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t1_j5t6ta9 wrote

Poor people, things must've been horrible for quite some time if they're making such a public statement.

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OP t1_j5t6zez wrote

It doesn't help that they are also currently going through a nasty cold snap (-30^(oc) in places) too.

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t1_j5upiqh wrote

-30 degrees original content?

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t1_j5v7sno wrote

Sounds about right. I don't think north Korea has had original content in quite a while.

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t1_j5x3n7u wrote

-22F which isn't a fun temp and generally keeps a large majority of people inside.

Oh -Produce870 : https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-64383442

Now -40C does equal -40F which is when it really gets fun! Ever see a dog suddenly not be able to walk after taking a poo in their own yard? I have! Running and picking up the Chihuahuas and Chi mix was/is easy... picking up the Lab/Shar-pei (RIP) at 45 pounds was a bit much back then (pregnant). Cats get kept totally inside during those temps... they have indoor potties.

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t1_j5to7nj wrote

A straight up “don’t go outside” announcement that is not followed up with some dumb bullshit about it being a plot or weapon of “the west” must mean it’s pretty serious

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t1_j5ty5h6 wrote

“As always, stay indoors!”

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t1_j5uc7e4 wrote

I was blinded during the event.

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t1_j5tequp wrote

North Korea is nuts when it comes to media. They use it to get things, usually food from the US or South Korea especially during the winter when food is short because they don’t have enough farmers. I wouldn’t put it past their leaders using this for something too because they won’t provide their own people with anything willingly.

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t1_j5tje4d wrote

To that point, the harmony hack (100 million dollars stolen) was attributed to the Lazarus group (aka North Korea state hackers)

This maybe an attempt to change the narrative

It could also just be their govt is fucked up and evil and killing its own people

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t1_j5v51eo wrote

Wasn't that attributed to them quite a while back? Why would announcing a covid lockdown now be an attempt to change that narrative? How are they related at all?

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t1_j5vico1 wrote

This one was just attributed yesterday … but there are plenty of other hacks you could be thinking of

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t1_j5ud2ae wrote

It's more lack of quality land to farm than the number of farmers. Historically, South Korea was where the farming/food production was and the more mountainous North was more industrial. North Korea used Soviet and Chinese aid and over farmed the land that they could, but they have a pretty cold climate and unpredictable rain, so now that they can't get fertilizer and equipment such as water pumps as easily they barely feeding the population during a good year.

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t1_j5u2u90 wrote

Every country is nuts with the media. It just looks different when you're talking about an empire vs a struggling nation like NK.

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t1_j5tknys wrote

“Respiratory illness” wonder what it could be?

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t1_j5tq01f wrote

They call it "The California flu." That's where it originally came from. It began when American actors ate overcooked carp. It's spread by keeping the house too warm and also by Americans' weakened spirit.

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t1_j5wrlee wrote

> It began when American actors ate overcooked carp.

Overcook the fish? Straight to jail. Overcook, undercook. Jail.

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t1_j5z5c32 wrote

Prepare the fish too fast? Jail, Prepare the fish too slow? Believe it or not, also Jail

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t1_j5y5aox wrote

I dont know if you just made this up or if its official north korean propaganda.

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t1_j5tmenk wrote

“It’s just the flu”

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t1_j5uiqcc wrote

By Easter it'll be gone.

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t1_j5v84q9 wrote

I know what you're getting at but here in the states we are getting hit by more than 1 illness and I imagine they could be too. RSV, Covid, Flu, and different strains of the common cold.

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t1_j5tcbfc wrote

Definitely not Covid. Best Korea does not get Covid.

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t1_j5tfy9v wrote

Sure thing it is Covid. By way of China.

Edit: but in Best Korea it is just a "respiratory disease", which it is.

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t1_j5tq2yi wrote

You're just asking to get banned from r/Pyongyang

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t1_j5tymdj wrote

I know that the majority in that sub are role playing, but I have to imagine some of them are not, and that freaks me out.

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t1_j5wvr00 wrote

You don’t really have to imagine that, though. Do you really think there are a lot of actual North Koreans hanging out on a US-based website in an English-speaking subreddit where all the other posters are quite obviously making a joke of your nation?

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t1_j5trxnv wrote

Oh my. What would I do without r/Pyongyang??

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t1_j5ub7in wrote

That's it. Banned. And your children are banned. And their children are banned! For the next 6 months.

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t1_j5uc0yu wrote

How gracious of you to make it at 6 months oh merciful one!

Please, stop by for supper and to fuck my wife and her friends after you get off work at your nuclear missile range!

Praise be 🙌

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t1_j5uqsl6 wrote

I would but I am... too tired. Yes. All of my many genitals work, but I am simply too tired to use them.

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t1_j5tiopm wrote

I’m just wondering if Kim Jung Un has had Covid yet. Probably not since he doesn’t go anywhere.

