that we no longer wear at home. They worked so enthusiastically that we almost wanted them to stay and continue working for us. This year it has been hard to find laborers to the end of the harvest season. Last year, they came in groups of two or three, or in larger groups of five or six, going from a house to another, working. But this year hardly anyone had North Koreans coming in at all. Many said that they had difficulty finding help for their farms. Choi Sunghee, an ethnic Korean woman who says that she has hired North Koreans many times, said that she had trouble finding them this year. She also said, “If we gave them old clothes, bean paste, red chili paste, or rice, they were so happy that their families would not have to starve, but I don’t know how they’re going to make it through this winter. We were more worried about how those people will survive than the work we have left to do at home. So we often find ourselves glancing over the other side of the river. Over the years, we grew very fond of them. When we think of all the suffering they will have to go through just across the river, we feel sorry for them.”
Now that the harvest season is over, there has been a large decrease in workers. One person who has been helping the North Koreans for a long time said, “There have been more Kottjebis (street beggars from North Korea) this year. The kids cross the river looking like ghosts and their nutrition has gotten visibly worse. I think that these days there are more North Koreans who don’t plan on going back to North Korea after crossing the river. There is so much crackdown and hardship over there these days that no one wants to go back.”
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
According to one government official in Hyesan, Ryanggang Province, the main reason for the difficulty in crossing the border to China during the harvest season was due to a complete confiscation of cellular phones from security agents. A strict border security and new security agents who replaced the previous agents made it hard to cross the border, and moreover, seizing cellular phones from agents has eliminated the tool by which border security guards and defectors used to arrange safe times to cross the border, especially when coming back to North Korea. The official said, “Every year many people had gone to China to earn money during the planting season and the harvest season and then came back, but this fall, there weren’t many who did so. I heard from them that they earned 200 Yuan and were able to live through the winter on it. I am not sure how people will survive this winter since they couldn’t go.”
He also said, “The Chinese usually overlook North Koreans working illegally unless someone intentionally reports them to the authoritie so that they wouldn’t have to pay them, but, in most cases, they didn’t report them because they were in need of their labor. However, North Koreans didn’t even try to go to China this fall because of new border security agents and the prospect of severe punishment. I wanted to help them to cross the border, but it was impossible without a cellular phone to find out when the best time to let them cross the border was. People are very upset by the fact that they lost a valuable income source. ”
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
Grain Losses While Threshing
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
___________________________________________________________________
[Intro] There is a way to prevent loss of grains
A significant loss of grains in the process of threshing is said to be present. The effort to minimize grain loss has started in the context of reduced crop prospects due to the damages from the flood that hit rice producing areas. However, questions remain over how effective an effort that’s limited only to ideological disciplining of the workers could be. Station 3, which exposes in detail and sternly criticizes who did what wrong in which farm focuses on heightening the sense of ownership among farmers in order to halt the loss of grains. Farmers, in turn, ask the government why electricity is not provided. While criticizing workers for not demonstrating enough sense of ownership, the government is failing to fulfill its own responsibility. Working on their own private plots on a priority basis in order to avoid hunger is the reality faced by farm workers. If farming on private plots is banned, there will be more stealing and smuggling of grains from the threshing process. A fundamental solution for ensuring the supply of food is needed. There is a way: permitting private farming will do it. The South Korean government and the international community, seeing the willingness on the part of the North Korean government to resolve the food shortage, will provide agricultural supplies and technology. The food shortage in North Korea can only be resolved by a fundamental restructuring of the society aimed for an increased food production.
Station 3 Focuses on the Issue of Threshing
With the harvest season coming to an end, the threshing process has started. Not only is the significant reduction in crop from the last year’s worrisome, but also posing a problem is the loss of grains in the period between harvest and threshing. Farm workers, regular citizens mobilized for agricultural production, soldiers – everyone in the sight is fighting tooth and nail to pilfer and smuggle as much rice as possible. To move sheaves of rice, cars are a necessity, and farms that cannot afford vehicles or shipping charges resort to using ox carts. Using an ox cart means rice sheaves are left in the field for days and stolen easily as a result. Even when there are guards on watch for the rice day and night, the rice gets stolen in any case by the guards themselves. When it rains, the situation is even worse, and it is not uncommon that rice gets wet from rain and goes bad.
The North Korean government has emphasized the importance of threshing via Station 3, and made pointed criticism toward specific cases, making a focused effort to warn people. Station 3 is the cable radio broadcast, which deals with internal propagandas with special importance, national issues that the government does not want to be revealed to the outside world, and foreign affairs explained to North Korean citizens. In contrast to the Korean Central Broadcasting Station (Station 1) and Radio Pyongyang (Station 2) directed mostly toward South Korean audience, Station 3 is only for the North Korean audience. The following is an excerpt from Station 3’s criticism on Dong-am Cooperative Farm in Sunchon, South Pyong-an Province, where sheaves of rice that did not get moved to the threshing floor got wet from rain, causing loss of grains:
“A few days ago, at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon City, we were surprised to see the amount of crops harvested by the work unit 4. It had rained since the night before in the field, and we saw all rice paddies filled with water to ankle level. The rice plants, with or without supports, were flooded and destroyed from the wind and rain. The situation at the threshing floor was far worse. The threshing machines were outside under the rain, disabling threshing altogether despite the fact that electricity was available. The lack of a plan for preparation caused the rain to flood the rice plants. When we asked the managers of the threshing floor about where the workers were, they said that the workers were given a break since there was no work to be done because of the rain. The rain had already stopped at that point, and it was well after 3 p.m., but there were no workers on the site except for two security men. It was clear to us that at Unit 4, there was no one who cared about the fact that the rice sheaves were drowned in rice paddies, and the threshing machines and harvested rice were wet from rain.
We would like to question Lee Chansil, the head of the work unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm, for his actions. We citizens are harvesting with our minds set on the goal of making a strong and prosperous country; why aren’t those workers doing the same? Neither the lack of workers nor distance was a problem in this case.
We have inspected four work units at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon city. At the nearby 6th Ryonpo Collective Farm, sheaves of rice were already moved to the side of the road to avoid getting wet from rain, and they were stacked up and covered. Also, they applied a double plastic thin film in order to keep the rain in the field of threshing. The different attitudes of Mr. Lee Chansil at Unit 4 at Dong-am Collective Farm in Sunchon, and Mr. Chun Sangbong at the Unit 6 at Ryonpo, make a striking contrast. It is not even the case that they are in different cities. They are located next to each other, but the difference is huge. The difference between the two work units shows that Mr. Lee and the workers at Unit 4 at Dong-am are working unwillingly not with a sense of ownership. This is the time when we need to put forth our best efforts, but some people regard their labor as a burden, and not with a revolutionary fervor, and thus they lost our hard-earned grains from rain without feeling any remorse.
In the end, the leader of the work unit, Mr. Lee, did not have any sense of ownership for the grains and the threshing floor, and thus had no interest in saving the grains from getting wet from rain and mud. On the other hand, we think the problem also lies in the management at Dong-am, including its head manager, Mr. Moon Hyangsik. If managers at each work unit could have been extremely careful and prepared for the rain, things would have been different. In particular, Unit 4 is very noticeable being located right beside the road, so it is obvious that workers did not even give it a glimpse at the field while it was raining heavily.
