The North Korean authorities have recently imposed new ‘loyalty assignments’ on trading companies requiring them to import building materials from China. However, rather than diverting them to the floodstricken northeast regions of North Korea, these materials are reportedly destined for the construction of Ryomyong Street in Pyongyang.
Ryomyong Street is intended to become a refurbished strip connecting Kumsusan Palace, where the embalmed bodies of former leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il lie, to the Ryonghung intersection near the Tower of Eternal Life.
“The Ryomyong Street construction project is actually in full swing at the moment, with internal construction in the new buildings progressing, including electrical work. Although a little less than half of the shock troopers at the Ryomyong construction site were dispatched for flood recovery work, many of those dispatched were actually part of a redundant workforce that were no longer required in Pyongyang after the primary drilling operations had finished,” a source in North Pyongan Province reported to Daily NK on October 24.
“These days, North Korean trading companies are preoccupied with buying the internal construction materials needed to fulfill the loyalty task, which requires them to guarantee materials for the construction of Ryomyong Street.”
The source explained that increasingly more emphasis is being placed on the Ryomyong Street effort than for housing reconstruction in the flood-damaged areas. The internal building materials for the project including electrical wiring, switches, lights, and telephones, etc. are all reported to be expensive imported products.
“The leadership is only feigning interest in the flood recovery, which is receiving considerable attention from the international community. The regime is using it for propaganda, while actually diverting the nation’s resources to Ryomyong Street,” he added.
“It’s yet another example of Kim Jong Un putting his personal political achievements before the interests of the people. For this reason, the flood recovery efforts continue to languish due to an inadequate supply of materials.
North Korean media outlets are inundating the population with slogans urging them to donate “one ton of cement, one kg of rice, and a tiny sum [of money] to the battlefield for flood recovery,” highlighting the fact that the materials for flood recovery are not being provided by the state but instead sourced from residents in other regions, including factory enterprises.
“The state is not taking any practical measures to provide supplies for the floodstricken North Hamgyong region. The building materials sent to the area to date have all been forcibly procured from factory enterprises in other areas as compulsory donations demanded by the authorities,” a source in Pyongyang explained.
“The Chinese construction materials imported from Dandong are primarily stored at the distribution warehouse in Sinuiju and then directly sent to Ryomyong Street project in Pyongyang. It is obvious that Kim Jong Un is more interested in building Ryomyong Street as a lavish neighborhood of Pyongyang, even at the expense of those in need living in the flood-damaged regions.”
