North Korea, people forced to live with 250 grams of food per day
Seoul (AsiaNews) - In August of 2014 the distribution of free food to citizens, which is the basis of North Korea's socio-political system, reached its lowest point in the last four years. The Government provided an average of 250 grams of food per day to its inhabitants. According to the United Nations World Food Program, the minimum survival ration is 573 grams daily. The cause of this negative peak is to be found in the drought that hit the country last spring and in the international sanctions caused by the Kim regime's nuclear program.
The numbers show a "worrying" decline according to human rights activists and experts in the country, ruled by Kim Jong-un. The data for July is slightly higher than those of the following month, but even those of the last seven months of 2013 totaled about 300 grams daily. Food distributions in the first five months of last year were slightly better, with 400 grams per citizen. The daily rations include rice and vegetables, although some sources speak of cereals "mixed with powdered stone" to increase their weight during delivery to the people.
The United
Nations' food aid organization concluded from the data that most ordinary North
Korean people are not properly fed and thus "are in danger of acute
malnutrition." The group "calls on" governments and non-governmental
organizations to "find a way" to resume the sending of humanitarian
aid.
The aid was blocked after the latest military provocations by the Pyongyang
regime, which is pursuing an unauthorized nuclear program and ordered a series
of missile launches in March 2013 that resulted in a severe crisis in the area.
The current South Korean government, led by conservative Park Geun-hye, has
stopped all forms of humanitarian cooperation. Only very few groups are allowed
to cross the border and bring provision of food aid or health care to the
population.
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