New York (AsiaNews) – In the last year, “The Un was being used completely as an ATM machine for the regime of Kim Jong-il, who withdrew over 150 million dollars from our accounts without leaving any receipts.            We have no idea where the money went to”.

An unnamed official of  the UN Development Program told the Chicago Tribune on Sunday, that the body stopped all operations in North Korea at the beginning of March because all funding “The money was going to the military regime whenever they wanted it”.

The UN official underlines that following the military provocation of October 9th last –when Pyongyang detonated its first atomic bomb in a mine - “all non government organisations that were helping the North Korean population abandoned the country. We were the only ones left with Caritas, but we were soon also forced to leave too because of the militaries exploitation of our organisation”.

An example being the project to install computers in the Capital’s universities: “We paid for 300 computers, but only 2 were bought. The others were packed away in boxes which we were not allowed to open. We were completely taken advantage off”.

North Korea has circa 22 million inhabitants.  88% of these live below the poverty line – less than a dollar a day – and for many their only food sources are provided by international donations.

Despite this, the leadership has never even attempted to launch a programme for economic stability, choosing instead, as with most dictatorships, to concentrate on arms spending.