Workers at Dong-am collective farm at Sunchon city should renew their resolve. A powerful nation can be only achieved victoriously through the mind power and patriotic resolution from workers to be the owners of the country. Farm workers must consider themselves as problem solvers, so they need to do their best. We need to attain victory through grain production as one with high spirit and resolution.
Grain Losses While Threshing
Grain losses continue even after the sheaves are moved to the threshing floor from the field. Although farming villages are supposed to have priority in getting electricity during the threshing season, the lack of machines and poor supply of electricity slows down the threshing process. During the slow threshing process, there are many who steal rice by sheave. On Station 3, listeners were reminded of the importance of the threshing process with Anheung Farm and Daeyang Farm of Pyongyang’s Sunan district pointed out as bad examples.
“One way the lack of ownership manifests itself in Unit 3 of Anheung Farm is the rough treatment of rice sheaves during threshing. Because of negligence in picking out the ears of rice from straw stacks after threshing, 10 to 12 ears of rice gets left on average on a stack of straws. Despite such a big loss of grains, the workers in this unit, without any remorse, proceeded to use the straw stack with ears of rice still on it for other purposes, and piles it on top of manure for composting. In Daeyang Farm, the process of threshing was equally rough. Unit 2 at Daeyang also had more than ten ears of rice left on a stack of straws, which the unit nevertheless sent to the livestock and the vegetable farming unit.
This phenomenon at Anheung and Daeyang demonstrates how the members of these farms are not trying their hardest at filling up out nation’s rice reserve. Could you say that those workers at Anheung Farm, who do nothing about more than ten ears of rice being left on a straw stack, are working patriotically to ensure the supply of rice for our nation? There is no loss of grains more regrettable than to lose them from the negligence during harvest after long and hard spring and summer days of raising rice plants. However, at Anheung and Daeyang, such a loss does not seem to be minded, which casts doubt on the prospect of making this year’s harvest into a success. The failings at Anheung and Daeyang is partly to be blamed on the unit workers not fulfilling their duty, but a more fundamental problem lies in the shortcomings of the managers at the farm. If the managers made sure to take a proactive role for the harvest, and prepared the farm workers mentally with good planning and leadership, a disaster as such would not have happened. In other words, if the managers had set a good example, the harvest would not have been the way it is now (...)”
Despite Asking Farmers to have a sense of ownership…
The North Korean government is also having trouble with farmers who have no sense of ownership in its collective farms. Through Station 3, the government has fiercely criticized the farmers winding up their workday on their own before the end of a work shift at a collective farm in Rajinpo, Yonan County, South Hwanghae Province, in the peak of the threshing season. The government made a resentful statement: “How can all farmers possibly leave their working place before the end of their shift? What could they have possibly been thinking?” The government also stated with anger that the farmers should have stayed at work until the electricity was back, rather than just leaving, risking missing the chance of utilizing the threshing machine when the power comes back. The bottom line was that every worker should work with a sense of responsibility in collective farms. The government delivered a warning that the farmers will have to use a treadle thresher if they continue not to put in their best effort.
Whenever criticized as such by the government, workers express their agony. “We know that there is nothing wrong in what the government says, but with everyone suffering from hunger pangs, who is going to use all their energy up in collective farms instead of tending their own private plots? Even though the government promises a preferential supply of electricity to the threshing floors, we have more days without electricity than with electricity. Nobody knows when the electricity is going to come back. In such uncertain circumstances, who will just stay and wait for the electricity? Don’t you think that it makes sense that we work in our own private plots if there is no electricity instead of just waiting for it to come back?” The workers would give their best effort if they get to keep whatever they harvested themselves at collective farms, but the ration that they get usually isn’t even sufficient for half a year’s food, and using that to pay back the food debt incurred during the spring season, there is not much to be left. Naturally, people put most of their energy and time into cultivating their private plots. One collective farm worker says that the best that the government can do is to allow private plots for the farm members, and that no amount of criticism and disciplining through Station 3 would change anything. The following is quoted from Station 3:
“Those who threshed grain beforehand should have worked with a determination to keep threshing until the rotational shift arrives. Nevertheless, the farm members’ state of mind has been so lackadaisical to the point that the entire members of the threshing group just stopped their work and went home. Currently, every worker in the country is greatly helping and leading each other in order to fully open the gate of the strong and prosperous nation for those who come after them; in such a circumstance, how can Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County show such a pathetic attitude with their terrible teamwork, and by going home carelessly even though the next shift did not come and not coming to work on time for their shift? Furthermore, even though we are in a difficult situation with the power shortage, the state is trying to secure electricity in the farming areas by all means these days to ensure that this year’s crop will be harvested as soon as possible; under such circumstance, how can they do such a pathetic job on threshing floors? How can you act so nonchalantly about threshing, instead of trying to maximize the use of the limited time when electricity is available? Have you already forgotten about the times when we toiled using the treadle thresher during the Arduous March? Also, you can still using the treadle thresher while waiting for electricity, and try to make a more efficient use of time to get as much threshing done as you can.
Choi Youngbin, the Chief of the Management Committee at Gwanyoung Collective Farm in Songhwa County, and Oh Dongsik, the Chief of the Management Committee at Rajinpo Collective Farm in Yonan County, demonstrate poor ideological moral and bad work behavior. We must ask them whether they have any patriotic spirits at all to have a good harvest and resolve the food problem. We must ask whether the people like them who caused disruptions in the threshing work because they cannot even do a single organizational work are worthy to be managers. The reason that Choi Youngbin and Oh Dongsik failed in their leadership is simple. It is because they have a poor ideological moral; harvesting this year’s crop well is an important task in resolving this year’s food problem, but they did not take the matter as that of life and death in supporting the future of Socialsm; instead, they just saw it as routine farm work, and in the hope to do the least amount of work possible, did not even do the organizational work properly. We all must learn the important lesson from these bad examples. The quality of organization and leadership in harvest determines the crop yield. Those whose names were mentioned above must keep in mind that they are in charge of their respective farms and do their hardest to collect the crops into the nation’s grain storage without wasting a single grain, by scrupulous organizational work and a firm sense of ownership. Every worker in the agricultural sector of each region must put effort to improve the farm work organization so that they can contribute to resolving the nation’s food problem by reaping a splendid harvest this year.”
With Stricter Border Controls, Chinese Villages Lack Farmhands
The consequences of stricter border patrols have affected the Chinese farming villages along the border between North Korea and China. Every fall, North Koreans have traditionally sneaked across the border into China to earn wages. However, this year almost all border crossings into China have ended. During the harvest season Chinese farmers usually hired North Koreans to work as farmhands to compensate for the lack of Chinese labor. It is not that no one crossed the border this year, but there was a dramatic reduction in the number of people doing so, less than 20 percent of the previous years. Like China, North Korea is also mobilizing its farmers for border patrol, making the border security much stricter. The Chinese farmers have expressed regret about the lack of North Koreans coming in for work. Jo Jung-geum Jo (alias), an ethnic Korean with Chinese citizenship living in Changbai, said “After working them for a couple of days we paid them a few hundred yuan and they said ‘we’ll be back next year’ and they went back home happily. They were tremendously happy even if we gave them clothes that we no longer wear at home. They worked so enthusiastically that we almost wanted them to stay and continue working for us. This year it has been hard to find laborers to the end of the harvest season. Last year, they came in groups of two or three, or in larger groups of five or six, going from a house to another, working. But this year hardly anyone had North Koreans coming in at all. Many said that they had difficulty finding help for their farms. Choi Sunghee, an ethnic Korean woman who says that she has hired North Koreans many times, said that she had trouble finding them this year. She also said, “If we gave them old clothes, bean paste, red chili paste, or rice, they were so happy that their families would not have to starve, but I don’t know how they’re going to make it through this winter. We were more worried about how those people will survive than the work we have left to do at home. So we often find ourselves glancing over the other side of the river. Over the years, we grew very fond of them. When we think of all the suffering they will have to go through just across the river, we feel sorry for them.”
