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A10 On North Korea’s side of DMZ,
WORLD NEWSSaturday 30 January 2016 K-pop reveals growing tension
In Russia: IN THE DEMILITARIZED ZONE, North Korea (AP) — There
is a strange quiet along the northern side of the
As food prices spike, some winners emerge Demilitarized Zone that divides the two Koreas.
Quiet, until you listen harder.
JAMES ELLINGWORTH shops and chain stores, food. At a time when sharp Mixed in with magpies flying peacefully overhead and
and in general from peo- food price rises have put leaves rustling in the freezing wind, the faint melodies
VITNIJA SALDAVA ple who want to consume Russian family budgets un- of South Korean pop ballads waft through the air,
healthy food.” der pressure, the ability to interspersed with spoken commentaries too weak to
Associated Press Now, as part of a farmers’ compete on price is key really follow but strong enough to discern an accent
cooperative selling high- for fast food retailers. Food that is decidedly southern.
PAVLISHCHEVO, Russia (AP) end organic dairy products prices rose 14 percent last The music has been drifting over the border in retaliation
to moneyed Muscovites, year, according to the for what North Korea said was its first hydrogen bomb
— For Olga Druganina, Rus- Druganina employs 18 peo- state statistics agency, at a test on Jan. 6. Amid indications that the North is now
ple and keeps more than time when real wages are preparing to launch a rocket that is bound to bring a
sia’s economic turmoil has further international outcry, the odd mixture of calm
and almost imperceptible strains of K-pop are an
been a great businessop- unsettling reminder that, like so many things in this hard-
to-read country, appearances can deceive.
portunity. Four years ago, Surrounded by a deeply dug-in and carefully hidden
array of troops ready to attack and artillery batteries
the former employee at an ready to fire, this is the world’s most heavily fortified
border. In a strip of land ridden with intermittent
industrial machines com- skirmishes and swathed in decades-old animosities,
the motto of the U.S. troops stationed merely a stone’s
Workers deliver food in a McDonald’s restaurant in Moscow, Russia. A long-standing policy to throw away — “Ready to Fight Tonight” — is a fitting
source as many ingredients as possible locally has paid off for the U.S. fast-food giant, which says testament to the latent volatility of the world’s final
it serves 1.1 million customers a day in Russia. McDonalds opened 59 new restaurants in Russia last Cold War flashpoint.
year and picked out the country as a high growth market in its 2015 financial results. Perhaps waiting to first find out what kind of response to
its nuclear test the United Nations will come up with, the
(AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin) North has so far said hardly a word about the restart of
the South’s propaganda broadcasts.
pany began to develop her 450 cows, sheep, goats falling and unemployment But flare-ups can be sudden.
modest farm near Moscow and even buffaloes. Her rising. Just a few months ago, the South’s decision to restart
as a business. She started products — cheese, milk, A long-standing policy to similar propaganda broadcasts after the death of two
out simply wanting to feed and traditional berry-fla- source as many ingredients South Korean soldiers in a land mine blast so incensed
family and friends, but Rus- vored yoghurts — sell at a as possible locally has paid North Korea that it issued an ultimatum to the South
sian bans on foreign foods premium at the LavkaLav- off for the U.S. fast-food gi- that if they weren’t stopped, the rock-concert-style
and the plunging value of ka chain of boutique shops ant, which says it serves banks of speakers on the southern side of the DMZ
the currency encouraged across Moscow, a growing 1.1 million customers a would be attacked and destroyed, even if that meant
her to expand and tap the presence named after the day in Russia. McDonald’s going to war. South Korea turned them off.
growing national demand Russian for “market stall.” opened 59 new restau- A Korean People’s Army colonel who on Friday escorted
for local produce. Its customers include many rants in Russia last year and an AP Television News crew around a military outpost
First came President Vladi- who would previously have picked out the country as on the edge of the DMZ seemed almost sanguine
mir Putin’s sanctions on bought now unaffordable a high growth market in its about them.
U.S. and European Union or unavailable imported 2015 financial results. That’s Back in the day, he said, the broadcasts used to be a
food products in 2014, a products.Local food pro- particularly surprising con- lot louder. He said that since signing up at age 16 he
response to international ducers like Druganina are sidering the Russian econo- has spent most of his 40 years in the military assigned to
sanctions over Russia’s role the most visible beneficia- my shrank 3.7 percent last various duty postings around the DMZ. Until 2000, the
in the Ukraine crisis. ries of the Russian govern- year and is forecast to re- North broadcast its own propaganda right back at the
Over the last year, the low ment’s policy of import sub- main in recession in 2016. South.
oil price has brought down stitution, aiming to replace McDonald’s is “definitely The colonel, Jon Nam Su, denied reports in the South
the value of the Russian ru- costlier imported goods benefiting” from having that it has started doing that again.
ble, making imported food with home-grown alterna- a Russia-based produc- “We’re not doing that,” he said. “But the puppets in
more expensive. tives. tion network for many of the South do what the U.S. wants, and they are saying
“It was a little agriculture to While Putin has called for its products, says Moscow- extremely unreasonable things.”
supply our family’s needs Russia to head toward self- based analyst Vladimir Access to the DMZ on both the North and South sides is
but when it happened that sufficiency in food, this will Pantyushin of Sberbank, heavily controlled.
the sanctions appeared, take years. who points out that the From the North, there are only two places where
all that gave a push to our At the other end of the company’s signature Big foreigners are allowed to go, so it is hard to
farm’s development,” Dru- market from Druganina, Mac is cheaper in Russia independently verify if the North hasn’t conducted
ganina says. “We started McDonald’s is another sur- than almost anywhere else such broadcasts.
developing and got a lot prising winner from Russia’s in the world when com- From the outpost where Col. Jon spoke, a concrete
of interest from both small refocusing on domestic pared to local earnings. q bunker perched atop a hill that commands a clear
view of the DMZ, it is possible to see guard posts in
the South that fly both the South Korean and United
Nations’ flags.
The bunker itself is often used for indoctrination
gatherings and tours for foreigners, who are provided
with binoculars. A well-worn trail passes below the
bunker along the northern edge of the DMZ. North
Korean soldiers use it for their patrols.q
