this is d.w. news live from berlin boris johnson lays out a plan to end england's coronavirus locked out the british prime minister details a multi-stage proposal to re-open the country starting with schools full limits on socialising could be lifted by some up but only if strict conditions are met also coming up with boeing grounds dozens of its triple 7 aircraft following a catastrophic engine failure that left in denver suburb littered with plane debris . plus riveting new footage from the red planet announcer releases the 1st

video of its perseverance rovers daunting descent on to mars will show you more in the next 15 minutes. i'm jarid very welcome to the show british prime minister boris johnson has unveiled a step by step plan to ease england's coronavirus lockdown now under his proposal schools will open again on march the i followed by a gradual reopening of the economy starting in april infections and deaths have been declining in england amid a strong vaccination dr johnson said his lockdown road map was designed to be cautious but irreversible path back to normality. pupils across england

does still learning your home but in just 2 weeks they'll return to the classroom opening schools is the 1st step in boris johnson plan to successfully measures every 5 weeks. there is therefore no credible route to a 0 covert britain or indeed a 0. 00 and you cannot persist indefinitely with restrictions that debilitate our economy our physical and mental well being and the life chances of our children allowing people to socialize again is the priority with restrictions on outdoor gatherings relaxing just before easter next on the list is reopening non-essential businesses by the end of april followed by pubs and restaurants by mid may all limits on socialising could then be lifted by the end of june everything stop to this an awful lot of people that need to pay their rent feed their kids so i would like to see things like that quicker but i think if we did a long time now i know it's not 9 to 15 long now i mean potentially some stuff we

would have just. like not. that's something johnson wants to avoid with hopes of a complete end to lock downs pinned on the vaccine rollout the biotech pfizer and oxford astra zeneca jobs have so far offered strong protection the prime minister says the plan will be adapted if infection numbers rise but also insists that measures must be eased soon. the lifting look will result in more cases more hospitalizations and sadly more did and this would happen whenever. is lifted with. or in 6. months because there will always be some people who are not protected by the vaccine. the government is investigating a controversial proposal to introduce covert status certificates that's despite

ministers repeatedly denying they would consider the use of these vaccine passports fearing they could be discriminatory a report of the review is expected to be published before june as we just heard there the u.k. is considering introducing vaccines it's a typical it's our reporter joel dahl roy has been looking me into this joe how has this idea been gaining traction well it seems almost certain that vaccines to tickets will be part of the post pandemic reality in some form the u.k.'s prime minister boris johnson says he thinks they may be used to allow travel but he says they shouldn't be used to grant access to services or for example to go to the pub however other countries are already granting special privileges to those who have been inoculated israel has recently rolled out its green badge program and that gives recipients the opportunity to go to gyms to cultural events and hotels across europe countries are quite divided about this idea spain and denmark for example

want to have digital certificates to allow people to travel so the southern countries which want to revive the tourism industries however leaders in france and germany are far more cautious they say they're giving special privileges to the vaccination vaccinated would be unfair especially as not everyone has access to the vaccines and we're not even sure if they restrict virus transmission now but whether governments accept the idea or not private companies may push ahead for example the air. and industry is working on a digital vaccination app and air new zealand says it will begin trialing that within a few weeks ok now the u.k. has said about how laying out how it's going to reopen what are are the european countries doing in lifting restrictions will some european countries are actually going ahead of the u.k. and reopen even though they don't have the same level of vaccination here in germany schools have reopened in several states for the youngest classes and that's

at the same time as corona virus infection rates are actually increasing across the country chancellor angela merkel says she's working on her own step based reopening plan although as always she's being very cautious about that now other european countries are also unlocking spain and italy in parts of those countries bars and restaurants are reopened but the crucial difference here is that in the united kingdom more than a quarter of all people have already received their 1st vaccination a short while here in europe it's only around 4 percent ok let's let's turn our attention to the u.s. now joel because they have just rates $500000.00 coronavirus related deaths the u.s. president joe biden put that number into perspective here's what he had to say. today we mark a truly groome heartbreaking milestone. 500000 71. did. that's more americans who