Now that the harvest season is over, there has been a large decrease in workers. One person who has been helping the North Koreans for a long time said, “There have been more Kottjebis (street beggars from North Korea) this year. The kids cross the river looking like ghosts and their nutrition has gotten visibly worse. I think that these days there are more North Koreans who don’t plan on going back to North Korea after crossing the river. There is so much crackdown and hardship over there these days that no one wants to go back.”
Hard to Cross the Boarder with No Cellular Phones
According to one government official in Hyesan, Ryanggang Province, the main reason for the difficulty in crossing the border to China during the harvest season was due to a complete confiscation of cellular phones from security agents. A strict border security and new security agents who replaced the previous agents made it hard to cross the border, and moreover, seizing cellular phones from agents has eliminated the tool by which border security guards and defectors used to arrange safe times to cross the border, especially when coming back to North Korea. The official said, “Every year many people had gone to China to earn money during the planting season and the harvest season and then came back, but this fall, there weren’t many who did so. I heard from them that they earned 200 Yuan and were able to live through the winter on it. I am not sure how people will survive this winter since they couldn’t go.”
He also said, “The Chinese usually overlook North Koreans working illegally unless someone intentionally reports them to the authoritie so that they wouldn’t have to pay them, but, in most cases, they didn’t report them because they were in need of their labor. However, North Koreans didn’t even try to go to China this fall because of new border security agents and the prospect of severe punishment. I wanted to help them to cross the border, but it was impossible without a cellular phone to find out when the best time to let them cross the border was. People are very upset by the fact that they lost a valuable income source. ”
Thursday, November 10, 2011
North Korea Today No. 426 October 26, 2011
[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] North Korean Minerals Are Valuable Assets for South Korea
First Anniversary of Kim Jong-un’s Official Inception: Focus on Economics
Yes to Exporting Coals, but No to Exporting Management Right
Restricting Mining Is Easier Said Than Done
A Sudden Rise in Overseas Representative’s Tax Liability
Overseas Representative Frown on Arrogant Attitude of New Officials
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] North Korean Minerals Are Valuable Assets for South Korea
It has been reported that many new economic policies have been proposed at the meeting of the Organization and Guidance Department held a year after Kim Jong-un, the current Vice-Chairman of the National Defense Commission, revealed himself to the world. Although the triple alliance between North Korea, China, and Russia will remain largely untouched, less extensive changes are to be made.
Strengthening regulation on foreign investments in mineral resources and exploiting the resources with North Korean technology is one of the proposed changes. The proposal would likely have stemmed from a growing concern that China may be overexploiting their mineral wealth and depleting it. But restricting foreign ownership or mineral rights will not bring about an immediate decline in exports, since the Party officials will be reluctant to give up such a lucrative enterprise. It is likely that the Central Party officials will not be easy to control.
It is truly a shame that the inter-Korean Economic Cooperation Project has been stopped short when we look at how North Korea’s mineral resources are being sold off at giveaway prices to foreign businesses. Mineral production is a project that is sure to benefit both North and South Korea; it must be partaken regardless of large investments that are needed for the infrastructure. It is imperative that we begin to work toward a cooperative measure with North Korea.
First Anniversary of Kim Jong-un’s Official Inception : Focus on Economics
October 10th of this year, which was North Korea’s Party’s Foundation Day, had a special meaning, since it also happened to be the first anniversary of military commissioner Kim Jong-un’s official inception to the Party. Military commissioner Kim was elected Vice-Chairman of the Central Party Military Commission at the 3rd Party Representative’s Conference held on the 28th of September last year, and inspected the troops at the official Review during the 65th Anniversary of the Party’s Foundation on October 10. This year there were no special external festivities, but internally there was a concentrated discussion on economic policy that would best suit a new leadership program. One Central Party executive said, “Subjects under discussion included an evaluation of this past year and future strategies. Diplomatically, a strengthened political, military and economic cooperation with China and Russia, and especially the alliance with China were highly valued above all else. Even in the times of the Great Leader the North Korean – Chinese relationship was never this close – this is how much the Party’s perception and evaluation of China has transformed since then. In various areas of Commerce, as well as of Trade, Industry, Sport and Health etc., the administrative sectors of the Party are actively making progress, for example by dispatching ambassadors to China and Russia to execute market research,” and essentially confirmed the North Korea – China – Russia triadic alliance and peace negotiations will remain untainted into the future. Since things were not working out with the United States government, he claimed there was no choice but to concentrate on diplomatic priorities with China and Russia to achieve a stabilization of the system and economic recovery.
“For our Republic, the current situation where the whole country is suffering from poverty and economic hardship as well as the international financial crisis leaves only expansion into the Chinese market as the only solution for survival. However there is strong concern about a complete reliance on China. We think participating in a six-party summit to achieve international cooperation and seek economic coordination with the international community will best expedite our nation’s economic recovery. It is only because people who can make proposals to the supreme leadership are so limited that we cannot seek public opinions on this issue; those who are well acquainted with diplomatic affairs, while they do assert that a North Korea- China –Russia alliance is basically the only ‘solution’, warn we must not completely rely on it. They say that we must deviate from a Pyongyang-centered foreign trade, to allow each city, prefecture of each region to make foreign expansion freely, and thereby take steps to resolving this economic hardship.” Such opinions are understood to be at loggerheads with those of the party leadership.
Yes to Exporting Coals, but No to Exporting Management Right
During the economic policy meeting held on the one-year anniversary of the official debut of Kim Jung-un, concerns over the public’s increased dependence on trade with China were expressed. Although it was acknowledged that a strong trade alliance between North Korea and China was unavoidable reality, a voice was raised to discuss a cutback on China’s aggressive investment on North Korea’s natural mineral resources.
This year’s trade dependency on China was over 80 percent as it was a year before. Minerals – coal, iron ore, and zinc – were the highest exported items to China. Few members of North Korean Cabinet expressed their worries on the sweeping of natural mineral resources by China. Citing an economists’ statement, “all natural resources will be dried up within a few decades if North Korea continuously sells its natural resources as raw materials to China at cheap prices,” the Cabinet members stated that the China’s encroachment had to stop before too late.
A Central Party official who attended the meeting said, “For years, we have had no choices but selling our natural resources to China to overcome economic difficulties and severe food shortages. However, at this meeting, many of us shared an opinion that we cannot keep on selling the resources until there is nothing left to be sold. We must not ignore the scary potential that the whole nation can be besieged by China if we continue to sell our natural resources as we have been doing thus far. Fundamentally, without natural resources, how will our future generations survive? Regarding all these, we agreed that we should produce goods, instead of relying on imported Chinese goods, and sell them at cheaper prices than those of China.”
