North Korea: Pyongyang at night

Several weeks ago I posted some daytime shots of the Pyongyang skyline. This is a similar view of Pyongyang, but at 1am in the morning.

Remember those joke postcards you could buy that were completely black and would say something like “Los Angeles at night”? That’s what Pyongyang reminded me of when I would stick my head out of the hotel window and peer into the complete darkness of the silent city across from our hotel. It felt like I was the only person there.

Incidentally, when I went down to the hotel gift shop to buy postcards for friends, I picked up the “Pyongyang at night” postcard set that ironically depicted the city in all its illuminated, blazing glory. Suffice it to say, they did not have any joke “Pyongyang at night” postcards, because that would have been to close to the actual truth.

The 3.2 million residents of Pyongyang receive only 1-3 hours of electricity per day. Keep in mind that only the crème de la crème – the citizens most loyal to Kim Jong-Il’s regime – are allowed to live in Pyongyang. Just three hours of electricity per day for the country’s elite.

North Korea’s electricity woes are starkly illustrated in the below satellite image of the Korean peninsula. Notice the difference between North and South Korea.

Credit: globalsecurity.org

As with everything else in North Korea, the electricity shortage is due to the actions of the U.S. Imperialists:

The U.S. should own responsibility for having caused such acute shortage of electricity in the DPRK and brought enormous economic losses to it and make compensation for them in any form.

This is an irreversible principled demand and a legitimate sovereign right of the DPRK, the victim.

If the U.S. does not fulfil its commitments but persistently pursues the policy of stifling the DPRK, the DPRK will be left with no option but to go its own way.

Then, it will be too late for the U.S. to regret for its act.

Not to worry, though, as it looks like the DPRK is going green and getting into wind power. I’m sure they will have a surplus of electricity in no time.