died in one year to spend them in. than a war or one. war to the vietnam war combined. that's more lives lost to this virus and any other nation on earth. there's real knowledge the scale of this mass death in america. remember each person and life they lived. u.s. president joe biden describing what he called a heartbreaking milestone jole dull roy what else did joe biden have to say when he gave a very emotional address there and he was really a times talking about the pain of losing loved ones in very moving terms he also called for an end to the politics and misinformation that is divided families is trying to reduce the bipartisanship that is surrounding the pandemic approach one year ago today the former president president claimed that his administration had

this virus under control a week after that the u.s. markets 1st death and then here we are a year later with half a 1000000 deaths that's one 5th of the entire global death toll from covert 90 where president biden has been taking part in ceremonies to mock that milestone and he's ordered the flags be lowered at half mast at all federal buildings for the coming days. just terribles and. d.-w. reporter thank you here's some of the other developments in the pandemic so far. has called on other e.u. countries to help with its court tragic coronavirus situation so the rocky is foreign minister has requested an advance vaccine shipment as the country battles a new record number of cases and the world's biggest vaccine make it india's serum institute says it's been told to prioritize its production of the astra zeneca vaccine for india it's asked other countries to be patient.

boeing is facing enough a setback male alliance of grounded more than $100.00 of its triple 7 planes worldwide after a jet engine caught fire over the us city of denver at the way can't large sections of the engine broke off and fill onto a residential neighborhood boeing says triple sevens with this particular type of engine shouldn't fly until an investigation has been carried out. moments of horror for the 231 passengers and 10 crew members aboard the boeing 777201 route from denver to honolulu one of the plane's engines exploded into flames and debris rained down to the ground. it was late the worst 20 minutes i was just brain and i was late because kid no. i was in use these billy the oldies but goodies in there we had a lattice for mon. and my life would be ending late that. the

plane made an emergency landing in denver no injuries were reported but united airlines announced that it would ground 24 aircraft until the national transportation safety board finished its investigation. a total of $128.00 boeing triple 7 zar affected the large twin jets are grounded for the time being most are older models and that includes the 26 year old united plane all of the boeing 7772 hundreds in question have pratt and whitney p.w. 4000 engines boeing has delivered 6900 of the planes japanese authorities have now issued a flight ban as a precaution affecting japan airlines and only pon airways this is not been the 1st problem with the boeing triple 7200 on december 4th there was a similar engine failure. let's turn to some of the other stories making news this

hour former u.s. president donald trump has lost a supreme court appeal against his tax returns being released to prosecutors the manhattan district attorney is investigating trump for possible tax and insurance fraud despite the court ruling secrecy rules mean that the tax returns will not be made public. facebook says it will lift a ban on australian newspapers in the coming days after reaching a compromise with the government cambra has agreed to make changes to a law that would force social media companies to pay for news content. e.u. foreign ministers have agreed to impose sanctions on 4 top russian officials who they say are responsible for jailing opposition leader alexei novell me the e.u. says it's a signal that debate and protest must be allowed in russia bought the kremlin has called the move disappointing and unlawful. meantime russian president vladimir

putin has hosted his brother rosie and counterpart alexander lukashenko for a winter sport meeting in saw the pair went skiing and rode snowmobiles in the black ski resort afterwards lucas chink of thanks for supporting della reese financially. and in israel thousands of volunteers are working to clean up a massive oil spill that's forced beaches to close authorities are investigating the source of the spill which has affected wildlife such as turtles and seabirds it's been described as one of israel's worst ever ecological disasters we've got some new footage of last week's spectacular landing to show you now nasa is mars rover called perseverance touchdown on the red planet after traveling nearly 500000000 kilometers the robot will look for signs of life on mars take a look. a 1st look after a nearly 500000000 kilometer journey to subsonic steve and he has been separated

the removal of the heat shield that was preceded by the opening of the perseverance his parachute the planet's rust colored terrain drew ever closer and after a few times minutes the 7 month wait was finally over i. had confirmed. ready to begin thinking the fans of perseverance will gather rock and soil samples but images like these will also allow the public to share in the excitement of the mission. and these are pretty cool videos and you know we will learn something by looking at the performance of the vehicle in these videos but a lot of it is also to bring you along on our journey or touchdown to mars and of course our surface mission as well the mars in addition to video footage the rover has also already transmitted the 1st recording of sound on the planet of wind heard across the galaxy.

