North Korean floods

From AP-

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea is seeking foreign help after massive flooding left hundreds dead or missing and swept away many buildings, a U.N. aid agency spokesman said on Tuesday.

North Korea, which has struggled with chronic food shortages for years, said in a report early Tuesday that floodwaters caused "tens of thousands of hectares of farmland (to be) inundated, buried under silt and washed away."

Paul Risley, Asia spokesman with the U.N. World Food Program (WFP), said: "If the figures are borne out by our own assessment, then we are very concerned that this is a significant emergency crisis.

Later Tuesday, North Korea's official KCNA news agency said coal mining pits, power lines and substations had also been inundated or damaged.

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Some 63,300 families had been left homeless and nearly 6,000 Red Cross volunteers were engaged in evacuation and relief, said the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. "The Red Cross rescue team in the capital city saved 14 people from swirling waters," it said.

The picture above, and ones like it I found like it at Yahoo News, look real enough. The photos are care of KRT, North Korea's Television network, and come via Reuters.

GI at ROK Drop is taking this news with a grain of salt.

North Koreans use these natural disaster excuses to get more aid money from South Korea and it provides the ROK government the cover it needs to send it. So when the big massive bribe aid package is announced during the 2nd Inter-Korean summit the ROK government can claim that it is also part of flood relief for North Korea. Talk about a well timed flood.

I have no opinion whether the flood is real or not. Either way, North Korea is in need of humanitarian assistance.

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