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t1_j5tjepl wrote

I'd be stunned to find out he isn't fully vaccinated, probably with either the Moderna or Pfizer vaccines. They're not available in NK, but it would be trivially easy for him to get his hands on whichever ones he wanted for himself and select friends/family.

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t1_j5tjle6 wrote

I mean you maybe right. But it wouldn’t surprise me if he did catch Covid and his health ain’t all that great so hopefully he croaks.

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t1_j5tp341 wrote

There would just be a power vacuum and not much would change for the people of North Korea unfortunately.

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t1_j5tt94r wrote

His sister would take over. She has been in the spotlight a lot lately. He already killed his aunt and uncle, and who knows how many other family members, so she is one of the few left.

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t1_j5u2rsy wrote

Wow. Had to look this up. A defector said the uncle was executed by firing squad of anti aircraft guns - another says he was ripped apart by 120 hungry dogs.

I guess we really dont know what goes on behind the scenes but that is some next level super-villain stuff.

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t1_j5v6x4m wrote

It was pretty wild from what I recollect. They shot one shell, then had the uncle stand in the depression and scattered him to the wind. Still better then being subjected to slave labor for life I guess...

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t1_j5ujs4f wrote

His sister is very scary. She's very involved with propaganda and often speaks out against South Korea. The only thing keeping her from being successor is how patriarchal North Korea is.

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t1_j5tpz8k wrote

If anything, standards would drop until whatever new power settles in, especially if there's in-fighting. Sure, there's not much right now, but it can always get worse.

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t1_j5u25d2 wrote

Even if he dies it won't change anything. The power structure there would fight it out until someone came out on top, and the idiocy would continue. It'll continue until the people revolt (unlikely, as they're so heavily brainwashed) or China rolls in to replace it.

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t1_j5vuhf3 wrote

Of course man, his sister will fill in the power vacuum and DPRK is running the place not only Kim

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t1_j5uk61w wrote

Vaccines don’t stop you from getting covid

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t1_j5uknea wrote

No, but odds are if you've been vaccinated you're much less likely to get seriously ill or die from it.

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t1_j5um5dy wrote

Do they have their own vaccines? Or do they not vaccinate their population?

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t1_j5umto8 wrote

> Do they have their own vaccines?

No

> Or do they not vaccinate their population?

It's unclear what they're actually doing, but they may be vaccinating at least part of their population with a Chinese made vaccine (the effectiveness of which is very questionable)

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t1_j5urdfa wrote

They barely feed their population. What makes you think they'd vaccinate them? Especially with vaccines from the big, bad West.

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t1_j5uqit3 wrote

If they're vaccinating their own people, it's likely they're giving priority to the military (thanks to NK's "Military First Policy" and to their "Core Class."

NK divides their population into three strata; "Core" (regime loyalists), "Wavering" (average citizens) and "Hostile" (everyone the regime considers disloyal and undesirable).

During the 1990s North Korean Famine, NK prioritized aid delivery to its Core Class (and even allowed them to skim/steal some of it to sell on the black market for profit). The rest of the population got nothing and is where most of the casualties came from.

It would not surprise me if they would/did do the same in regard to Covid vaccines as well.

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t1_j5uorzh wrote

Nah, at best they have the Chinese or Russian vaccine. Hell, that may have been what Russia gave them for the Ammo.

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t1_j5wrr7v wrote

I love that he travels by armored train. He's like a comic book villain.

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t1_j5uoohy wrote

Pretty sure he’s vaccinated even if he had or does get it. Putin got his pretty early in the pandemic.

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t1_j5u1wnc wrote

So they're fucking frozen in place, and suffering from presumably Covid, with their sub-standard medicine... All locked in together spreading and infecting each other. The death toll is going to be catastrophic.

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t1_j5ucgnl wrote

Some of the rural hospitals in N Korea don’t even have power. This is most likely already awful but it sounds like this could be catastrophic.

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t1_j5uic51 wrote

Well, the point of them all staying locked in is so they don't infect each other.

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t1_j5yjv6b wrote

They've had COVID for years and the death toll didn't spike

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t1_j5ykm2p wrote

That they let us know about.

Remember getting any real accurate information out of North Korea is difficult at best.

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t1_j5tolws wrote

Strange and unexplainable respiratory illness that totally isn't COVID.

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t1_j5tnd9g wrote

Good thing they spent all that money on missiles and weapons to threaten their neighbors. That should keep them safe.

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t1_j5wen4q wrote

They have the lowest military spending in the region, they're just poor. It's a resource poor area, and they don't exactly cultivate many trade relationships. Isolation is not a strong economic choice, apparently.

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t1_j5tqnnr wrote

Would it be a mistake to think their weapons are rusted and decrepit like Russia’s?