the rover is also beaming back photos from the martian surface as it collects and stores samples it's hoped that they could be brought back to earth by return mission in the early twenty's thirty's the year that we were. ok finally now electronic music pioneers das punk us we think feeling dance floors around the world with make it hits over nearly 3 decades the french musicians called time on their career in a you tube video they have publicist later confirming the breakup without providing any for the day's house which are famous for hiding their identities through a futuristic helmets release their last album in 2013 they started out as a rock bags changing their style and after a viewer describing his dost punky thrust.

you're watching the news get this we'll have the headlines in 45 minutes coming up our documentary series explores how castro north korea finances its nuclear program . have a great day. in mexico many pushed all floods are thrown out and of climate change isn't off the story this is my playfield way from just one week. what it's going to really get. we still have time to and i'm going. plus a. north

korea's like game of thrones good with the dragons. society as capitalists and everything is geared to make sure that there's as much cash for kim as possible . not in capitalism money is the life blood flowing through the paintings it's no different to north korea. bureau $39.00 is involved in everything that makes money for north korea selling arms smuggling of drugs guns are free to go for us bills this is about hundreds of millions of dollars a year. to did everything everything. we do all we were told was meek bolos.

north korea a pariah state largely isolated from the rest of the world. a dictatorship shrouded in mystery. every day the country's state run media praised the heroic deeds of the supremely. time seems to stand still here her was in troop numbers most korea has the full flow i just tell me in the world for 3 generations the kim family has ruled the country by divine right and with an ion fist. north korea's military arsenal is outdated but contains the korea

weapons running the country severe sanctions how does the regime manage to survive . and how have the kims amassed enough money to threaten the world with the most powerful weapon of all. the. on the other side of the world in the netherlands a history professor is working on answers to these questions graham codebreaker from the university of leiden has been studying the enigmatic country and its roots for years he says our image of north korea is mistaken. north korea isn't what it tells it is just look at the country functions at the

highest level what is the main goal of of the government of the regime i should say it's to make money is to make cash for kim. what intrigues me personally is how north korea manages to make money. one of the questions we were stuck with says where does the money go how much money just north korea make. for their leadership in pyongyang questions like these a dangerous north korean regime send a letter of indictment under my name to that's government charging me with 3 comparable crimes the worst of the 3 was the accusation that our research my research was in my name and damaged the supreme they can see if the supreme leader this sounds like it's a funny crime writes damaging the supreme dignity of somebody in north korea. threats not to be taken lightly remco broke his investigations threatened to

disrupt to north korea's sources of hard currency the country's 1st nuclear bomb tests in 2006 prompted international isolation without legal sources of income the regime to to raising money illegally. new york the seat of the united nations it's here that the u.n. has imposed 9 rounds of sanctions against north korea and also where its global activities are monitored by an international panel of experts. the group consists of 8 members including former intelligence and military and financial experts for their own safety they work away from the public eye only the coordinator hugh griffiths is willing to speak on camera sanctions have a tremendous imparts on one level on north korea it means the economy can flourish . in the way it would if they were able to sell their largest foreign currency on

the commodities legitimately so they called ship cole legitimately they can't ship or legitimately they call ship zinc legitimately. foreign currency is very important to any country no matter how talk your kids economy you need foreign currency to buy the goods are essential for your population you know for your elite group so far in current use pretty essential to north korea's survival the question is what's more important to the north korean leadership developing a nuclear and ballistic missile program or seeing their economy flourish. the regime opted to go for the bomb in 2005 or sufficiently revealed that it had nuclear weapons as protection it said against attacks from foreign power as

specifically the united states. home to the government and to the country's elite. shiny new apartment blocks lined spotlessly clean showcase seventies. this is where pyongyang's up a cost resides the city is home to 3000000 people but only those who are considered loyal to the regime if he or anyone wanting to enter the capital from the outside needs a permit. sanctioned show. economic research institute he's also rise to talk to journalists about the sanctions for example i'm going to do number one with the legion just it's impossible to sanction a country completely even now we trade and obtain foreign currency on album. sanction as much as you like we will advance of our own accord we will turn our

competitiveness into a sword through our sacrifices and we will progress bravely. looks enough on. the sanctions that have been put on north korea are extremely strict i mean this for the nothing the country that has been sanctioned bore diversely more more strictly at the same time working. 'd with our north korea policy and using sanctions to try and have the regime modify its behavior. because we're not saving the one entity that earns most of his money this case is afloat for they see this case as a life. many high ranking defectors from north korea talk

