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this is a country where the war never ended. every morning at exactly 6 am loudspeakers across north korea sound a morning wake up call featuring the same melody every day. 2 a melody familiar from a revolutionary opera. it tells the story of a young nurse at the front who has dedicated her life to the party and is searching for the beloved general who summons her to show him the way. this is a country at war against the border that divides it. all

. to. come up is another one of them i was always at the top of my class the teachers all rated me highly. even at school there was a hierarchy among the pupils at the top you're always at the class representatives in the political representatives. and are always held both positions around but there is a process they put together that all of us know. it that's how i learned to give orders and how to lead people. at the border between the 2 koreas divided by a cold war time stand still with no peace agreement ever signed the war has been

suspended since hostilities ceased in 1953 in the course of the next 6 decades the north secretly developed a weapon that the world's major powers believed only they had the secret to the nuclear bomb. how is a country considered one of the poorest on the planet and which is also shunned by most other nations able to afford such weaponry. only those who were part of the system are privy to the secret. it took me years to track them down those who we were able to ask had a tragic tale to tell of men and women who were tasked with earning money for their country whatever the price the money of the dictators men. seoul just 50 kilometers away from the border to north korea in the space of just

20 years the south korean capital became the 4th richest city on the planet after tokyo new york and los angeles. this is where the ordeal ends for many of the refugees from north korea. this young high ranking official from the north traveled thousands of kilometers on a trek across china all the way to seoul he's been living here with a new identity for 2 years today he calls himself michael kim he's 28 years old and works part time as a museum attendant. there really were. this is an exhibition organized by the sole authorities. it shows a model apartment in north korea. to illustrate what life looks like for the residents of pyongyang today with the team is a highway in this it is it was having actually lived there myself i've been asked to explain in further detail.

both on a. ride on the way i began my career in the state security agency the cia of north korea. i worked in the financial department where i came to attention due to my expertise i was transferred to office 39. years and that was unusual. is a you know i want to listen. i was only 25 when i joined i was the youngest member of staff that said it was time to sue cause it was a bold and killed example when it offers 39 manages and directs all the economic activities of thousands of firms and factories very. highly paid so we hire him and the office was set up to earn money for the regime outside the country . i thought i was over there on to kind of a clue because

a half of north korea's gross domestic product comes from office 39 sort of on the . coast course you don't know we assume that. michael fled from one day to the next without warning his family he knew too much to be able to keep on believing in the regime he decided to meet us 3 weeks ago he insisted on showing his face while being interviewed in the hope of becoming too well known to be secretly assassinated. reports from men who have been involved in office 39 the guardians of north korea's many financial secrets are extremely rare there have been precious few defectors fleeing the country means putting yourself in danger as well as family members left behind. limb ill on the other hand was right at the bottom of the hierarchy upon who was sent halfway around the world to work on a construction site in the desert of kuwait we were taught and up with oh there was

a great for me it wasn't about whether i wanted to do it time was running out i wanted to leave quickly so that we could get something to eat as our leader kim il sung died in july 994 and starting a year later in may 995 the state was no longer able to provide the normal food rations people started to panic. this was the 1st time they had reduced the russians feel good i had a 2 year old daughter over there in order to leave you had to be married and have children if you don't have any children they won't let you out i thought it was a family of 4 or 5 can live for at least 6 months on my salary of over $120.00 a month if i sent it if young young with her with a new crew. and after 2 months we asked why we weren't getting paid hundreds when they said they had not been instructed by the party to pay our salary for the party

in north korea was kim jong il our commander in chief. that answer silenced us leader then hundreds of workers had to keep their mouths shut. we kept on working at night to using our flashlights. so that we could fight off sleep and just carry on. i kept working like that for 5 months and all that time i didn't get paid. i felt cheated and. sending workers abroad was an idea 1st introduced in 1974 a gigantic network of clandestine companies and financial constructs gradually evolved all of them with one sole goal earning money for office 39. this man was likewise born in the north in pyongyang in early 2000 he was sent to singapore he earned tens of millions of dollars for north korea as

a representative of pyongyang's north east asia bank in 2003 he was suspected of having passed on information about the regime's finances he fled to south korea today the former banker works for his new country's intelligence agencies he supports them in their struggle against the regime he wants war eternal allegiance to our main goal is to make for in cash and this foreign cash business is secret. complete the secret office number 3 ny and continued creating that the system is setup like it's all north korean institutions where these foreign cash is generated there is to report it to kitchen to the top and then should bring that should be that in cash to family and now it turns on and before communal so he gather all

