Seoul (AsiaNews) - The North Korean government has sentenced to death a man who allegedly killed and then ate his two children during the devastating famine of 2012. The story was reported by the Sunday Times, while AsiaNews sources say they can not confirm or deny the news: "We have no information on this case, but cannibalism was practiced certainly in North Korea during the famine of the early nineties ".
According to the British newspaper - citing a North Korean journalist who works for AsiaPress - the latest famine has cost at least 10 thousand victims. To avoid death, a North Korean citizen would have first killed his eldest daughter and then his youngest son, who was caught him in the act: "The killings - says this source - took place while his wife was away on business. Upon returning he offered her the meat, but suspicious, she warned the authorities, who arrested him". The government did not confirm or deny any of these events.
The food situation in the country is terrible. Rather than make a plan for economic recovery, in recent decades to the government has chosen invest the money from international aid and its meagre earnings- from the mining of coal and the production of cartoons - into nuclear weapons programs. According to UN figures, from about 22 million people, half live on less than 1 dollar a day.
The famine of the nineties, caused by the militaristic madness of the late Kim Jong-il, according to some estimates left "at least" 2 million dead. Last's years famine instead is the work of the third son and current dictator, Kim Jong-un, who re-launched his father's currency reform and missile program. Because of this, the United Nations has approved new and heavier sanctions against the regime and its inhabitants.
The Yohnap, news agency from the southern part of the peninsula, said in 2012, "at least three people" were sentenced to death and immediately executed for cannibalism. Some sources that work in humanitarian programs have told AsiaNews they can not rule out anything, "It is impossible to talk about individual cases. What is certain is that the North Koreans have really been reduced to starvation: nothing would surprise us now."