North Korea has reduced food rations for its soldiers for the first time in more than two decades as the Hermit Kingdom grapples with a potential food crisis, officials said this week.
South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which oversees ties with its northern neighbors, said North Korea’s food situation “appears to have deteriorated”.
FILE: A North Korean boy holds a spade in a corn field in an area devastated by floods and typhoons at Soksa-Ri Collective Farm in South Hwanghae Province. (Portal/Damir Sagolj/File Photo)
The ministry noted a Feb. 6 report by North Korea’s state news agency KCNA on plans for an “urgent” ruling party meeting on agriculture. According to the Ministry of the South, such special meetings are rare.
Meanwhile, DongA Ilbo, a South Korean newspaper, reported on Wednesday that the North reduced daily food rations for its soldiers for the first time since 2000.
Although the report could not be 100% confirmed, South Korea’s unification ministry said it and other agencies were monitoring the situation.
FILE – In this November 15, 2020 file photo provided by the North Korean government, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un attends a meeting of the Politburo of the ruling Workers’ Party in Pyongyang, North Korea. Kim ordered the execution of at least two people, banned fishing at sea and locked down the capital Pyongyang as part of a desperate effort to protect itself from the coronavirus and its economic damage, South Korea’s spy agency told lawmakers on Friday, November 27, 2020 with. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP, File) (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP, File)
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The report comes after the US-based monitoring group 38 North in recent North said that North Korea’s food availability “has probably fallen below the absolute minimum in terms of human needs”.
North Korea is familiar with serious food shortages, often caused by natural disasters such as floods that damage crops. Between 1994 and 1998, the country suffered one of its worst famines, killing hundreds of thousands of people.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un speaks during a Politburo meeting of the ruling Workers’ Party in Pyongyang, North Korea, in this June 29 photo provided by the North Korean government. (AP/Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service)
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The North is under withering international sanctions for its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs. In recent years, what little trade it has had has been virtually cut off by self-imposed lockdowns to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Portal contributed to this report.