this and then spend it or according to his priorities so 2 economies one is to family economy and the other one is the national economy run by the cabinet and run by their so called you know central planning so to family i call it you know royal court economy royal court economy they possess all the best profitable businesses is toto's this department stores you know those services in the rest trunks they are making money for in cash and then it also goes to continue now into. soul separate economy. the money that you make will never good central economy not. central bank. finance ministry and trade bank they can

never. what pope their nose into our businesses in that they can never they can not asking if you can get up or and then read a look at the. so let's say a 1000000000 years dollars a year to get that cash in cash and then use that now nuclear missile program that you know consumes a lot of money it's from those pocket there are different world careers you know at most 150000 maybe 50000 in russia and a little more in china and others in scattered around or so crew than 50 thought and they make a lot of money there's only. so 70 percent 80 percent of the salary cuts. and sent to the state in the party so

if they make all of them a $100.00. deal mountie is a much small man knowing it. put in your own. pair were smuggled $1515000000.00 a month they don't make only $100.00 u.s. bucks a month in they make more maybe several 100 at least so a lot of money is going to control. the volume of their cash income conjunct winds fund increased dramatically in the past in the past 20 years in the past 20 years so you can buy more and he can. do continue this in

a nuclear missile program in the colony younger than the mother does or know that a home you know will go especially in places where we have a special agreement in places like eastern europe so obvious danger africa. we're workers everywhere. and poland the ukraine the pakistan mongolia the big distant. one. while traditional your dwellings dot the modern city scape the noise from the pneumatic hammers is on the press and every day the concrete expanses continue to spread a little more in the mongolian capital. for a period of over 70 years the country had a communist regime the city's grand monuments honoring the eastern bloc are a legacy of that era but after the collapse of the soviet union mongolia switched to the western capitalist camp people left rural regions in droves for the city's

tar is an urgent need of new housing but lacks sufficient manpower to build it the government has therefore been hiring workers from china vietnam and north korea for reinforcement the work is a sign the same way in each construction site. the mongolian workers are used for exteriors jobs rather better qualified north koreans for example take care of the interior. the workers from pyongyang are under observation day and night we want to approach them discreetly and 1st just send our interpreter. hello hello to them all the north koreans working today sure. do they sleep here yes. and they never go out just to go shopping that's all. and they eat and sleep here yes inside.

north korea goes to extreme lengths to prevent its workers from coming into contact with the outside world and discovering a reality that is other than the one depicted in the daily propaganda they're only allowed to go out in groups so that they can keep an eye on each other. but in the narrow market aisles of all on but talk we spot a north korean worker who appears to be on his own. can we talk while we look at the shoes. yes so. when did you come here to mongolia. 3 years ago. that's a long time yes and when are you going back home soon in a month and have you and bus money no i've not earned a lot of mongolian money and why not paid i didn't get much not much no i've been

working but i never got any money and they must be bad people has a lot of bad people around here so do you have family north korea how many childrens are there. i have one child. my wife was pregnant when i left. i have never seen my child. so 3 years old 3 yes boy or girl i got a letter saying it was a boy i'm desperate to go and see my son. the workers usually have 3 year contracts and are not allowed to go home during a time only very few use their stay abroad to defect due to their family still living in north korea they are all too aware that they would never see them again. is mongolia covering up the presence of these workers within its borders neither the government nor the companies employing them were prepared to talk to us but allegedly there are 1200 north koreans in the country they are there legally at the

invitation of the mongolian government. the companies transfer the salaries directly to the north korean embassy and. from where the money is then confiscated by the regime in pyongyang a fraction of the somme a few dozen euro's a month at most is paid to the workers who use it to support their families in north korea. the construction workers are not the only money makers for the regime it also dispatches loggers to the forests of siberia peasants to farms young young even exports doctors the regimes most lucrative source of income acupuncturists and chiropractors are sent abroad to open practices there what they earn however goes to the regime back home and there are 3 of them. would let you into north korean waters.

