North Korean Food Shortage

AP is reporting that World aid agencies are asking for stepped up supplying of food to the hermit kingdom. North Korea could possibly be facing another famine.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050601/ap_on_re_as/nkorea_hunger_1

BEIJING - World aid agencies called for food assistance to be stepped up to
North Korea despite a stalemate in talks to end its nuclear program, saying the communist regime still faces tremendous shortages affecting millions of people.

The isolated North has depended on outside support to feed its 24 million people since the 1990s. An estimated 1 million North Koreans starved to death after the Stalinist regime's state farm system collapsed after decades of mismanagement and the loss of subsidies from Moscow.

"Whether there is progress or not in the six-party talks, we feel that as humanitarian agencies, we need to continue to provide assistance to the North Korean people who are genuinely in need," said Victor Hsu of the New York-based Church World Service, one of 100 groups participating in a conference in Beijing on aid for North Korea.

"Those of us who visit regularly see that the need is very immense," Hsu said on Tuesday.

The U.N. World Food Program recently launched a new appeal for food donations, saying the supplies that let it feed 6.5 million North Koreans were dwindling and forcing it to cut off aid to children and the elderly. That followed a WFP request to governments for 500,000 tons of food for North Korea this year.

I believe the US and other countries should send food and humanitarian aid to North Korea no matter how misguided the regime is in Pyongyang.

While I'm at it, I will make a book recomendation. Bradley K. Martin a writer who has visited North Korea four times has written an excellent book titled- Under the loving care of the fatherly leader. It's an excellent look at North Korea's history under the Kims, Il-Sung and his son Jong-IL. It's a weighty volume of 700 pages but worth the effort.