NK citizens in blackout from Japans quake for 2 days

Martin Uden, Britain's ambassador to South Korea, said Sunday that markets in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, appear to be well stocked with reasonably large amounts of food, poultry and electronic products, despite the communist state's ongoing search for food aid abroad.

Uden, who traveled to Pyongyang and Wonsan, a port on North Korea's east coast, from March 11-14, said he witnessed plenty of chicken, fish and vegetables and an array of computer and camera accessories during his visit to the "Dong-il" market in the capital city.

In his travelogue that was written after his second trip to the North following the first in 2008 and sent to Yonhap News Agency, Uden said that overall, both the variety and quantity of food products available at the Pyongyang market were a "fair bit less" compared with three years ago, noting the absence of beef was especially noticeable.

"This March, I saw no beef and a tiny amount of pork. But plenty of chicken of all sizes, both cooked and uncooked, and some duck. Large amounts of good-looking fish and plentiful root vegetables," the British diplomat said in his travelogue that offers insights into the daily life of ordinary Pyongyang citizens.

"In terms of the food aid that the DPRK is seeking at present, it's worth remembering that even if this one market appeared reasonably stocked, it's not possible to draw wider conclusions from that," he said, using the abbreviation of the North's official name.

Uden said he arrived in Pyongyang on the second Friday of March, the day of a devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan, but was kept in the dark about the disaster until Monday, when the state news organizations carried reports about it. He called the incident an eloquent example of information control by the government.

"In (North Korea), you can only know what the state wants you to know," he said.

The diplomat also described monotonous roadside landscapes between Pyongyang and Wonsan, a challenging life environment facing Western diplomats in the North's capital and experiences of contact with North Korean officials in his four-part travelogue.

The following is the full text of Uden's travelogue.

Visit to Pyongyang. The Program -1

I try to get to Pyongyang once a year. It's such an important part of my work in Seoul, that I find it enormously helpful to see the reality of life in the DPRK. I'm lucky in that I can stay with my colleagues in the British Embassy up there.

Most of my EU colleagues in Seoul are accredited to both North and South Korea, and when they travel up there they have to stay in a hotel and rely on the DPRK government for transport and arrangements for their visit. It's a lot easier for me since the British Embassy can arrange the program, and we have our own transport to allow us to move around with more freedom.

I'm going to post a short series of blogs on my visit there. Apologies that it's taken a while to get this written, but the terrible crisis in Japan has of course been an enormous preoccupation. I also make no claim to particular or fresh insights. Nobody just travelling there for a weekend can claim that.

The UK established diplomatic relations with the DPRK just over 10 years ago, and we opened an Embassy not long after. We have our office and residential buildings in the German Embassy compound, and the Swedes also share the office building. The compound itself is in a larger diplomatic area which is closed to normal North Koreans, but our diplomats can travel throughout Pyongyang and to a small number of North Korean towns (Nampo and Wonsan) but anywhere else needs permission from the DPRK government.

Life for my colleagues in Pyongyang is undoubtedly challenging. There are a few shops and restaurants that take only foreign currency and, therefore, can pretty much only be used by foreigners. But there is virtually no social interaction with North Koreans, other than with the local Embassy staff provided by the DPRK government, and only a limited number of restaurants in Pyongyang that will serve foreigners.

So life is very circumscribed and restricted, as well as somewhat oppressive in such a state-controlled environment. We make sure they get away regularly and their postings are shorter than, say, in Seoul.

I went with some colleagues from London (eases the load on the Embassy) and travelled in and out on Air China. (EU concerns about Air Koryo mean we don’t use it as a rule.) Apart from meeting all the UK and DPRK members of the Embassy, we saw other EU Heads of Mission, the Chinese Ambassador, representatives of international organizations and NGOs, the English-language specialists who work at Pyongyang universities as well as DPRK officials at the Foreign Ministry and the Workers’ Party of Korea. More on all that to follow.

Worth recalling that we were there just after the terrible events in Japan. The earthquake happened on Friday afternoon, local time. Even on Sunday, our interpreters knew nothing about it, nor did the (British) English-language specialists we saw on Sunday night. Why the state news organizations kept this news back until Monday, I've no idea. But it's an eloquent example of the effects when control of the sources of information is completely in the hands of government. You can only know what the state wants you to know.

Visit to Pyongyang. Shopping -2

So many parts of everyday life in Pyongyang are opaque to the foreigner (to say the least).

We find that our Embassy interpreters are happy to answer our questions about their daily life, but we don't want to put them in any embarrassing position by asking awkward questions, and indeed sometimes they don't know the answers to our questions.

There is an overall Lowry-esque feel to Pyongyang, with innumerable stick people (you hardly ever see a fat North Korean) bustling from one place to another in drab clothes, much like the work of Lowry when he painted industrial Lancashire. The fact that much of the transport is trams and trolley-buses, and buildings too are box-like and grey all adds to a rather anachronistic feel.

