Secret police forced to do dirty business to resolve hunger problems
Meanwhile North Korea's dictator calls Pavarotti & Company to help celebrate Kim Il Sung's birthday
Pyongyang (AsiaNews/Chosun Ilbo) North Korean authorities have ordered families of National Security Agency (secret police) officials "to start doing business" to help resolve the country's "temporary" food crisis.
The news comes following recent failures in nuclear weapons program talks. Now the country is expecting to have another drop in humanitarian aid from countries around the world, including Russia and China.
According to Kim, a North Korean refugee in China, the price of rice has skyrocketed in some regions of the county. Now one kilogram can cost as much as 500 won (180 euro), he says. Even the dollar's value recently has reached astronomic proportions, exchanging at 1400 won (about 510 euro).
However now North Korean monetary authorities have set the price of 1 kilogram rice at 46 won (17 euro) and the exchange rate at 160 won (58 euro) per dollar.
Since labor reforms went into effect in July 2002, allowing for an increase in salaries and ending of food rations, an ordinary worker earns 2000 won (730 euro) a month on average. Yet during this dramatic situation not even those who work can guarantee themselves proper sustenance.
Kim said secret police and other public order officials do not receive food rations, and hence are turn to corruption, violence and abuse to make ends meet. For the minimum infraction of the law they exploit the situation by confiscating property and thus provoke resentment in citizens who protest against them.
Last month the World Food Program reported the country was undergoing a serious food crisis due to a lack of funds and stockpiles of food. This weekend Carol Bellamy, UNICEF's general director, will visit North Korea to discuss providing future relief services and to tour children's shelters and public health care centers where the agency had sent aid.
Not even the latest national emergency seems to inspire the regime to step down from the high pedestal of power and arrogance surrounding its authoritarian leader, who continues to put on media-attracting lavish national displays and events.
According to news released yesterday by Chosun Sinbo, the pro-government daily owned by an association of Korean residents in Japan, the country wants to invite the three world famous tenors, Pavarotti, Domingo and Carreras, to sing at an upcoming national spring festival. The festivities will begin on Apr. 15 to celebrate the birthday of the immortalized former president, Kim Il-Sung, who died in 1994. (MR)
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