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t1_j5ttfbv wrote

I'm not sure. I saw one documentary about a NK soldier who defected and got away to the South. He was grossly underfed, and had worms. Soldiers supposedly get better food than the regulars.

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t1_j5w1yt8 wrote

Their normal stuff and tanks and aircraft are done and likely looted for parts. Their missiles and rocket artillery is likely maintained enough for their purpose.

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t1_j5v6ci4 wrote

What's the propaganda benefit of not just saying it's covid?

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OP t1_j5v6r8q wrote

They don't have many tests, so maybe they are just being overly cautious with calling it covid without the means to be 100% sure. Idk what befit it would have though.

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t1_j5wfq26 wrote

It could be a matter of fearing a public scare. A lot of countries still have difficulty getting vaccines, and North Korea would reasonably stand to have an even greater difficulty considering their isolation and lack of sea trade routes. They'd have to get their vaccines from China, and considering their low trade capacity I doubt they could pay for them.

So unless they ask for help from China, they aren't getting vaccines anytime soon. Whether they've done so and failed, or are simply too proud to do so, I don't know, but they don't have any other way to get those vaccines.

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t1_j5tjsmg wrote

isn't the capital always locked down anyway?

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t1_j5wgt85 wrote

You can visit depending on where your passport is from. I know you can't normally visit with a US passport, I'm not sure who else is barred but Europeans are usually fine.

It's more normal than most people expect, there are a lot of videos these days. Not a lot of private cars, people in the city mostly travel by public transit (buses and subways). There are parks, water parks (I am bothered by there being a rock climbing gym in one), fried food vendors, karaoke, etc. It's nice to see since I used to think it would be more 1984.

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t1_j5uhhxg wrote

[deleted]

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OP t1_j5uigoy wrote

The Western news outlets do tend towards being biased against North Korea and exaggerate stories to sensationalize the nation. This Does, however seem pretty serious and unexaggerated as it was announced by the DPRK government themselves and the news is just repeating what the North Korean Health authorities have said.

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t1_j5w3z6n wrote

There is a tenuous lines of communication open to North Korea via China. North Koreans work in China or Russia, people also escape to China and may defect to South Korea. Some keep in touch with family back home and send money back. It's all very tenuous because North Korean government knows all about this and only tolerate it due to the money they bring in to the country. It can ends very suddenly if they feel like making an example out of few people. Story from defectors are also limited in their usefulness because they can be greatly exaggerated, or limited to their home town. The dark humor I've gotten from South Korean researchers on North Korea is that the only corroborating evidence they can collect on North Korean food situation is the number of bodies that float down the Imjin river.

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t1_j5uiqgy wrote

It's a wonderful land built from candy where all of your wildest dreams come true!

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t1_j5wigvl wrote

These days there are a lot of tourist videos, and you can find some North Korean films or cartoons if you look hard enough (letterboxd + YouTube help for films). You can visit if you have a passport, but some passports are barred like those from the US.

But official communications are limited and journalism around North Korea by outside journalists is usually time-lagged and hearsay. As a rule, outside news about North Korea is easy to exaggerate, but Covid-19 is a deadly pandemic and is still an active threat.

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t1_j5vokms wrote

Oh right! I almost forgot, they're Covid free!

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t1_j60ldqd wrote

Masks and lockdowns… ya know, the normal precautions taken with respiratory infections

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t1_j5xb8jz wrote

I would be willing to bet that Kim and the North Korean elites have all been vaccinated whereas the common people of North Korea have been denied that chance. You know just a feeling I have.

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t1_j5w0ej1 wrote

Oh so just another regular day in North Korea

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OP t1_j5w2qac wrote

No? they are halting all businesses and Factories etc. this is very disruptive to supply chains and is out of the ordinary.

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t1_j60kpn8 wrote

Yeah, that’s going to be extremely detrimental. They’re already hungry. I hope I’m wrong but I don’t see this ending well.

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t1_j5w2tgb wrote

They have industries ?

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OP t1_j5w3dnt wrote

They are an autarkic (Virtually) closed system economy, which means that they have to make everything they need by and for themselves, so yes of course they have industries even if said industries production is often insufficient and key resources scarce or unavailable.

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t1_j5x8aef wrote

Seriously, what point does obfuscating something that utterly transparent serve?

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t1_j5wzzms wrote

If everyone died in North Korea I wonder how long it would take for us to find out.

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t1_j60h3vq wrote

Aren't they already pretty much locked down for the most part?

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t1_j5to98a wrote

I'm not ready for another worldwide lockdown... Please

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t1_j5vxhpt wrote

Because of the hordes of people that travel to/from North Korea? You know for all their tourist destinations.

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t1_j5wh5ir wrote

Clearly I meant that it spread from China, who does have hordes traveling the world (and thousands currently dying from COVID)

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