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N. Korea moves millions to farms
Washington Times Insider ^ | June 2, 2005 | Nicole Winfield

Posted on 06/02/2005 6:49:44 AM PDT by prairiebreeze

ROME -- North Korea is sending millions of people from its cities to work on farms each weekend -- another indication that the risk of famine is particularly high this year, a U.N. official said yesterday.

The U.N. World Food Program (WFP) is the only aid organization that has a presence outside the North Korean capital,.

"It's not a new phenomenon, but it certainly caught our folks' attention in terms of the size and the scale," she said. "I suppose also we're so worried about the situation, it's one more sign that things aren't going well."

The isolated North has depended on outside support to feed its 24 million people since the 1990s. An estimated 1 million North Koreans starved to death after the Stalinist regime's state farm system collapsed after decades of mismanagement and the loss of subsidies from Moscow.

In Beijing on Tuesday, world aid agencies called for food assistance to North Korea to be stepped up despite a stalemate in talks to end its nuclear program, saying the communist regime still faces tremendous shortages affecting millions of people.

The WFP recently launched a new appeal for food donations, saying the supplies that let it feed 6.5 million North Koreans were dwindling and forcing it to cut off aid to children and the elderly. That followed a WFP request to governments for 500,000 tons of food for North Korea this year.

Of the $202 million that the agency appealed for this year, it has received about $72 million -- and practically all of it has been consumed, Miss Webb said.

"Unless something happens very soon, by the end of August, the only people we'll be feeding are 12,000 children in hospitals," she said.

(Excerpt) Read more at insider.washingtontimes.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: famine; farms; nkorea; northkorea
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To: RightWhale

How does one go about gelding a eunuch????


41 posted on 06/02/2005 10:02:22 AM PDT by F.J. Mitchell (Sorry George, Hillary and Bill will give up their absolute power, only when it is pried from their)
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To: F.J. Mitchell

Harvey didn't say Rumsfeld would find it easy.


42 posted on 06/02/2005 10:03:28 AM PDT by RightWhale (It comes down to lack of private property rights)
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To: Chairman_December_19th_Society

Not a toughie-simple:
World opinion, good or bad, costs US tax-payers nothing.
Case closed.


43 posted on 06/02/2005 10:07:08 AM PDT by F.J. Mitchell (Sorry George, Hillary and Bill will give up their absolute power, only when it is pried from their)
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To: RightWhale

LOL!


44 posted on 06/02/2005 10:08:59 AM PDT by F.J. Mitchell (Sorry George, Hillary and Bill will give up their absolute power, only when it is pried from their)
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To: F.J. Mitchell
Case closed.

That's where I fall too, but I was trying to view this through a pol's eyes--who often have a different perception of reality than you or me.

45 posted on 06/02/2005 10:10:16 AM PDT by Chairman_December_19th_Society (James Burnham--Liberalism is the ideology of Western suicide.)
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To: Chairman_December_19th_Society

Our Politicians are beginning to sound like my parents (God Bless them) when my brother and I ocassionally raised hell. "What will the neighbors think?" they would say. I spent a whole lot of my life worrying about what the neighbors think, until one day I decided to just let the neighbors worry about what I think.

Our politicians haven't as yet reached that plateau of rationality.

All the above is political speak for: "I see your point."


46 posted on 06/02/2005 10:21:50 AM PDT by F.J. Mitchell (Sorry George, Hillary and Bill will give up their absolute power, only when it is pried from their)
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To: Modernman

I have in mind the current hunger problem, not "what if".


47 posted on 06/02/2005 10:25:09 AM PDT by cynicom
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To: Uncle Fud

Little Kim getting the "Ceaucescu" would be the best possible outcome. Then the South will have one heck of a time integrating the North. A poster on this board previously suggested setting up a "puppet regime" after the implosion. Bad term, however, unlike East Germany, where the people did have some access to the West in spite of the Stasi, in the case of North Korea, you are dealing with a people who have been isolated, brainwashed (and thoroughly messed up), and so conditioned to living in what amounts to the perfect police state. The Kim dynasty had outdone Stalin and Mao on this one. It may take a generation or two for the North to be brought up to speed before a full integration can take place.
Of course the North's view of integrating the peninsula would be to launch a bunch of human wave attacks, and wind up turning the entire peninsula into a glass parking lot. But that doesn't matter to Little Kim, the psycho hedgehog. He's safe in his bunker. Or so he hopes.


48 posted on 06/02/2005 10:42:02 AM PDT by Fred Hayek (I live in Minnesota, I run a business in Minnesota, but I remain a TEXAN!)
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To: cynicom

Tiny Kim is looking for something better than plaform shoes to give himself a little stature. He is a bug that will eventually have to be stepped on, either by his own hungry populace or by someone else.


49 posted on 06/02/2005 10:42:04 AM PDT by F.J. Mitchell (Sorry George, Hillary and Bill will give up their absolute power, only when it is pried from their)
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To: prairiebreeze
Pretty harsh there. Since I doubt the average NK citizen has weapons, how would you suggest they take matters into their own hands against a well armed, well trained military?

It happened in Romania. All it takes is widespread misery and some incident to start the ball rolling downhill.

50 posted on 06/02/2005 10:43:48 AM PDT by TexasRepublic (BALLISTIC CATHARSIS: perforating uncooperative objects with chunks of lead)
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To: Rutles4Ever

I agree. People need to wake up. That is why we fight wars. The people that want to be against wars don't realize that if we don't fight them we will be the ones going to the farms, death camps, or what ever you want to call them. God Bless America and all who have defended HER Past, Present, and the future to come.


51 posted on 06/02/2005 10:52:23 AM PDT by JOE43270 (JOE43270 America voted and said we are One Nation Under God with Liberty and Justice for All.)
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To: prairiebreeze

If these poor people are starving, they won't be very good workers and won't last very long. Hard to maintain a population that way.


52 posted on 06/02/2005 11:05:14 AM PDT by Polyxene (For where God built a church, there the Devil would also build a chapel - Martin Luther)
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To: Modernman
Yes it is easy to say, and hard to do. No, there is no great mystery in it, no special insight or awareness required, no information beyond what one sees other men doing to one's own relations. Everywhere and always, men have the option to simply not tolerate being treated like animals. When they tolerate it, they are treated like animals.
53 posted on 06/02/2005 3:59:36 PM PDT by JasonC
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To: Modernman
When the N. Korean system reaches a point of near-collapse and decides to go out in a blaze of glory, it will very much be our problem.

Like all other moribund regimes, NK will go out, not with a bang but a whimper.

54 posted on 06/02/2005 6:10:46 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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