The aforementioned party official’s statement implied that the North Korean Government’s intention to select Chinese investments on mineral mines in the future. A senior party official at Pyongyang also alluded to the similar ambiance as above. In his statement, the official said, “Due to the limited economic capacity, we were not able to develop mineral mines by ourselves. Unfortunately, this led to sales of the management right of our mines to foreign countries. So far, a huge amount of natural resources have exited North Korea bound for China at cheap prices. Needless to say, a serious concern over the continuous depletion of North Korean natural resources by China was raised by party members.
Furthermore, a voice of criticism was heard. According to the dissenter, the economic relief by trading so much coal and other raw minerals with China was not delivered as it was expected. As a matter of fact, we even sold coal for government agencies’ power plants to China to purchase food. However, we have not been able to solve the food crisis even with this effort. Therefore, there were plenty of similar opinions saying that we should export mined coal and other minerals to China instead of mining rights. Also, we should invest in the development of domestic technologies and economic capabilities so that we could process the raw materials and sell them at higher prices.”
Restricting Mining Is Easier Said Than Done
The incentive to impose restrictions on foreign investments and mining concessions was spurred on by the futility of selling off resources to China, which has not resolved the economic situation nor has it offered a long term solution to the failing economy. However, being more selective about Chinese investments is easier said than done. With economic sanctions continuously imposed on North Korea, unchanging international affairs, and worsening inter- Korean relations, North Korea would have nowhere else to turn. What would fill the economic void created by the absence of Chinese investments? The military, the party, and the cabinet do not have a reason to give up their way of earning easy money. It is likely that the interests of higher ranking leaders will conflict with those of the officials in charge of the infrastructure.
A Sudden Rise in Overseas Representative’s Tax Liability
The Central Party decided in a cabinet meeting that the funding supplied by ore and coal should be paid by raising the Overseas Representative’s tax liability from now on. The decision intends to increase the tax from $20,000 to $30,000. Overseas Representative officers have been astonished by the news. The general understanding among the officers is that they are repeatedly challenged by the rise in tax even before the chaos caused by the recent harsh inspections calms down. They do not think that that the new $30,000 liability makes any sense at all given that the requirement to provide 500,000 tons of food to the government is moving at a snail’s pace, although its due date is delayed by one month from September to October. One official lamented the situation by saying that “I can only smirk at the situation because the government raised the tax liability by $10,000 when I couldn’t even pay for the original amount of $20,000.
On one hand, the government frequently put us under inspection to see how much we keep money set aside, and on the other hand, it keeps raising the amount of tax liability; I don’t see how I can handle this tax liability. Now, every department has been paralyzed by severe inspection, and given that, how can I make money? I barely paid 4,500 Yuan for loyalty funds for the Party Foundation Day, and this tax liability is getting more demanding. When asked whether there was any significant difference since Kim Jong-un’s introduction as the Vice-Chairman of the Central Military Commission’s official one year ago, he answered, “In the past, Overseas Representatives prioritized political assignments; even when they could not make enough money to pay the tax, they would still be rewarded for successes on political assignments. Nowadays, however, the government only cares about receiving money. The government will not recognize political accomplishments if the tax isn’t paid.” The government is putting emphasis on the economic success over political success. Many think, however, that even with the government’s shift in their priority in consideration, its raise on tax liability is unrealistic especially after the slowing down of international trades caused by the recent harsh inspection. Some officials even say that “this time it is not going to be a problem that can be solved by replacing just a few people.”
Overseas Representative Frown on Arrogant Attitude of New Officials
The officials at Overseas Representative have understandably thrown out complaints about the colleagues who were newly deployed to their offices, such as a deputy restaurant manager who was naturally sent by the Security department. An increasing number of people openly rebuke new colleagues, saying “I can’t stand the new deputy restaurant manager. He is such an arrogant and impudent person. It is obvious that his connection to the new administration brought him to the position despite his lack of skills and experience. He despises everybody else.” Another official said, “I can’t stand him, either. He seems to think he is the great patriot our country needs. I think our country would collapse if someone like him made it to a higher position.”
An official who briefly visited Pyongyang said, “Old colleagues, myself included, rebuke new colleagues (behind themselves,) naming them one by one. I try not to make them upset; however, for fear of retaliation by using their authority to inspect me. Whenever they shoot a suspicious eye at us and treat us like criminals, (presuming we are guilty of inappropriate behavior), I am close to confronting them out of anger.”
The official also talked about Pyongyang’s food situation that has worsened enough to shock him, saying “I came to see (realize) why my family in Pyongyang asked me to send rice instead of money during the last spring hardship season. The rice price in Pyongyang soared to 2,900 won per kg. My family was right to tell me they could not get rice with the money I could have sent to them.” He felt sorry for his family members, who were not fed enough and lost much of their weight. Though hardly pressed to complete food procurement task, he was fortunate to feed himself without difficulty while working overseas.
He added that “It is absurd to expect overseas workers to be loyal to our country while treating them as criminals. (Presuming that they are guilty of inappropriate behavior) We are not asking for recognition (appreciation) of our contribution to our country. My hope is that the newly deployed people lacking knowledge and experience do not despise predecessor or those who has thus far worked overseas without legitimate reason. They will realize how difficult it would be to save face of the higher level officials by completing tasks assigned to them and, at the same time, to feed their family as well.
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] North Korean Minerals Are Valuable Assets for South Korea
First Anniversary of Kim Jong-un’s Official Inception: Focus on Economics
Yes to Exporting Coals, but No to Exporting Management Right
Restricting Mining Is Easier Said Than Done
A Sudden Rise in Overseas Representative’s Tax Liability
Overseas Representative Frown on Arrogant Attitude of New Officials
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] North Korean Minerals Are Valuable Assets for South Korea
It has been reported that many new economic policies have been proposed at the meeting of the Organization and Guidance Department held a year after Kim Jong-un, the current Vice-Chairman of the National Defense Commission, revealed himself to the world. Although the triple alliance between North Korea, China, and Russia will remain largely untouched, less extensive changes are to be made.
Strengthening regulation on foreign investments in mineral resources and exploiting the resources with North Korean technology is one of the proposed changes. The proposal would likely have stemmed from a growing concern that China may be overexploiting their mineral wealth and depleting it. But restricting foreign ownership or mineral rights will not bring about an immediate decline in exports, since the Party officials will be reluctant to give up such a lucrative enterprise. It is likely that the Central Party officials will not be easy to control.
It is truly a shame that the inter-Korean Economic Cooperation Project has been stopped short when we look at how North Korea’s mineral resources are being sold off at giveaway prices to foreign businesses. Mineral production is a project that is sure to benefit both North and South Korea; it must be partaken regardless of large investments that are needed for the infrastructure. It is imperative that we begin to work toward a cooperative measure with North Korea.
First Anniversary of Kim Jong-un’s Official Inception : Focus on Economics
October 10th of this year, which was North Korea’s Party’s Foundation Day, had a special meaning, since it also happened to be the first anniversary of military commissioner Kim Jong-un’s official inception to the Party. Military commissioner Kim was elected Vice-Chairman of the Central Party Military Commission at the 3rd Party Representative’s Conference held on the 28th of September last year, and inspected the troops at the official Review during the 65th Anniversary of the Party’s Foundation on October 10. This year there were no special external festivities, but internally there was a concentrated discussion on economic policy that would best suit a new leadership program. One Central Party executive said, “Subjects under discussion included an evaluation of this past year and future strategies. Diplomatically, a strengthened political, military and economic cooperation with China and Russia, and especially the alliance with China were highly valued above all else. Even in the times of the Great Leader the North Korean – Chinese relationship was never this close – this is how much the Party’s perception and evaluation of China has transformed since then. In various areas of Commerce, as well as of Trade, Industry, Sport and Health etc., the administrative sectors of the Party are actively making progress, for example by dispatching ambassadors to China and Russia to execute market research,” and essentially confirmed the North Korea – China – Russia triadic alliance and peace negotiations will remain untainted into the future. Since things were not working out with the United States government, he claimed there was no choice but to concentrate on diplomatic priorities with China and Russia to achieve a stabilization of the system and economic recovery.
