NORTH KOREA ROUNDUP: PROPAGANDA, REMITTANCES,

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 SHENYANG 000079

SIPDIS

SIPRNET DISTRIBUTION

DEPARTMENT FOR PRM, INR, EAP/CM, EAP/K

E.O. 12958: DECL: TEN YEARS AFTER KOREAN UNIFICATION
TAGS: PREF PREL PINR PGOV KN KS CH
SUBJECT: NORTH KOREA ROUNDUP: PROPAGANDA, REMITTANCES,
PUST, DIPLOMATS AND SNOW DAYS

REF: 06 SHENYANG 01190

Classified By: CONSUL GENERAL STEPHEN B. WICKMAN. REASONS 1.4 (B)/(D).


1. (C) SUMMARY: This is a roundup of North Korea-related
information collected by Post in recent weeks. Contacts
report that nuclear propaganda has recently started
disappearing in North Korea's major cities, including
Pyongyang. Pyongyang's private university, PUST, appears
to be back on track as its founders await the final
blessing--in the form of licenses for computers and lab
equipment--from the U.S. Department of Commerce. Elaborate
networks of brokers on both sides of the PRC-DPRK border
permit North Koreans illegally in China to remit their
earnings to North Korea with relative ease. A Chinese
academic says that North Korea's new Consul General in
Shenyang has an exceptionally strong "political background"
compared to his predecessors. The North Korean military in
Rajin conscripted and bused civilians to outlying areas to
clear snow during March's massive snowstorm, which
paralyzed a large section of the country. END SUMMARY.

NUKE PROPAGANDA ON THE OUTS?
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2. (C) Two sources who travel to North Korea on a routine
basis have recently mentioned that nuclear propaganda has
disappeared in places they frequent, including in at least
two major cities. Dr. James Kim, head of the Yanbian
University of Science and Technology (YUST),on April 4
told Poloff and visiting SENK staffer John Kachtik that
during his most recent trip to Pyongyang in late March, the
propaganda trumpeting the North's October 2006 nuclear test
previously posted throughout the city had abruptly
disappeared. A Yanbian-based western NGO worker who
travels to the DPRK twice per month reported to Poloff on
April 9 that the same held true in Rajin, where he carries
out humanitarian work every month.

PYONGYANG'S PRIVATE UNIVERSITY BACK ON TRACK?
--------------


3. (C) Plagued by long delays over the past several years
and compounded by the DPRK's 2006 missile/nuclear tests
(see ref A),Pyongyang University of Science and Technology
(PUST)--North Korea's first private university--may finally
open in September 2007, according to the institution's
China-based coordinator. According to PUST's project
manager, David Kim, construction of all buildings should be
completed in July. But the wild card, according to Kim,
remains the U.S. Department of Commerce, to whom the PUST
project team--based at YUST in Yanji--is now applying for
the appropriate export licenses for classroom computers and
certain equipment (e.g., for science laboratories).

UNDERGROUND BANKING: REMITTANCE NETWORKS
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4. (C) Fairly elaborate networks of cross-border financial
brokers are permitting North Korean border-crossers in
northeast China to remit their earnings to North Korea with
some ease. A Shenyang-based Chinese scholar recently
described to Poloff how a female North Korean acquaintance
illegally living and working in Shenyang remits earnings to
her mother back home in North Korea. Every few weeks,
after accumulating enough money to send home, the
individual--through a local Shenyang broker--deposits money
to be sent into a post office account registered in Yanji,
capital of the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture. Once
the money has been deposited, the Shenyang-based broker
then phones his Yanji-based partner (who owns the mailbox),
who in turn contacts a partner in North Korea, who
subsequently delivers the funds to the Shenyang-based North
Korean's mother. (NOTE: No money actually crosses the
border for the specific transaction. The Yanji and DPRK-based
partners maintain a trust-based accounting system
(i.e., informal correspondant accounts). END
NOTE.) The entire transaction process takes
approximately one hour and is conducted entirely in RMB in
both countries. The brokers take a certain percentage of
the total value of the transfer, though the amount is
unclear.

NORTH KOREAN DIPLOMATS IN SHENYANG
--------------

5. (C) The DPRK's new-ish Consul General in Shenyang, LI
Jifan (rendered in pinyin--probably Ri Gipan in Korean),is
something of an anomaly, according to a Shenyang-based
Chinese scholar chummy with a number of North Korean
diplomats stationed in Shenyang. Unlike his many
predecessors, Li--a former Director of the DPRK Foreign
Ministry's China shop--is not only a career diplomat but
also a proficient Chinese speaker. Li's "political
background" is also apparently unusually strong, according
to the scholar; some North Korean diplomats have confided
to him that they have on occasion heard Li issuing orders
to visiting officials in more senior positions than he.

NORTH KOREAN SNOW DAYS
--------------


6. (C) A massive snowstorm in early March 2007 walloped
northeast China but paralyzed a large section of North
Korea. According to a Yanbian-based western NGO worker in
Rajin at the time of the storm, the snow virtually
incapacitated the city. Residents and government workers
in Rajin had neither plows nor many shovels, he said. Our
contact witnessed citizens flood into the streets, using
wooden planks as shovels. Employing picks, axes and
hammers, residents sat in the streets chipping away at the
ice on the ground. The local military, he said, compelled
soldiers and ordinary citizens to shovel the snow. Once
Rajin was sufficiently cleared, military personnel
conscripted certain Rajin residents to continue elsewhere;
the unlucky ones were bused to neighboring localities with
the soldiers to continue their snow-clearing duties, slowly
making their way north toward the border. Such was the
snow-driven slowdown that it eventually took our contact--
several days later than he had expected--nearly eight hours
to return home to Yanbian from Rajin--nearly double what it
normally takes by car.
WICKMAN