DPRK The darkness empire
If
we had to redesign the geographic map of Asia following the shadow lines
featuring its society, the Democratic Popular Republic of Korea (DPRK) would
certainly be the darkest, the most secret and perhaps the most dangerous area
of the whole continent. Kept alive, at
an international relationship level, thanks to its strategic position and to
the most profitable nuclear blackmail, the DPRK, is a nation that lives at the
limit of survival. Its population, reduced to starvation before silence, has no
opportunity to free itself from the iron grasp of a cruel dictatorship that
controls any details of the Korean society and one of the largest armies in the
world. The worship of the personality of the “Supreme Leader” Kim Jong-il, inherited by his
father Kim Il-sung “ The Eternal President” and now passed into the hand of the
young Kim Jong-un, is the element around
which develops the whole apparatus of power. Like a continental fault that
separates the Chinese empire at north and the USA influence area at south
(South Korea), the DPRK plays this role of
buffer state, for the interests of the parties, like a political weapon
for its own subsistence. However, the population seems to fight a different
battle: along the semi desert avenues of Pyongyang, among the desolate streets
of Kaesong as well as in the small countryside villages, in an unreal, deep
silence, hidden behind the scared and lost glances, the daily struggle against
hunger seems to be the only act and only answer that North Korean citizens are
able to give. Squashed by the party propaganda and by the lack of any form of
information coming from the exterior
world, they move like robots in grey and impersonal towns where the only bright
colours are reserved to the worship of the personality of the “Great Leaders”.
Their whole life is managed by the
government: control on the work and family, food rationing, prohibition to
travel without authorization, prohibition to travel abroad, are just some of
the restrictions imposed to the population. The black market is not sufficient
to provide the quotas of food given by the government. Many try to escape from
this tight country through the Northern border with China and through the
Southern border with South Korea, by sea. Escaping is not easy, especially to
China, where the refugees are not recognized as political refugees. With the
recent death of Kim Jong-il, the reins of the
country are held by the third son, Kim Jong-un, identified as the heir since a long time. The
domestic situation of the DPRK remains tense like the international
relationships with China, USA and South Korea. The nuclear nightmare hangs on
the eastern Asia’s future and the stabilities between the nations are fragile
and thin silk threads.