“For our Republic, the current situation where the whole country is suffering from poverty and economic hardship as well as the international financial crisis leaves only expansion into the Chinese market as the only solution for survival. However there is strong concern about a complete reliance on China. We think participating in a six-party summit to achieve international cooperation and seek economic coordination with the international community will best expedite our nation’s economic recovery. It is only because people who can make proposals to the supreme leadership are so limited that we cannot seek public opinions on this issue; those who are well acquainted with diplomatic affairs, while they do assert that a North Korea- China –Russia alliance is basically the only ‘solution’, warn we must not completely rely on it. They say that we must deviate from a Pyongyang-centered foreign trade, to allow each city, prefecture of each region to make foreign expansion freely, and thereby take steps to resolving this economic hardship.” Such opinions are understood to be at loggerheads with those of the party leadership.
Yes to Exporting Coals, but No to Exporting Management Right
During the economic policy meeting held on the one-year anniversary of the official debut of Kim Jung-un, concerns over the public’s increased dependence on trade with China were expressed. Although it was acknowledged that a strong trade alliance between North Korea and China was unavoidable reality, a voice was raised to discuss a cutback on China’s aggressive investment on North Korea’s natural mineral resources.
This year’s trade dependency on China was over 80 percent as it was a year before. Minerals – coal, iron ore, and zinc – were the highest exported items to China. Few members of North Korean Cabinet expressed their worries on the sweeping of natural mineral resources by China. Citing an economists’ statement, “all natural resources will be dried up within a few decades if North Korea continuously sells its natural resources as raw materials to China at cheap prices,” the Cabinet members stated that the China’s encroachment had to stop before too late.
A Central Party official who attended the meeting said, “For years, we have had no choices but selling our natural resources to China to overcome economic difficulties and severe food shortages. However, at this meeting, many of us shared an opinion that we cannot keep on selling the resources until there is nothing left to be sold. We must not ignore the scary potential that the whole nation can be besieged by China if we continue to sell our natural resources as we have been doing thus far. Fundamentally, without natural resources, how will our future generations survive? Regarding all these, we agreed that we should produce goods, instead of relying on imported Chinese goods, and sell them at cheaper prices than those of China.”
The aforementioned party official’s statement implied that the North Korean Government’s intention to select Chinese investments on mineral mines in the future. A senior party official at Pyongyang also alluded to the similar ambiance as above. In his statement, the official said, “Due to the limited economic capacity, we were not able to develop mineral mines by ourselves. Unfortunately, this led to sales of the management right of our mines to foreign countries. So far, a huge amount of natural resources have exited North Korea bound for China at cheap prices. Needless to say, a serious concern over the continuous depletion of North Korean natural resources by China was raised by party members.
Furthermore, a voice of criticism was heard. According to the dissenter, the economic relief by trading so much coal and other raw minerals with China was not delivered as it was expected. As a matter of fact, we even sold coal for government agencies’ power plants to China to purchase food. However, we have not been able to solve the food crisis even with this effort. Therefore, there were plenty of similar opinions saying that we should export mined coal and other minerals to China instead of mining rights. Also, we should invest in the development of domestic technologies and economic capabilities so that we could process the raw materials and sell them at higher prices.”
Restricting Mining Is Easier Said Than Done
The incentive to impose restrictions on foreign investments and mining concessions was spurred on by the futility of selling off resources to China, which has not resolved the economic situation nor has it offered a long term solution to the failing economy. However, being more selective about Chinese investments is easier said than done. With economic sanctions continuously imposed on North Korea, unchanging international affairs, and worsening inter- Korean relations, North Korea would have nowhere else to turn. What would fill the economic void created by the absence of Chinese investments? The military, the party, and the cabinet do not have a reason to give up their way of earning easy money. It is likely that the interests of higher ranking leaders will conflict with those of the officials in charge of the infrastructure.
A Sudden Rise in Overseas Representative’s Tax Liability
The Central Party decided in a cabinet meeting that the funding supplied by ore and coal should be paid by raising the Overseas Representative’s tax liability from now on. The decision intends to increase the tax from $20,000 to $30,000. Overseas Representative officers have been astonished by the news. The general understanding among the officers is that they are repeatedly challenged by the rise in tax even before the chaos caused by the recent harsh inspections calms down. They do not think that that the new $30,000 liability makes any sense at all given that the requirement to provide 500,000 tons of food to the government is moving at a snail’s pace, although its due date is delayed by one month from September to October. One official lamented the situation by saying that “I can only smirk at the situation because the government raised the tax liability by $10,000 when I couldn’t even pay for the original amount of $20,000.
On one hand, the government frequently put us under inspection to see how much we keep money set aside, and on the other hand, it keeps raising the amount of tax liability; I don’t see how I can handle this tax liability. Now, every department has been paralyzed by severe inspection, and given that, how can I make money? I barely paid 4,500 Yuan for loyalty funds for the Party Foundation Day, and this tax liability is getting more demanding. When asked whether there was any significant difference since Kim Jong-un’s introduction as the Vice-Chairman of the Central Military Commission’s official one year ago, he answered, “In the past, Overseas Representatives prioritized political assignments; even when they could not make enough money to pay the tax, they would still be rewarded for successes on political assignments. Nowadays, however, the government only cares about receiving money. The government will not recognize political accomplishments if the tax isn’t paid.” The government is putting emphasis on the economic success over political success. Many think, however, that even with the government’s shift in their priority in consideration, its raise on tax liability is unrealistic especially after the slowing down of international trades caused by the recent harsh inspection. Some officials even say that “this time it is not going to be a problem that can be solved by replacing just a few people.”
Overseas Representative Frown on Arrogant Attitude of New Officials
The officials at Overseas Representative have understandably thrown out complaints about the colleagues who were newly deployed to their offices, such as a deputy restaurant manager who was naturally sent by the Security department. An increasing number of people openly rebuke new colleagues, saying “I can’t stand the new deputy restaurant manager. He is such an arrogant and impudent person. It is obvious that his connection to the new administration brought him to the position despite his lack of skills and experience. He despises everybody else.” Another official said, “I can’t stand him, either. He seems to think he is the great patriot our country needs. I think our country would collapse if someone like him made it to a higher position.”
An official who briefly visited Pyongyang said, “Old colleagues, myself included, rebuke new colleagues (behind themselves,) naming them one by one. I try not to make them upset; however, for fear of retaliation by using their authority to inspect me. Whenever they shoot a suspicious eye at us and treat us like criminals, (presuming we are guilty of inappropriate behavior), I am close to confronting them out of anger.”