about a secret government department that said to administer the regime secret funds kim il sung and his son kim jong il reportedly set it up in the late 1970 s. and equipped it with wide ranging power as its tasks using clandon stine hard currency transactions to secure an independent power base for the kims while also raising money for the nuclear bomb the leaders personal luxury its name office 39. only 200 kilometers to the south east seoul south korea's hypermodern capital and one of the 10 most expensive cities in the world around 25000000 people live in the metro area about half the population of south korea. among them most of the 30000 people who managed to flee from north korea to start a new and hopefully a non. life in the megacity. the young

han used to be a north korean diplomat he escaped in 1901 he went on to become deputy director of south korea's institute for national security strategy which employs north korean defectors to gather valuable information. few people know more about the kim dynasty s workings. q journey to legend has it that when kim jong il came to power he renamed the finance department of the workers' party central committee it was now called office 39 because it was located on floor 309 or another story says that it was march 9th when kim jong il issued an order to set up such a bureau. either way to this day office 39 is the department that collects and manages the cam family's secret plans so you.

talk to any prominent north korean ex and all tell you that if you're 13 that is absolutely crucial in earnings revenues for north korean regime it's absolutely vital take away everything collapses. here in new york the united nations imposed and monitored the sanctions against north korea an entity as important as office 39 surely ought to be at the top of prescribed organizations. office $39.00 as is normally talked about bar north korean defectors we don't really see office 13 going into our investigations instead we're looking at the north korean banks and the shell companies that traditionally operate over seas and 3rd current trees to generate foreign currency and then that. back to north korea.

39 is never mentioned in official documentation but it's money raising activities the globe. worked in cambodia a world heritage site over 2 and a half 1000000 people visit the ancient buddhist temple complex every year. selfies for the tourists hard currency for cambodia. tourism is by far the largest sector of the economy here and kobolds operating company earned more than $100000000.00 in 2018 a lucrative business and one that north korea is cashing in on. right next to the entrance to the temples is a museum that opened in 2015 at its heart is a 3 d.

painting depicting the history of the command empire in monumental images. throngs of tourists are guided through here every day so 7 hard that. nothing. the city pentad like one day and painting. and constructed it was. then the us colony in the last one in constantinople. circumventing un sanctions north korea not only built the complex but also financed it in return pyongyang pockets all the takings for the 1st 10 years after that profits will be shed $5050.00. the north korean direct to didn't want to appear on camera but he did tell us that the museum makes about $7000000.00 a year in entrance fees of. he expects to trouble in the near future at the end.

in the evening after the museum closes the north koreans throw another set of doors open for the tourists with cameras not welcome inside the restaurant we film in secret you to be here you know we had a very new. to the tables are almost always fully booked. richard you really should be treated you know you're here to feel. secure and be serene and. if you are going. through. the many boasts north korean specialties such as cold noodles and sea cucumber the price is a surprisingly high by cambodian standards with main courses costing up to $50.00. the restaurant is especially popular among tourists from china and south korea most

of the young women who work here are students from pyongyang. they live and sleep above the restaurant and in many cases and not allowed to leave the premises for years. every evening at the same time they change their outfits and get ready for the big show. was the eat. food. i. was. there all $113.00 north korean restaurants like this worldwide 3 of them in cambodia they're believed to make several $1000000.00 a year. yeah but the waitresses don't get paid

a cent the big bucks western hard currency flow directly into the regime's secret coffers. was. this is just one example of north korea's systematic exploitation of its own population. north korean workers are deployed around the world even in the european union such as here in poland we found north korean work brigades on a building site they were promised good wages and decent working conditions only to be treated like slaves. in the evening after a 12 hour shift the workers the bussed back to their hostels.