Unless you read Korean it can be hard to make out the shops and service centers that often make up the bottom storey of blocks of flats. But there are plenty of barbers, repair centres, cafes and shops. Foreigners really aren't too welcome, but it is clear from the outside that the selection of goods on offer is small.

However, you don't see the long lines that you might associate with old communist stores. In Pyongyang people rely on the state system of distribution for their staples, above all rice, but there are also markets both official and unofficial. I visited the Dong-il market when I was there in November 2008 and was keen to go back.

There was a very clear difference in terms of the food on sale - largely dictated by a change of season in a way that has fallen out of habit in consumer societies used to large-scale imports of food. In 2008, there was plentiful pork and a fair amount of beef - at a time when farmers would traditionally have been slaughtering their livestock in preparation for the winter.

This March, I saw no beef and a tiny amount of pork (one woman with four unappetising bulging plastic bags). But plenty of chicken of all sizes, both cooked and uncooked, and some duck. Large amounts of good-looking fish (don't ask me what sort) and plentiful root vegetables - potatoes, carrots, radishes - but little green vegetable. No Chinese cabbage (but there wouldn't be - it's all made into kimchi in the autumn) and just a few savoy and red cabbages.

Overall, a fair bit less in variety and quantity compared to 2008. From the attention paid by the throngs of customers, I guess that the prices were within reach of their pockets. In terms of the food aid that the DPRK is seeking at present, it's worth remembering that even if this one market appeared reasonably stocked, it's not possible to draw wider conclusions from that. How much this situation is reflected out in the countryside, or even in other parts of Pyongyang, I can't say.

Another difference from 2008 was the electronic goods available. Just about everything will been produced in or imported through China. In 2008, there were a few computer accessories (computers themselves aren't sold in markets like this) but noticeably more this time and of higher spec. It was just computer mice before, but now some flash drives, although I don't recall seeing any DVDs, either blank or recorded. The level of digital cameras available has certainly gone up.

Not just the standard palm-sized shiny simple model, also the black sophisticated camera with multiple settings, as well as spare batteries and flash drives. Lots of cell-phone accessories, but also no cell-phones here.

Sadly this is the sort of place where there are sensitivities about photography. Foreigners are allowed in and can make purchases, but trying to take pictures would be a step too far.

Visit to Pyongyang. Wonsan -3

It was unseasonably warm while I was up in the DPRK(Democratic Peopls' Republic of Korea). In mid-March it can easily not get above zero, but in the middle of the day on Sunday 13 March in Wonsan it was 19°C. Wonsan - on the opposite side of the peninsula from Pyongyang - is one of the few places diplomats from Pyongyang can go without prior permission from the Foreign Ministry. So we took two cars and drove the 200km to Wonsan.

There is a pretty good paved 4-lane road all the way, with occasional potholes but generally a good surface. In contrast to South Korea, the striking thing to me about the road is its utter sameness. By the side of the road are 6 or so lines of trees which, if they aren't meant to impede photography out of a car window, certainly do a good job of it.

Then the fields behind, stretching to the nearest line of hills, are flat and growing rice or wheat. On steeper terrain there may be fruit orchards, but by and large that's the extent of the agricultural diversity. No poly-tunnels; no market gardening. Going across the entire width of the country, we go up and over the mountains that run down the spine of the peninsula, and over the whole country it's clear that no speck of cultivable land is left untilled.

The only places where the trees lining the road are absent are where a river or some other geographical feature makes it impossible or along two long, flat stretches which (from seeing just the same expedient used in the south) are clearly designed to be used as emergency airstrips.

But travelling through South Korea, the vibrant tourism industry is ever with you. Every few miles there will be a signpost to a temple, museum or just another town. I didn't keep careful count, but on the 200 kms, we saw one pagoda by the side of the road, took one stop at the only wayside station, and there were very few junctions off the road.

Indeed, it was clear that any nearby villages were protected from view by earthworks, which also obscured any locations of military significance.

To give an idea of the state of the countryside from Wonsan to Pyongyang, we made a rough count of the livestock we saw over these 200 kms. There were:

- About 25 herds of goats, each of 20-50 goats;

- Over 100 oxen, most of them pulling ploughs or carts;

- About ten tractors (but only one on the way to Wonsan in the morning);

- Over 20 stalled vehicles awaiting attention by the side of the road;

- Three pigs;

- Six dogs;

- Four excavators;

- Perhaps 100 vehicles in total on the road;

- Simply thousands of people working in the fields.

It's easy to see that with thousands of people working and only ten tractors between them, there's an awful lot of manual labour going on.

Visit to Pyongyang - The Embassy -4

My visit up to Pyongyang typifies in a small way the reason we have an Embassy there, but also the limitations of what we can hope to achieve. Without some means of engagement, we have no chance of influencing North Koreans, slim as the chances may be for a true dialogue.