The official also talked about Pyongyang’s food situation that has worsened enough to shock him, saying “I came to see (realize) why my family in Pyongyang asked me to send rice instead of money during the last spring hardship season. The rice price in Pyongyang soared to 2,900 won per kg. My family was right to tell me they could not get rice with the money I could have sent to them.” He felt sorry for his family members, who were not fed enough and lost much of their weight. Though hardly pressed to complete food procurement task, he was fortunate to feed himself without difficulty while working overseas.
He added that “It is absurd to expect overseas workers to be loyal to our country while treating them as criminals. (Presuming that they are guilty of inappropriate behavior) We are not asking for recognition (appreciation) of our contribution to our country. My hope is that the newly deployed people lacking knowledge and experience do not despise predecessor or those who has thus far worked overseas without legitimate reason. They will realize how difficult it would be to save face of the higher level officials by completing tasks assigned to them and, at the same time, to feed their family as well.
Monday, November 7, 2011
North Korea Today No. 425 October 19, 2011
[“Good Friends” aims to help the North Korean people from a humanistic point of view and publishes “North Korea Today” describing the way the North Korean people live as accurately as possible. We at Good Friends also hope to be a bridge between the North Korean people and the world.]
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Is Crackdown on North Korean Refugees the Best Way?
Refugees Expected This Winter
Fees for Border Crossing Skyrocket as Surveillance Increases
Border-crossing Families Increase due to Food Crisis
No Means of Asking for Support from Daughter Who Fled to South Korea
Some Increase in Crops in North Hamgyong Farms
Lack of Salt Poses Challenge for Making Next Six Months’ Supply of Kimchi
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Is Crackdown on North Korean Refugees the Best Way?
The South Korean government made an offer of 200,000 food aid items such as Choco Pies, ramen noodles, snacks, and nutrition-dense foods to the North after the floods in North Korea. When the North did not respond, the South government withdrew its aid proposal. According to the World Food Program, a third of North Koreans are suffering from starvation, and immediate actions need to be taken. The South Korean government should give food aid as soon as possible to keep in line with the humanitarian principles. As for the North Korean government, it should accept any kind of aid to save people from death by malnutrition and then ask for more aid as needed. It should also allow its citizens to find their own means for survival. What ordinary North Koreans want is simple. They do not have any expectation for food distribution any more. They just want to be left alone by the government control. Suppressing economic activities to curb social disturbances is like burning down the whole house to kill a bedbug. The more control is imposed on the people, the more they want to escape. When people face a dead end, they take their family members and quietly cross the border. Being called traitors is not what they want, but it is the only choice left to them. Those defectors are fully aware of the fact that they will have stay hidden in foreign countries, and their human rights will not be honored. To prevent having more refugees, the regime should relax its control and let the people work on their own. The cold winter has arrived earlier than usual this year. North and South Korean governments need to cooperate to bring relief to the suffering people.
Refugees Expected This Winter
The Central Party has ordered strengthening border control for the possibility that people would try to cross the border over the frozen Tumen River. A Party official said that the Party was concerned about a massive exodus of refugees. These refugees will be different from those crossing the border to China simply to get some help from their relatives with some secondhand clothes or to buy things to sell in North Korea. The concern is that the Party will lose control over those who are risking their lives and leaving the country with thoughts of never coming back.
One Pyongyang security officer who made an inspection in the border area said, “The residents were barely surviving. Pyongyang officials need to witness the tragic lives of these people firsthand. Telling these people to stay and endure this pain is the same as telling them to die. If there is any chance for a survival, anyone would try to cross the border and never give up.”
An official from the Central Party said, “There is no question about the direness of the situation when even a security officer is concerned about the lives of the people. The potential sudden influx of refugees into China might not be as large as the one during the Arduous March, but a great number of people are likely to make a life or death decision this winter. China should protect them, or at least provide shelters for the refugee children. There number of refugees will increase in the near future, and I hope concerned people overseas will show some interest and support.” He also expressed his concern that even if they successfully crossed the border, they would need the help of the international community in order to survive in China.
Fees for Border Crossing Skyrocket as Surveillance Increases
As the surveillance on border crossing and cell-phone usages in the border area strengthens, border crossing fee is increasing as well. Professional brokers also say that it has gotten much harder to get a contact in North Korean and Chinese Border Security units. A soldier of the Chinese border security unit said that there was a sudden increase in requests by Korean-Chinese in China to help the border crossing of their relatives living in North Korea. Many requests are still coming from professional brokers to bring over young women from North Korea, but an increasing number of Korean-Chinese people, who can no longer stand aside and watch their relatives dying of hunger, are asking for help. An official who had inspected the border area returned to Pyongyang and said, "The purpose of punishing those who had crossed the border, the military personnel who helped them cross, and the cell phone users was to prevent a larger scale exodus by blocking the route. However, according to the officials in the border area, this policy only helps the brokers because the brokers now charge higher fees for the increased risk. Many local officials tent to be cautious in fear of the punishment when caught receiving bribes from the brokers. However, others seem to be bold enough to help border crossings in order to make a huge sum of money at once. Unless the current food shortage is addressed, there is no way we can prevent illegal border crossings, no matter how hard we try."
In the meantime, the search for cell phone users in the border area is continuing. In places like Hoeryung, Onsung, and Musan, cell phone users are getting arrested and sent to the Provincial Safety Bureau. Those who are arrested this time are said to be undergoing a thorough investigation for border crossing and smuggling charges, and their deeds in the last 10 years at the very least will be examined.
Border-crossing Families Increase due to Food Crisis
The phenomenon of family disintegration began to appear across the nation was at peak during last spring’s food shortage, and it has come again this fall. Food shortage is in the core reason for the disintegration, causing families to fight over food, parents to go separate ways with different children in order to keep the hungry children alive or sell everything including the house to pay for food and then get divorced as a result. Many families are disintegrating, and this phenomenon is most prevalent among the poorest. Scattered family members become kkotjebi, wandering around as beggars. When the local party workers find these wanderers, they arrest them and try to send them back to where they came from. As the majority of the kkotjebis come from other cities or villages, it is not an easy task to send them back. If the wanderers are from the area they are found in, the neighborhood unit is to take care of them. The chief of the neighborhood unit is responsible for a couple of these families, and there are usually two to three wandering families within a neighborhood unit.
Recently, the number of families fleeing from North Korea has been increasing. The rationale of such families is that they would rather die together than be broken up as Kkotjebi (Homeless). Since the border security measures in the area of Heoryong and Onsung in North Hamgyong Province are very strict, defectors try to find new escape routes. Kim Young-Cheol (Alias), interviewed in the border area before fleeing over to China, said, “I don’t see how we are going to survive. I am doing this for my children. Although we have a new leader, nothing has changed, except for the increase in government control and oppression. How am I going to live without food rations when even Chinese imports are banned? I have been forced to go to work every day for a despicable wage and no food ration. My small farming lot failed this year because I had no money to buy fertilizers. My corn harvest was only about 50 kilograms. Some of them were stolen, and some were spent for a loan payback. My family cannot survive this winter with the corn we have left. We will die from starvation if I don’t take any action. Either way we will die, so I decided to cross the border. I will ask my distant aunt in Heilongjiang Province in China for help. If I stay here, my children will die before me.” Whether he has safely made into China is unknown, but the evidence that an increased number of families are crossing the border can also be found in a neighborhood unit’s lecture. Choi Soon-Nam (Alias) said that she felt more urge to cross the border with her family after attending neighborhood unit meetings every day to hear repeated criticisms against disappeared families. “I don’t pay attention to the Party’s criticism and punishment on the defectors. The only things that gets my attention is those families who succeeded in border crossing and the family living well with the money sent by their daughter who fled from North Korea. Frankly, I envy defectors for their ability to take action. If I ever decide to cross the border, I need to take my whole family with me because family members left behind will be severely punished”, she said.
