North Korea in Photos and Video

For more than 55 years the North Korean people have been kept in complete isolation from the outside world, living in a literal time warp which is frozen somewhere between the late 1940s [ citing many of their fashions ] and the late 1960s. They subsist on a steady philosophical diet of State created fairy tales and carefully crafted mythologies designed by the North Korean department of propaganda to instill awe and worshipful reverence of the Kim family dynasty. This massive lie all began in 1926 with the advent of Kim Il-Sung. Today the charade continues through his grandson, Kim Jong Eun. It’s been stated that as many as one million people in North Korea have died due to famine. But no one on the outside knows the exact numbers. That’s just an estimate. Funny thing, usually when a million people are passing away from famine, the UN is all over it, it’s all over the alphabet news casts and the world begins gathering to DO something about it. Fund raisers kick in, celebrities get on board, and famine relief concerts are broadcast around the world to raise awareness and raise money. It’s an odd silence that instead fills the spaces where the world would usually be doing something to help the North Korean people. So into that odd silence I’ll interject this photo and video report.

WARNING: Some of the video reports on this page display graphic, explicit, violent or other uncomfortable scenes and imagery which may be disturbing to some viewers.  I had a hard time watching much of it myself.  The content of  some of the videos is appalling to the soul of a free human being. I am not posting this material to disgust readers. I am posting it to educate readers. There is a reason that we love and treasure our freedoms and our civil liberties in the United States. The video reports below provide just a mere glimpse of what happens to a human population in a nation where evil is allowed to flourish for decades on end. These videos cover a broad time period of approximately 50 years or more, including the era of Kim Jong Il, the father of current North Korean leader Kim Jong Eun, aka Kim Jong Un, as well as the era of his grandfather, Kim Il-Sung.

I’d like to add that if there has been a period of “lesser Antichrists” who have made an appearance upon the world stage since the times of Christ, one would have to regard the regime of the Kim family in North Korea as part of that dismally wicked pantheon. The mere fact that this horrific oppression and population indoctrination has gone on for more than 50 years does leave one incredulous.

If you don’t have time to watch all the videos posted, try to make time to watch the first one. It is a complete documentary on North Korea made just a few years back by a British film crew who were granted unusual access to the insides of North Korean society. Even what they saw was just a glimpse and 90% of what takes place in North Korea remained off limits to them. Nonetheless it not only stunned me, it made me want to kiss the ground that I was born free and cherished as a citizen of the United States of America.

Photos from inside North Korea

A few little known facts that I ascertained from watching these video reports:

• At a certain point in time, as recently as 1994, it was literally against the law for any North Korean civilian to make eye contact with a foreign visitor or tourist.
• Visiting journalists are forced to bow to all statuary and monuments to North Korean “Supreme Leaders” whether they wish to, or not. NOT to bow might be grounds for the immediate termination of the visit.
• Visiting journalists are not allowed to query any North Korean citizen or State representative of the regime in public or private. Should a wrong question be presented, the visit is ended. Should a wrong answer be volunteered, the citizen or representative who gave this answer might spend the remainder of their life in a prison gulag for committing a crime against the State.
• All hotel rooms in North Korea are bugged. Someone is always listening to all conversations held in those rooms.
• Due to sanctions and the rarity of gasoline, North Korean streets are practically deserted. Foreign journalists from the UK video-taped a North Korean policewoman in an immaculate uniform directing traffic – that did not exist – in the center of a large empty thoroughfare.
• No elderly or handicapped persons are visible on North Korean city streets. They have either been relocated to an undisclosed location outside of Pyongyang, or they are encourage to stay indoors. They are regarded as social “untouchables” for the most part. They are cast away.
• Vast sums of money has been spent over the decades to create enormous monuments, displays, statuary and the like of the Kim Family dynasty which now sit desolate, as only a handful of foreign visitors arrive to tour these sites each week. Journalists were astounded at how desolate public squares and city monuments were in Pyongyang. Every locale was impeccably clean, and totally empty.
• In Pyongyang, city block after city block of expensive high rise buildings and structures give the feeling of a pristine but deserted movie set. It’s all been done for show for any foreign guests. Everything is empty, hotels, office buildings, city squares, civic centers. UK journalists speculated as to whether the greater part of Pyongyang had been built to prop up appearances and to boost the moral of a beaten down and starving population.
• Chauffeur and taxi drivers in North Korea are under strict orders to speed from one destination to the next, dis-allowing a foreign guest from taking any unscheduled stops along the way. Queries placed to the driver about anything observed en route are ignored.
• The majority of all human activity observed in city squares in Pyongyang pertains to locals rehearsing for six hours a day to appear in celebrations and pageants dedicated to North Korean leaders. Children rehearse for their parts in these pageants for six hours a day as well.
• Journalists speculate that there are may be about 18 “State sanctioned hair styles” which may be worn by North Korean women. I found a possible photo of these styles with their numbers showing and posted it. Some writers suspect the same rules are in place for the North Korean men, as photos of their “State preferred” hair styles have been seen and documented as well. See photos.
• Although the world long ago moved on from the Korean War of the early 1950s [ just as we have now normalized relations with Vietnam in the decades since the 1960s] North Korea is locked into a virtual zero forward movement “time freeze” around the events of the Korean War. Huge museum displays about the war are mandatory viewing for every North Korean citizen, including young children. These museum displays are graphic and horrible. Every child in North Korea is educated to loathe and despise America and Americans from babyhood. It’s not unlike what takes place in the Muslim Mosques throughout the Mideast, regarding the generational inculcation of hatred of the West.
• Every North Korean citizen is told, repeatedly, from infancy, that their “Supreme dear leader” has supernatural gifts. The Supreme Leader is regarded as somewhat of a living Deity on Earth. This macabre fairy tale has been kept going through three generations of the Kim family dynasty in North Korea. The entire nation is living as people enslaved in a cult might live, not unlike the notorious US based cult of Scientology. Newspapers, broadcasts, music, video, magazines or and sort of media from the outside world are strictly prohibited in North Korea. The entire population is kept completely ignorant of conditions and events from the outside world. Those who escape and live to learn about the actual world they live in are not only shocked by what they learn, they are stunned by how little they EVER knew about the real world from their upbringing in North Korea. They exhibit a peculiar type of “reality shock PTSD” that actually requires quite extensive counseling and even therapy to heal from. This healing and recovery process from their past in North Korea can take years to finally complete, if ever.

“Everyone is scared, permanently.”- description of North Korean society given by a former propaganda writer from North Korea who swam to freedom in South Korea with his two daughters in recent years.

More Little Known Facts & Statistics about North Korea

Life Inside North Korea:  2009 Video Report

Population

The population currently stands at around 24.45 million, according to the UN Population Division, a growth of 151% since 1950. The UN estimates that the North Korean population will rise to 24.55 million by 2100.

Corruption

North Korea is officially the world’s most corrupt country, according to the
Corruption index 2011 from Transparency International, which ranks countries on a scale of one to ten. Kim Jong-il‘s homeland made its index debut this year with a score of one.

Capital punishment

North Korea ranks third for meting out the death penalty, behind China and Iran, according to Amnesty International’s death penalty statistics. 60 people were executed there in 2010.

Military strength

According to the IISS Military Balance 2011, North Korea has 1.19 million people on active duty (1.02 million army personnel, 60,000 navy and 110,000 air), plus 189,000 active paramilitary personnel, and a further 600,000 reservists. 5.7 million North Koreans are reservists in the worker/peasant red guard, which is compulsory to the age of 60.

Nuclear capability

North Korea is a nuclear power, but only has two nuclear warheads (2009 est.), lagging far behind the world’s other atomic powers. According to 2009 research by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Russia has nearly 13,000, the US 9,500 and the UK 192.

North Korea v South Korea

Between 1958 and 2010 there were around 150 incidents between North Korea and South Korea (that we know about). The Datablog mapped them in 2010.

Poverty

North Korea scored 19.4 on the 2010 Global Hunger Index, a level classed as alarming by the International Food Policy Research Institute. The situation has worsened since 1990, when the country scored 16.2. The proportion of the population that is undernourished has risen from 21% to 32% in that time.

Peace

North Korea ranks 149th on the Institute for Economics & Peace’s Global Peace Index 2011, with a score of 3.09. Only Somalia, Iraq, Sudan and Afghanistan are less peaceful.

Carbon dioxide emissions

North Korea ranks 44th on the world carbon emissions index (using 2009 figures from the Energy Information Administration), with a CO2 emissions level of 79.55m tonnes (3.51 tonnes per capita). That’s an increase of 14.3% year on year, the 14th highest (a rapid increase is an indicator of economic growth).

Football

The North Korean football team scored one goal in the 2010 World Cup (though that was against Brazil), conceded 12 goals and received two yellow cards. They didn’t make it beyond the group stage.

Han: The Price of Freedom

Tags: life in North Korea, North Korea, videos North Korea, photo gallery North Korea, fascism, socialism, Kim family dynasty North Korea

Related articles

• China Ponders It’s Relations with North Korea: Keep or Dump? Fight or Talk? (readyforanythingstore.net)
• Numerous Red Flags and Early Warning Signs Coming Out of North Korea (biblicaltimes.wordpress.com)
• China Ponders It’s Relations with North Korea: Keep or Dump? Fight or Talk? (21stcenturyscreenshots.wordpress.com)
• North Korea Threatens US With Preemptive Nuclear Strike (21stcenturyscreenshots.wordpress.com)
• VIDEO: North Korea: Hazard or hyperbole? (marketcurator.com)
• Canada’s FM Baird Welcomes Expanded Sanctions Against North Korea (vtncankor.wordpress.com)
• The Iran-North Korea Axis of Proliferation (lynleahz.com)
• South Korea and US begin military drills as North Korea threatens war – Fox News (americanbulwark.com)
• North Korea Wants Attention… (evergreeninstitute.wordpress.com)

• Defense Ministry: South Korea keeping close watch on North amid tensions (cnn.com)
• So far DPRK doing what it said, by Chris Nelson (vtncankor.wordpress.com)
• Dennis Rodman plans to vacation with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (mercurynews.com)
• Why North Korea loves to threaten World War III (but probably won’t follow through) – Washington Post (blog) (washingtonpost.com)
• Kim Jong Un urges North Korean troops to be on ‘maximum alert’ amid tensions (aworldchaos.wordpress.com)