here is the reason your nose cradle so i guess no story. well yes then mr quest we once in a way is our in the world the do here for how long you've been here and will be. on. if the doctors are not allowed to talk without permission from the embassy. north korea reportedly generates 450000000 euros a year from remittances earned by its citizen secretly working abroad. no records are kept of these secret funds and accounts documentation could potentially be used as evidence receipts bank transfers and internal notes are systematically destroyed on the orders of the kim family. this enables

the regime to deny their existence in front of the international community but above all to the starving population back home they are not to get wind of the millions the kim family earns at their expense. children both ends of the record that i was a worker too. i didn't get anything for 6 or 8 months. i worked myself to the bone. so i reckoned why not help myself and this man spent many years in siberia prior to his defection he worked his way up to management level feeling remorse he wanted to break his years of silence in the hope that his testimony could help other former foreign workers who are still prisoners of the system or. where we moved out of the world on the people positioned above the workers siphon off huge sums of money from those salaries for themselves sort of

let's say our bosses land a contract for $10000000.00. tell us that it's 7000000 and we tell our foreman that it's even lower maybe 5000000. so even then we're still able to transfer our mandatory share to the regime another trick is to negotiate 50 men for a job then we arrange to use only 20 and we send the rest elsewhere that means we can put aside a pile of money for ourselves. in a good month how much did you earn. around $20000.00 you were in one month yes. do you know how much office $39.00 earns per year and how much of that goes into developing missiles. with. it is nobody knows that. that's the most strictly guarded secret of all

nobody in office 39 can say neither the amount for the office workers nor the costs for their workers or any other figure. if they were taught what it all plans to acquire nuclear weapons were 1st conceived by the regime back in 1953 during the korean war after the us threatened to deploy its nuclear arsenal against the country since coming to power in 2011 kim jong un has launched 85 missiles and conducted for nuclear tests twice as many as his father and grandfather combined the test missiles were fired over the sea of japan or in the direction of the pacific with the capability to send nuclear warheads as far as california chung young now insists that washington would never dare to attack north korea again. on november 29th 2017 north korea surprised the world with the test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile kim jong un told his people that the country was

now a nuclear power and boasted that it could deliver a strike anywhere in the u.s. at the same time a group of 8 men of different nationalities convened at the new york headquarters of the united nations where a race against time began they comprised experts on rocket technology finance aviation and shipping experts some were from the civilian sector others from intelligence agencies their work is top secret their goal to dry up the secret money sources of the kim family for their own safety no photos exist of this expert committee only hugh griffiths the group's head since 2014 was willing to talk on camera these rockets that years of a stigma so relate to technology that he has being recovered by the south korean navy ships close enough. when the wreckage is washed out when they've recovered it and then they've invited the panel to inspect. the

stepper and once we've inspected the 3 we know the serial numbers were to take photographs and then in many cases we're able to trace back. just sticks or procurement chain. so that's the rope and then we have what's left of that. says one of the 1st those who see killer is a cluster of them rather. you want to obscure this. well our investigation show the percentage all the components used in iraq some missiles. have been so stubborn but these goods will be exported in the 1st instance to other countries in asia to business and to such as sing a pole or. hong kong. so that to

a large multinational company based in say europe for selling the goods everything appears to be an old those no north korean trace on the only official paperwork. in addition to research work the committee wields its own weapon the economy they devised sanctions that became progressively more severe in order to isolate north korea. we waited 5 months for official permission to fly to north korea the north korean diplomats didn't want us to film in winter fearing that the power outages might leave a bad impression finally in late march 2800 with temperatures rising again it happened we were granted permission to travel by train to north korea via china and the border town of dun dong. we find a country where time appears to have stood still a country that has been largely cut off from the outside world since 1953.

every inch of arable land is farmed. everything serves to feed the nation. for 7 hours the fields rolled by to this day still farmed using only hand tools and manual labor. most of north korea's nuclear power plants are located in this region our route takes us close to 3 year ania mines a number of underground facilities and also the new young beyond nuclear research center which went operational in 1965 with the help of the soviet union it is the heart of the country's nuclear program.

our escorts await us in the capital pyongyang. we're now entering a world reserved for the privileged section of the population. these streets and boulevards serve $3000000.00 residents 10 percent of the population the most loyal supporters of the regime a special permit is required to enter the city our 2 guides accompany us from dawn until late at night they've been tasked with showing us that john young despite all the sanctions imposed by the united nations is no longer some economically crippled city with a poverty stricken population all thanks to the new national heroes the scientists . this architect spent 8 years studying in france after leaving the a colossal now for architecture in paris he returned to north korea in 2010 today he's one of the best architects in the capital designing skyscrapers for the new elite. despite the

costly. this building was constructed in a slum here in just under 8 months and that again an economically challenging time for koreans the gulf legal but they still managed to complete it all we want to show that we can live in continue to develop and can afford everything we needed a and promoting scientific advancement plays an extremely important role in our own development to preserve the whole of the we're all the residents here have occupations in science and technology. including teaching staff and everything else at the south zool so if they close and they don't send you all the stuff. you. know. hello hello. can i keep my shoes on yes.