for. them monitored around the clock by north korean agents. one of them however decided to talk to us. when i was there no problem coming here on your own. you know on sundays we can go out alone. i know get through what would happen if you got caught. played accuse me of this and that and i'd be interrogated by north korean state security here in poland. if they were not satisfied they'd send me back to pyongyang for further interrogation and i might even get put in prison. and so you have a job here. i came here to make money. no matter how hard i

work can't make money. the working conditions are miserable we have no freedom we have to spend our lives crammed together in groups so you're probably aware that they keep almost all of our wages we only get a fraction of. my thirties and my wife and daughter are at home. next to nothing but i have to do this for them and i have no choice in. modern day slavery north korea sends well trained to a cause to poland to toil away in ships and on construction sites. because families

are effectively held hostage in north korea. their relatives back home will often face severe punishment. because the pay just. the rest goes to the regime as it cashes in for kim largely unnoticed by the international community north korea has sent laborers all over the world believed to number up 215-0000. about 40000 of them are in russia and up to 100000 in china north koreans also work in kuwait malaysia cambodia mongolia amman. the united arab emirates and in a number of african countries the un has become aware of this income for pyongyang and just a term and to drain the source's. experts estimate that the regime makes up to $1000000000.00 a year this way. now and where ever money is earned it ends up

at office 39. dollars it conducts money transactions with absolute authority in which a. defect to say the office is directly controlled by kim jong un and manages the leadership secret accounts what's called the palace economy. but where exactly in pyongyang is office 39 located and just how many millions flow into its coffers. when we asked the north korean official he and his interpreter feign ignorance. to believe i don't understand the question but perhaps you know more. have you ever heard of floor 39. 39 floors are we talking about high rises.

office 39 is one of the best kept secrets of the came regime only north koreans who've escaped are able to talk about it openly. so at a secret location we meet a man who used to work for the office he was based in china his task smuggling foreign currency. then he escaped his position was so important that the north korean regime has threatened to kill him. afraid of being identified he had plastic surgery to alter his face and even then he's only willing to be filmed from behind a car or. north korea ostensibly has

a planned economy. this means that the state takes care of supplying the population with food and other goods. but in north korea this system has been largely abandoned as. food and goods for daily use has as such collapse. as a result the majority of the north korean population has to be self-sufficient. and resort to the black market. to understand office 39 and the capitalist structures in place in north korea it's important to understand its history. in 1991 the world's biggest communist country the soviet union was dissolved and north korea lost one of its most important trading partners. while many formerly communist states now switched to a marketing. in the me the kims continued to further isolate themselves. in 1994

the year kim jong is succeeded his late father a devastating famine descended on the country during the great famine in the mid ninety's when the screen starved to death do public duty distribution system collapsed and witnesses describe seeing loved ones of dead bodies in the streets anywhere between $1.00 to $3000000.00 north koreans. so what happens is the north koreans know knew that if there was a disease funds they could no longer trust a lot of the state. and it was the rural population in particular who have to be self-sufficient black market started to emerge known as john madang today there are an unknown number of these markets throughout the country 400 of them are even officially licensed providing tax income for the regime. most of the buying selling and bartering here involves food and goods from china all manner of currencies are

accepted especially u.s. dollars and chinese yuan. to china and north korea share a border that is more than a 1000 kilometers long but over 80 percent of that border is not even secured with barbed wire people in the border region are subject to little control by the state and they enjoy substantial trade with china this trade is the basis for the black market in north korea. the biggest beneficiaries from the informal economy are government officials in pyongyang because of their loyalty although mainly out of financial self-interest the regime permits them to trade and over the years they've become wealthy they sell luxury goods smuggle room materials and invest. in real estate they're called door to

masters of money and enjoy the luxury and freedom afforded to them by the regime but that loyalty comes at a price. many don't seem to hold senior government positions including at office 39. and the. like this man who's been living in hiding in seoul since he fled the north. while growing up in the ninety's he witnessed how north korea developed increasingly capitalist structures before his escape he was responsible for exports likely the offices most profitable business fearing reprisals from the regime he likewise does not wish to be recognised. in your. home you have my position and

a rank within the organization was management employ you. so you do have a plan and. i was in charge of foreign trade. where the departments that did trade with europe. sure a lot of them in fact. hamburg germany until a few years ago the north korean state insurance company k n i c had a branch in an innocuous looking apartment block in the city. from here 6 north korean officials made deals with major european insurance. office 39 has a department for foreign insurance policies this department conducts insurance fraud. for example they used to reinsure russian

m 18 helicopters that were nearing the end of their operational lives. because. so many thought on it in concrete terms this department signed contracts with large european insurance firms there's a chance initially they would pay the insurance premiums of say $5000.00 a month. at eventually the helicopters were blown up or set on fire to collect the insurance some. parish. worries you and that amounted to maybe $2000000.00 and even my fellowmen you know. it was. just one case among many in 2015 the european union added the cayenne i see to it sanctions list accusing the company of co financing pyongyang's nuclear weapons program via office that 9 experts estimate that wrecked helicopters and similar

