Two surprising North Korea stories today: Inter-Korean mailman goes legit about a new South Korean organization focused on helping separated family members send mail and donations, plus arrange meetings, with people inside the North (actions normally semi-legal, at best, in SK). The story highlights the experience and skills the organization’s 80-year-old founder has used to overcome barriers to smuggle get items into, and information out of, North Korea. A useful, interesting skill set indeed.
The second is China hires tens of thousands of North Korean guest workers about China’s plan to support the North, and dodge sanctions on aid to NK, by granting visas to at least 40,000 guest workers to labor in factories, mines, and construction projects in Chinese cities along the border. These northeastern areas of China, unlike the southeast and other more developed regions, have little need for additional, low-cost workers – highlighting both the concerns China has over North Koreans getting past its border region, and the aid-based, versus business-need, focus of the effort.