Workers at a North Korean terrapin farm probably wished they could withdraw into the protective shells of their charges yesterday, after a visit from North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who reportedly lambasted operations at the facility.
A large photograph on the front page of the Rodong Sinmun — the official newspaper the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea — showed a clearly irate Kim wagging an admonishing finger at a group of officials in a building housing terrapin breeding tanks.
During his inspection of the farm, Kim “strongly criticized the shortcoming of its officials as a manifestation of incompetence, outmoded ways of thinking and irresponsible work style,” Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said in a report on the visit.
Photo: EPA
Kim appeared to take particular umbrage at how the failings he uncovered were in a farm set up at the personal initiative of his father, former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, whom the younger Kim succeeded as leader following his death in December 2011.
“The employees who failed to bear deep in their minds [Kim Jong-il’s] leadership exploits could hardly perform their role as masters in production,” KCNA quoted Kim Jong-un as saying.
If all officials worked like those on the farm, North Korea would never achieve the visionary goals of his father, Kim Jong-un said, adding that their mismanagement would also damage the prestige of the Workers’ Party.
Terrapin has long been a popular, if pricey, feature of North Korean cuisine and is usually served in a soup that is valued for its nutritional qualities as much as its taste.
Kim Jong-un, like his father and grandfather before him, conducts scores of “field guidance” inspections every year at civilian and military units across the nation.
Each one is covered by North Korean state media outlets, and the reports and pictures nearly always project the image of a smiling or intrigued Kim Jong-un, questioning and encouraging people as he doles out “expert” advice on their work.
Reports of a stern, public dressing-down like the one given to the officials at the Taedonggang Terrapin Farm are unusual, and undoubtedly deeply worrying for those on the receiving end.
According to South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, Kim Jong-un has ordered the execution of more than a dozen officials so far this year, apparently for questioning his authority.
The service last week reported that North Korean Minister of the People’s Armed Forces Hyon Yong-chol had been purged and most likely executed for insubordination and dozing off during a formal military rally.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion