North Korea Confidential

"This new book covers a range of topics about North Korea today. There are chapters on private commerce, leisure activities, crime and punishment, and even fashion trends. Some of the information is revelatory, especially about black market trade with China that has allowed goods and information to come into North Korea, for example foreign films and books smuggled in on USB sticks. It explains how many of these developments happened after the famine in the 1990s, when many North Korean people realised they had to depend on themselves and not the regime to survive. The outside world has transformed, and although the pace of change is much slower in North Korea, life is changing there, too – hugely. When I was growing up in the eighties and nineties, we didn’t have landline phones – only companies had them. But new technologies have come over the border from China, including mobile phones, which became desirable objects for North Koreans. “Developments came after the famine, when many North Koreans realised they had to depend on themselves and not the regime to survive.” The regime always told us we were the best country, but we didn’t even have cell phones, so that’s why they had to bring them in. Also the North Korean government needed the money from trade with China. The use of cell phones influences the way the country is changing, but it doesn’t mean there will be a revolution. There is still no internet."