Security Agents and Police Officers are responsible for the security enforcement in the border areas. When more than three defectors are caught in their control area, the director of the security agency and the chief police officer get blamed and punished. When defectors flocked into Musan area due to the strict border control in Hoeryong and Onseong, the director of Musan security agency got blamed and fired by the Central Party. As a result, the security agents and police officers are strictly enforcing all the security measures, keeping tight surveillance and executing harsh punishment on defectors in order to avoid getting punished themselves by the Central Party.
No Means of Asking for Support from Daughter who Fled to South Korea
Jeongnim Kim (Alias) from Saebyul Gun, North Hamgyung Province, has managed to make ends meet thanks to her daughter, who fled to South Korea a couple of years ago. However, she recently lost everything as a result of the currency reform. She had saved most of the hard cash she received from her daughter, because she could not easily spend the money knowing what hardship her daughter had to go through in a foreign country to make the money. The savings were for her youngest daughter and son’s marriages in the future, so the loss was more painful to her. On top of this, the whole family recently got arrested and interrogated for 40 days about her defector daughter. They were able to get released only after offering some bribe, for which they had to sell all their household goods. Now she desperately needs her daughter’s help, but there is no way of contacting her. Due to the strict ban on cell phones since the end of last year, she was unable to find anyone with a cell phone. Therefore, she has not been able to keep in touch with her daughter for over a year. The broker who helped her daughter cross the border also fled to China, and there is no way of finding him either. Rumors suggest that he has gone to South Korea to avoid getting caught. Ms. Kim suffers knowing that with no help from her daughter soon, all three people in her family will die.
Some Increase in Crops in North Hamgyong Farms
In some farms in North Hamgyong, there are smiles on farmers’ faces with the increase in crops this year. An official from the North Hamgyong provincial party said that the farms that had enough fertilizer imported from China this year seem to have benefitted. The farms that had a sufficient supply of the fertilizer in fact had more crops than privately owned small plots. A worker at a farm in Hoeryong, North Hamgyong said, “This region with its mountainous terrain does not have much cultivatable land, but it still makes me incredibly happy, even in the middle of my sleep, to think about this year’s crops which we had waited for so long.” Farmers are also elated to see the result of their hard work on an empty stomach this year. However, Kim Pansok (alias), the manager at a cooperative farm in Hoeryong was worried despite the successful harvest of this year: “It is not entirely a good thing that we had a good year while the harvest in other major rice producing areas suffered from the flood this year. We haven’t even started threshing the crop, and there already are people coming in from everywhere to get their hands on it. I don’t know with all these people we’d have half a year’s supply of food left to us.” On the other hand, even in the same province, the farms that did not have enough supply of fertilizer did not have good yields. In Kyongsong county, there are a lot of farms that had a bad year with disease and insects as well as the drought, and farmers are dismayed by the lack of crops to be harvest. Still, North Hamgyong farms are having better harvests in comparison to those in other regions.
Lack of Salt Poses Challenge for Making Next Six Months’ Supply of Kimchi
In North and South Hamgyong Provinces, the lack of salt throughout the region imposes an emergency on making kimchi for the upcoming winter months. An official at South Hamgyong provincial party says, “We tried to import it through the North Hamgyong trade office, but it didn’t work out. Because of the food shortage, we are not permitted to import nothing but food, and it’s hard to get the approval for importing salt. We could only import about 200 tons so far.” The head and the deputy head of the provincial trade office went to China and made several attempts to import salt, but they have had a hard time with finding companies that accept deferred payment. On top of the salt shortage, the vegetable crops this year are bad, which means that it will be hard to have enough supplies to make kimchi for the upcoming winter months. Garlics and pepper powder by kilogram are more expensive than five kilograms of rice or eight kilograms of corn. The party officials are likely to have vegetables and supplies needed for making kimchi distributed to them in any case, but for most others, it will be hard to make kimchi for this winter.
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Is Crackdown on North Korean Refugees the Best Way?
Refugees Expected This Winter
Fees for Border Crossing Skyrocket as Surveillance Increases
Border-crossing Families Increase due to Food Crisis
No Means of Asking for Support from Daughter Who Fled to South Korea
Some Increase in Crops in North Hamgyong Farms
Lack of Salt Poses Challenge for Making Next Six Months’ Supply of Kimchi
___________________________________________________________________________
[Intro] Is Crackdown on North Korean Refugees the Best Way?
The South Korean government made an offer of 200,000 food aid items such as Choco Pies, ramen noodles, snacks, and nutrition-dense foods to the North after the floods in North Korea. When the North did not respond, the South government withdrew its aid proposal. According to the World Food Program, a third of North Koreans are suffering from starvation, and immediate actions need to be taken. The South Korean government should give food aid as soon as possible to keep in line with the humanitarian principles. As for the North Korean government, it should accept any kind of aid to save people from death by malnutrition and then ask for more aid as needed. It should also allow its citizens to find their own means for survival. What ordinary North Koreans want is simple. They do not have any expectation for food distribution any more. They just want to be left alone by the government control. Suppressing economic activities to curb social disturbances is like burning down the whole house to kill a bedbug. The more control is imposed on the people, the more they want to escape. When people face a dead end, they take their family members and quietly cross the border. Being called traitors is not what they want, but it is the only choice left to them. Those defectors are fully aware of the fact that they will have stay hidden in foreign countries, and their human rights will not be honored. To prevent having more refugees, the regime should relax its control and let the people work on their own. The cold winter has arrived earlier than usual this year. North and South Korean governments need to cooperate to bring relief to the suffering people.
Refugees Expected This Winter
The Central Party has ordered strengthening border control for the possibility that people would try to cross the border over the frozen Tumen River. A Party official said that the Party was concerned about a massive exodus of refugees. These refugees will be different from those crossing the border to China simply to get some help from their relatives with some secondhand clothes or to buy things to sell in North Korea. The concern is that the Party will lose control over those who are risking their lives and leaving the country with thoughts of never coming back.
One Pyongyang security officer who made an inspection in the border area said, “The residents were barely surviving. Pyongyang officials need to witness the tragic lives of these people firsthand. Telling these people to stay and endure this pain is the same as telling them to die. If there is any chance for a survival, anyone would try to cross the border and never give up.”
An official from the Central Party said, “There is no question about the direness of the situation when even a security officer is concerned about the lives of the people. The potential sudden influx of refugees into China might not be as large as the one during the Arduous March, but a great number of people are likely to make a life or death decision this winter. China should protect them, or at least provide shelters for the refugee children. There number of refugees will increase in the near future, and I hope concerned people overseas will show some interest and support.” He also expressed his concern that even if they successfully crossed the border, they would need the help of the international community in order to survive in China.