how old is it 8 months. look at the pictures. they speak volumes there is our esteemed leader personally giving people decorations. for koreans he's the most glorious occasions . i was really happy when we moved in here i could only cry and think about his love the marshall devotes a lot of time to the scientists and they reward him with their industriousness my husband has been a scientist for 30 years. her husband teaches fluid mechanics at the technical university of kim cheick the apartment they were assigned has 200 square meters of floorspace the regime also provides the

furniture. not everyone in junge young lives in modern high rises like this one but this family is far from an exception every year since kim jong un came to power he has built and inaugurated a new residential district that has involved 50 new residential blocks sprouting up within the space of a few months they're intended for the scientists and their families who have rendered extraordinary services for the regime one of these high rises is home to an architect's office serving kim jong. un's excellent work. through some things the courts are for of course there's always more work to be done there are always more projects we never have enough architects this is in itself a huge building site everyone is tied up in at least 2 or 3 projects and is working nonstop. but it's still not nearly enough and we do all nighters.

given the international situation and all the sanctions doesn't that hamper construction no no no not at all i don't see how that would have an impact on that but i saw a lot of construction sites in europe where work was immediately suspended after a crisis. but here we carry on working despite the growing number of projects in the pipeline we're not afraid of anything we keep on making progress regardless. god was in the how is north korea able to finance this construction boom has it been able to shrug off the sanctions out on the streets the standardized socialist dress code has been lent a little more color in the last 3 years the mood seems almost relaxed and yet the regime still governs its people with an iron fist. even the slightest critical

gesture or word of disapproval will soon find some one in one of the country's many camps for political prisoners since kim jong un has been in power however there have been signs of a reorientation the orders now are to ensure that the economy evolves at the same pace as the nuclear program. of. the one who cut all this to size. but be careful. down there you have to cut it straight look this is not straight. after the money that we built this entire set of ourselves and thanks to these korean built machines we've been able to automate a number of jobs and also reduce our power consumption. as a result we've almost doubled our production capacity everything here is

a joint product of the experts from the academy of science and the researchers at kim il sung university. and. where does the material for the shoes come from. through them we're unable to import materials due to the strategy of our enemies so we produce everything ourselves and that involves checking which components we have available so that we can make our own shoes ok carry a small town for you see most of. the key factors for this economic revival innovation and adaptation the goal is to purse of your and prove to the world that the country doesn't need anyone else. we have solar panels. we have them installed on practically all foundry roofs. they generate up to $400.00 kilowatts of electricity. our factories need

a capacity of only $300.00 kilowatts. that means the electricity generated from the solar panels isn't easily enough to keep our factory running despite the sanctions and the isolation. you can. the shoe factory is one of a number of model factories that kim jong un has had built for each sector of industry they all include a digital control center with a direct connection to pyongyang's universities and research centers more model factories are to be set up across the country. the regime dictates which roles everyone is assigned the country's economy and society are centrally planned right down to the fate of each individual. young north koreans know as soon as they are in elementary school how their lives

will pan out depending on their abilities their family background and the needs of the party the state selects their career many end up in the military. the country has a standing army of $1000000.00 soldiers in north korea men are subject to a minimum compulsory military service totaling 10 years those who manage to be admitted to kim il sung university the country's most prestigious college are usually exempt this is where the next generation of engineers economists bankers and businessmen are educated the future personnel of office 39. need this facility was founded by a commander in chief with the noble idea of training men and women for leadership positions in the korea of tomorrow our d.l. leader kim jong il sent us a letter in december 2009 saying keep your feet on the ground and look at the world

combine a noble spirit with the wealth of knowledge and become the supporting structure for my late father's revolution make sure that the whole world looks up to the korea of kim il sung. is north korea's economic upswing and economic miracle a final fake conflict to keep the people in the dark about the new wave of sanctions threatening to bring the country to its knees the official figures cannot be verified unable to talk to citizens directly we can't say what they think and feel all we can take away are our general observations. traveling across the country the impression you get is that a brighter future awaits following the famine of the 1990 s. which claimed the lives of between 600001 1000000 people the streets have no cars but some dashes of new color life is hard but seemingly not as hard as it used to be. kim jong un spent part of his childhood under

