Films from North Korea

As many as 400,000 children in North Korea are severely malnourished and in desperate need of help. So far, Mission East has distributed food aid to around 27,000 children, but the needs are enormous. Managing Director Kim Hartzner has recorded these video clips in the North Korean provinces of North Pyongang and Kangwon.

Mission East is the only Danish relief organization that has been given access to distribute food aid in North Korea. We have been invited to do so by the North Korean government, in co-operation with a Finnish partner organization.

Mission East is responsible for the monitoring of the distribution of the aid, in order to ensure that it reaches the children that are in most need.

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This movie from the end of June 2012 (without commentary) shows an orphanage in the city of Haeju in the Southwestern part of North Korea. The children are listless and lack food and care. Several of the children show signs of severe malnutrition like distended stomachs, which indicate a severe lack of protein, thin limbs, apathetic expressions and hair loss. Most children were malnourished, some of them severely malnourished. Managing Director and doctor, Kim Hartzner, explains that as a rule of thumb the malnourished children in North Korean look only half as old as their age, e.g. a 4-year old will look like a 2-year old.

The section about working in the fields shows how dry the land is. During the time Mission East was there no rain had fallen for approximately 2½ months, which meant severe damage of the crops. Local agricultural techniques are primarily based on manual work and the country is suffering from a chronic food shortage, made worse by recent weather shocks.

The children who sing together are from a different children’s institution in Haeju.

North Korea Mission East Kim Hartzner orphanage children food care malnutrition agriculture crops