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Asia-PacificDecember 5 2005

Small steps towards the real world

On a visit to Pyongyang, Stephen Timewell examines the state of North Korea’s fledgling banking system, which is slowly developing in order to increase foreign trade.
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On my journey to Pyongyang a Beijing receptionist remarked that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is very much like China was 25 years ago. And as the motorcade of China’s President Hu Jintao passed thousands of flower-waving North Koreans on his visit to the world’s most secretive and politically isolated country at the end of October he may well have agreed.

Visiting Pyongyang is like going back decades in a time machine, to a land with no advertising, no Nokia, Microsoft or McDonald’s billboards and almost no cars. Impressive grand avenues and massive public monuments dominate the landscape but there is no new construction or shops. The streets are scrubbed clean by hand and are full of hundreds of orderly people wearing their ‘Great Leader’ badges and walking everywhere. Curiously, bicycles are discouraged because of bad accidents and the government encourages power walking for good health, or so I am told. In a country said to spend 30% of its GDP on defence, there is no visual military presence (or overt police presence) in the capital at all. The ‘traffic ladies’ standing at major intersections are a welcome replacement for traffic lights but there are precious few cars to direct.

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