Something to look forward to

Now that the Ling and Lee stories are behind us, let us not forget that journalism inside North Korea is still active. These North Korean journalists are risking more than abduction

Reporting from Seoul – Editor Jiro Ishimaru dimmed the lights and started the shaky video clip before a roomful of North Korea experts.

The footage, taken surreptitiously from a speeding motorcycle, was jarring: It showed the Soonchun Vinylon factory, which many defectors claim has been secretly used to produce lethal chemicals, including nerve gas. But the video showed a deserted complex slouching forlornly on a weed-strewn stretch of countryside.

The experts sat wide-eyed. They had heard rumors of the factory’s fate, but this was their first real evidence.

The images will soon be featured in an issue of Rimjingang, a magazine published in Japan that offers a highly intimate look inside North Korea. What makes it all the more remarkable is that the quarterly publication consists of articles written not by outsiders, but by a few North Koreans, farmers and factory workers who risk their lives to provide poignant vignettes and hard-news accounts of life in their reclusive homeland.

Give them your support, because if they’re caught, nobody can save them and nobody will be able to remember them.

Look forward to the English edition of Rimjingang.