Fees for Border Crossing Skyrocket as Surveillance Increases
As the surveillance on border crossing and cell-phone usages in the border area strengthens, border crossing fee is increasing as well. Professional brokers also say that it has gotten much harder to get a contact in North Korean and Chinese Border Security units. A soldier of the Chinese border security unit said that there was a sudden increase in requests by Korean-Chinese in China to help the border crossing of their relatives living in North Korea. Many requests are still coming from professional brokers to bring over young women from North Korea, but an increasing number of Korean-Chinese people, who can no longer stand aside and watch their relatives dying of hunger, are asking for help. An official who had inspected the border area returned to Pyongyang and said, "The purpose of punishing those who had crossed the border, the military personnel who helped them cross, and the cell phone users was to prevent a larger scale exodus by blocking the route. However, according to the officials in the border area, this policy only helps the brokers because the brokers now charge higher fees for the increased risk. Many local officials tent to be cautious in fear of the punishment when caught receiving bribes from the brokers. However, others seem to be bold enough to help border crossings in order to make a huge sum of money at once. Unless the current food shortage is addressed, there is no way we can prevent illegal border crossings, no matter how hard we try."
In the meantime, the search for cell phone users in the border area is continuing. In places like Hoeryung, Onsung, and Musan, cell phone users are getting arrested and sent to the Provincial Safety Bureau. Those who are arrested this time are said to be undergoing a thorough investigation for border crossing and smuggling charges, and their deeds in the last 10 years at the very least will be examined.
Border-crossing Families Increase due to Food Crisis
The phenomenon of family disintegration began to appear across the nation was at peak during last spring’s food shortage, and it has come again this fall. Food shortage is in the core reason for the disintegration, causing families to fight over food, parents to go separate ways with different children in order to keep the hungry children alive or sell everything including the house to pay for food and then get divorced as a result. Many families are disintegrating, and this phenomenon is most prevalent among the poorest. Scattered family members become kkotjebi, wandering around as beggars. When the local party workers find these wanderers, they arrest them and try to send them back to where they came from. As the majority of the kkotjebis come from other cities or villages, it is not an easy task to send them back. If the wanderers are from the area they are found in, the neighborhood unit is to take care of them. The chief of the neighborhood unit is responsible for a couple of these families, and there are usually two to three wandering families within a neighborhood unit.
Recently, the number of families fleeing from North Korea has been increasing. The rationale of such families is that they would rather die together than be broken up as Kkotjebi (Homeless). Since the border security measures in the area of Heoryong and Onsung in North Hamgyong Province are very strict, defectors try to find new escape routes. Kim Young-Cheol (Alias), interviewed in the border area before fleeing over to China, said, “I don’t see how we are going to survive. I am doing this for my children. Although we have a new leader, nothing has changed, except for the increase in government control and oppression. How am I going to live without food rations when even Chinese imports are banned? I have been forced to go to work every day for a despicable wage and no food ration. My small farming lot failed this year because I had no money to buy fertilizers. My corn harvest was only about 50 kilograms. Some of them were stolen, and some were spent for a loan payback. My family cannot survive this winter with the corn we have left. We will die from starvation if I don’t take any action. Either way we will die, so I decided to cross the border. I will ask my distant aunt in Heilongjiang Province in China for help. If I stay here, my children will die before me.” Whether he has safely made into China is unknown, but the evidence that an increased number of families are crossing the border can also be found in a neighborhood unit’s lecture. Choi Soon-Nam (Alias) said that she felt more urge to cross the border with her family after attending neighborhood unit meetings every day to hear repeated criticisms against disappeared families. “I don’t pay attention to the Party’s criticism and punishment on the defectors. The only things that gets my attention is those families who succeeded in border crossing and the family living well with the money sent by their daughter who fled from North Korea. Frankly, I envy defectors for their ability to take action. If I ever decide to cross the border, I need to take my whole family with me because family members left behind will be severely punished”, she said.
Security Agents and Police Officers are responsible for the security enforcement in the border areas. When more than three defectors are caught in their control area, the director of the security agency and the chief police officer get blamed and punished. When defectors flocked into Musan area due to the strict border control in Hoeryong and Onseong, the director of Musan security agency got blamed and fired by the Central Party. As a result, the security agents and police officers are strictly enforcing all the security measures, keeping tight surveillance and executing harsh punishment on defectors in order to avoid getting punished themselves by the Central Party.
No Means of Asking for Support from Daughter who Fled to South Korea
Jeongnim Kim (Alias) from Saebyul Gun, North Hamgyung Province, has managed to make ends meet thanks to her daughter, who fled to South Korea a couple of years ago. However, she recently lost everything as a result of the currency reform. She had saved most of the hard cash she received from her daughter, because she could not easily spend the money knowing what hardship her daughter had to go through in a foreign country to make the money. The savings were for her youngest daughter and son’s marriages in the future, so the loss was more painful to her. On top of this, the whole family recently got arrested and interrogated for 40 days about her defector daughter. They were able to get released only after offering some bribe, for which they had to sell all their household goods. Now she desperately needs her daughter’s help, but there is no way of contacting her. Due to the strict ban on cell phones since the end of last year, she was unable to find anyone with a cell phone. Therefore, she has not been able to keep in touch with her daughter for over a year. The broker who helped her daughter cross the border also fled to China, and there is no way of finding him either. Rumors suggest that he has gone to South Korea to avoid getting caught. Ms. Kim suffers knowing that with no help from her daughter soon, all three people in her family will die.
Some Increase in Crops in North Hamgyong Farms
In some farms in North Hamgyong, there are smiles on farmers’ faces with the increase in crops this year. An official from the North Hamgyong provincial party said that the farms that had enough fertilizer imported from China this year seem to have benefitted. The farms that had a sufficient supply of the fertilizer in fact had more crops than privately owned small plots. A worker at a farm in Hoeryong, North Hamgyong said, “This region with its mountainous terrain does not have much cultivatable land, but it still makes me incredibly happy, even in the middle of my sleep, to think about this year’s crops which we had waited for so long.” Farmers are also elated to see the result of their hard work on an empty stomach this year. However, Kim Pansok (alias), the manager at a cooperative farm in Hoeryong was worried despite the successful harvest of this year: “It is not entirely a good thing that we had a good year while the harvest in other major rice producing areas suffered from the flood this year. We haven’t even started threshing the crop, and there already are people coming in from everywhere to get their hands on it. I don’t know with all these people we’d have half a year’s supply of food left to us.” On the other hand, even in the same province, the farms that did not have enough supply of fertilizer did not have good yields. In Kyongsong county, there are a lot of farms that had a bad year with disease and insects as well as the drought, and farmers are dismayed by the lack of crops to be harvest. Still, North Hamgyong farms are having better harvests in comparison to those in other regions.
Lack of Salt Poses Challenge for Making Next Six Months’ Supply of Kimchi
In North and South Hamgyong Provinces, the lack of salt throughout the region imposes an emergency on making kimchi for the upcoming winter months. An official at South Hamgyong provincial party says, “We tried to import it through the North Hamgyong trade office, but it didn’t work out. Because of the food shortage, we are not permitted to import nothing but food, and it’s hard to get the approval for importing salt. We could only import about 200 tons so far.” The head and the deputy head of the provincial trade office went to China and made several attempts to import salt, but they have had a hard time with finding companies that accept deferred payment. On top of the salt shortage, the vegetable crops this year are bad, which means that it will be hard to have enough supplies to make kimchi for the upcoming winter months. Garlics and pepper powder by kilogram are more expensive than five kilograms of rice or eight kilograms of corn. The party officials are likely to have vegetables and supplies needed for making kimchi distributed to them in any case, but for most others, it will be hard to make kimchi for this winter.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)