a false identity in switzerland did he bring the dream of modernization and opening up with him from europe. the young dictator possesses a nuclear bomb that protects him home and abroad and. also consolidates his problem but where as his father and grandfather built statues and palaces he builds railways bowling alleys swimming pools museums of natural history and leisure parks facilities no longer just serving the elite cultural advances in science and industry opium for a people who are for now still in all of new developments the aim to reinforce the dictatorship now in its 3rd generation. in a sign of the times on this evening the colors of north korea shine in splendor for the 1st time after dark is north korea getting outside help russia and above all china vote in favor of u.n. sanctions while at the same time continuing to trade with north korea an overthrow

of kim jong un's regime is not something they want to see. the country's secret coffers and assets keep growing even in places where you'd least expect it such as berlin in the heart of europe. in 2016 the german authorities began trying to close down this youth hostel located on the grounds of the north korean embassy. since 2008 the rent totaling more than $38000.00 euros a month has gone directly to the kim family. germany has terminated the lease but the owners of the hostel have steadfastly refused to vacate the premises. and do you know whether office 39 makes money in france or germany or italy and france or germany sure. it will grow in the long

a little and there are no workers in those countries because of the stringent laws pointed to it but one thing they do have is money and wealth fund it. but what about. north korea buys and sells real estate parental or speculative profit. you know. if they were to do direct business in those countries and openly show that our company is a north korean company mediately be subject to a tax on it. we rent out apartments. nobody knows who the owner is really we just collect the rents. do you know the names of these firms. as i don't know if i were to tell you that they'd end up on the sanctions list right away. it is just yes north korea is an awful dictatorship but the people who serve the regime faithfully like me or my friends or even the bosses are just doing our job someone didn't know. and joining us is pretty evil perhaps

so they do is in itself banned but there is still a code of honor between us there is a a thing you got to. do they earn money in the us. not that i know of him and you get it but we do do everything we can to relieve them of money. we have technology hacking that includes blackmailing software that north korea hacks into the us infrastructure industry or digital companies. we can't analyze or make much use of the data as such we just hack our way in. and then demand money in return for guaranteeing that we will keep the data to ourselves. it's basically north korea

taking digital data as a hostage. you know stuffing these you know code the real trade with china coal and iron ore and other stuff you know this is the real ascension so he took the only cylinder that. they would not stop at with the how can this top or north koreans you know. how many shadow companies and operatives are there how far does their network truly extend and what kind of danger do they pose. of final reports the security council we've documented north korean weapons prohibited military training programs and dozens of african and middle eastern member states in mozambique the contracts one of the contracts we saw was worth more than 6000000

dollars intense and near the contract was worth a similar amount in euro's a little more i think maybe $12000000.00. so it's all about the money part of the problem with ballistic missiles is that. the technology wasn't supplied to all the countries that want to technology so the north koreans stepped in and this is very alarming that in terms of proliferation there was this. new killer. you know a new killer facility in syria that was set up with north korea and the systems i'm this is this is the kind of activity that i know concerns a lot of people. in the north koreans also have a syringe stockpile of chemical weapons as well.

it's been 20 years since lim ill fled the kuwaiti desert where he'd been working on construction sites in the meantime he's become a father again here in seoul he has 2 sons they know they also have a big sister somewhere on the other side of the border you know the irony about it which the more i wonder what it is that made me who i am pretty that if it were a normal regime i would never have run away. and this mismanaged system and the forced me to make that terrible decision. but once a month in seoul refugees from the north meet up in a christian center in order to remember their families and their people back home almost like orphans of the man who was once their leader they turn to their god to

rediscover a purpose in their lives. while in the north those taking orders from the dictators continue to work in the shadows at home and abroad to guarantee the survival of the regime. ego africa. the bigger animals around a lot of attention but don't overlook these little flowers very endangered sure. you can do something to protect them. and. we present 3 success stories from south africa. identifying rare plants preplanning them creating an urban oasis. in 30 minutes.

to. yourself. or your next you tube channel. don't miss out. look closely. listen carefully to. see. this to get good. discover. subscribe to documentary on to.

play. this is deja news live from berlin world leaders meeting in the french town of split on how to deal with iran. donald trump backs away from attempts to make france the go between as the west tries to rein in tehran's nuclear ambitions iran's foreign minister flies in it but talks with the americans are not on the schedule also coming up.