Indeed the meetings we had with DPRK diplomats and at the Workers' Party followed a familiar pattern. It only takes a straightforward question to set the DPRK side off on what is clearly a carefully scripted description of their position, with plentiful ideological explanation, but also taking anything from 20 to 40 minutes.

I can't help but be enormously impressed at the patience of our Ambassador there. Sadly the basic message from them on dialogue between North and South Korea was very similar to what I hear from their counterparts in Seoul - that the basis of trust (expressed as a lack of "sincerity" on the other side) needed for any progress does not exist at present.

Being there can also give some insights into what life is truly like in Pyongyang. It would be easy to see the DPRK as populated by ideologues and automatons, but speaking to the city's inhabitants it becomes easier to realize that while some are indeed part of the machine, others - including those thousands toiling in the fields - are doing little more than trying to earn their daily bread. And some of the insights, even if only about what's in the shops or what the road to Wonsan looks like, can only come from personal observation.

Of course we do more than that as an Embassy there. We have had an English language program there for some time, in which our specialists work in Pyongyang universities trying to improve the level of English taught there. There's no doubt that these days access to external sources of information can only come with a command of English. We also keep in touch with the international organizations, non-governmental organizations and other Embassies there, seeking their views on, for instance, the food situation in the DPRK.

As opportunity offers, we can also find other ways to ensure that a true picture of the outside world is seen in Pyongyang. That might be the "Bend it like Beckham" film we got shown at Christmas on DPRK TV. Or it could be bringing DPRK officials to London when we can and where appropriate. Trying to show that the world is not ranged against the DPRK or its people is well worth it. But so long as they are denied the chance to have access to external media, and so long as any kind of dissent is seen as treasonable, it will be a long, hard job to chip away at the atmosphere of isolation and fear that the regime needs to justify the harsh conditions that North Koreans have to endure. (Yonhap)

英대사 "평양선 日대지진 이틀간 몰라"

두번째 방북 마틴 유든 대사 방북기서 전해 통제실상•시장 분위기 등도 소개

"북한에서는 주변 사람들이 일본 대지진 소식을 사흘 후에나 알 정도로 언론통제가 심했다."

대지진이 일본 동북부 지역을 강타한 11일 3박4일 일정으로 방북했던 마틴 유든 주한 영국대사는 27일 연합뉴스에 전한 방북 소감문에서 "13일까지도 북한대사관의 통역관이나 현지의 영국인 교사들도 일본에서 무슨 일이 일어났는지 알지 못했다"며 북한 내 사회통제의 단면을 알렸다.

북한은 일본 대지진이 발생한 지 하루가 지난 12일 조선중앙통신을 통해 처음 보도한 데 이어 조선중앙방송 등 대내 매체는 13일부터 본격적으로 전하기 시작했다.

지난 2008년에 이어 두번째로 방북한 유든 대사는 14일까지 나흘간 평양과 원산을 둘러봤으며, 시장의 모습과 현지 주민의 모습 등을 목격하고 돌아와 방북소감문에 담았다.

유든 대사는 "첫 방북 때는 시장에서 상당한 양의 쇠고기와 돼지고기가 판매되고 있었는데 이번에는 쇠고기를 전혀 볼 수 없고 소량의 돼지고기만 있었다"며 "감자, 당근, 무 등 뿌리채소는 많았지만 녹색채소는 거의 찾아볼 수 없었다"고 전했다.

또 2008년 방북 당시에는 시장에 약간의 컴퓨터 주변기기만 있었을 뿐이었는데 이번에는 휴대용 저장장치와 디지털 카메라 등 다양한 종류의 중국산 제품들을 볼 수 있었다고 소개했다.

그는 "평양에서 원산으로 가면서 보니 들판에 족히 수천명은 되는 대규모 인력이 일하고 있었는데 트랙터는 고작 10대가량에 불과했다"며 "이는 주민 다수가 엄청난 육체노동에 시달리고 있음을 시사해주는 것"이라고 전하기도 했다.

유든 대사는 장문의 방북기를 마무리하며 "(우리가) 북한 관리들을 적대시하지 않고 있음을 보여주고 기회가 닿는 대로 북한 주민들에게 바깥세상의 실제 모습을 보여주기 위한 대안을 모색해볼 필요가 있다"고 강조했다.

2008년 2월 서울로 부임한 유든 대사는 한국에서만 세번째 근무를 하고 있는 '한국통'으로 꼽힌다.

런대대학 퀸메리 대학에서 법률을 전공한 뒤 변호사 생활을 거쳐 1977년 외교관으로 입문한 이래 한국, 일본, 유고슬라비아, 알바니아 공관과 유럽안보협력회의(CSCE), 영국 무역투자청 등지에서 일했다.

예전에 한국 근무를 마치고 영국으로 돌아가 2003년 `한국에서 보낸 시간들'(Times Past in Korea)을 펴냈으며 방대한 양의 한국 관련 서적을 수집해 보유하고 있다. (연합)