tricks helped the kim regime break in several $100000000.00. north korea uses its global network of embassies to ferry money back to pyongyang government officials enjoying diplomatic immunity transport the money in cash in their flight baggage a simple but efficient way of ensuring the funds keep calm flowing. north with embassies say differently from cymbalta it's often made these are not new. but the 2 things of this financial is also illegal mainly. north korean diplomats are basically class couriers came. into finished and this is where they may be drug lords and maybe weapons smugglers that they carry definitive passports so they can tyson. providing military supply

training much of that has been done through north korea's embassies particularly in africa and the middle east all the countries in the middle east current syrian arab republic as the greatest levels of prohibited cooperation with north korean military and. the father of the current syrian dictator had been on friendly terms with the north korean leader kim since the 1960 s. pyongyang supplied syria with military personnel as well as weapons and ammunition in its war against israel. an important source of income which exists to this day. using tactics resembling those of 18th century pirates office 39 operates cargo ships under false flags and fake names according to the un this is enabled north

korea to send large quantities of weapons and military equipment to syria. between 201220178 says at least 40 shipments with prohibited cargo from north korea passed through the suez canal but then the u.n. managed to have one of the deliveries intercepted. so we've found something called go on its way to syria. resistant tiles vols which could be used chemical weapons development but also missile fuel is highly corrosive such as could be used for ballistic missile. programs well the bill of lading clearly gave as an address in syria to stop bush from company for serious scientific studies research center the s.s.

all see which is responsible for serious ballistic missile and chemical weapons development program. the russian state insists the chemical weapons produced in the s.s. labs have been used by syrian dictator bashar al assad against his own people for years. one 3rd of all buildings in syria have been destroyed the regime in damascus has been planning for the time off to the civil war ends and types to receive billions of dollars from international donors for the country's reconstruction. the armies of work has required a come from north korea as formally agreed by the 2 countries at a meeting in june 29th seen here to pyongyang is looking forward to a lucrative business. the money to buy office $39.00 it goes straight into the coffers of the leadership. is used on the one hand to provide for the next 3 items

it is used to pay for the diminished see these beds cars that somehow find their way into the earth korea despite the sanctions but it also is also used and this is probably more important to deliver the best actors you can you can trade. as early estimate eighty's came in john ill start a training the most talent as children in terms of method medical bill if he's a programmer abilities to be called cyber hackers they're also good money or run somewhere like the one across 5 years for example is considered to come from the north koreans it is the biggest cyber attack the world has ever seen hundreds of thousands of computers around the world in about 150. country's rendered useless now the u.s. government is publicly placing the blame for that cyber assault uniquely dubbed want to cry squarely on kim jong un's army of hackers british intelligence officials and microsoft had previously concluded the groups associated with the

north korean regime were responsible for the want to cry hack. in seoul specialists have north korean hack in the site's simon says a consultant a south korean intelligence agency. we've been following the activities of north korean hackers for 10 years now in the past they've been primarily attacking the south korean ministry of defense and other government agencies but since around 2015 it's become clear that their interest has shifted to international banks. north korea has limited access to the internet with only 1000 ip addresses available to the country many are used by north korean computer specialists to attack other countries experts say that between 601300 hackers are at work for the regime an estimated

$2000000000.00 may have been diverted by young highly trained north korean hackers to fund the country's nuclear weapons program. north korea is changing an impoverished communist state is now a country with a highly flexible shadow economy. and as with commercial companies all that matters are american dollars cash for kim the workers here and now slaving away not for the revolution but for the wealth of their leader and his cronies as the gap between rich and poor widens. while the population in pyongyang enjoy constant growth in prosperity the u.n. says that 40 percent of the rural population still suffer from malnutrition in order to control its people the regime employs oldskool also a tarion role north korea's underground economy on the other hand is 21st century

capitalist dandong china. north korea's gateway to the world and a symbol of how futile the un's efforts have been to dry up kim sources of cash. 'd the sino korean friendship bridge across the yalu river has connected the 2 nations since $943.00 every day trucks queue up in front of the customs checkpoint it brings together smugglers traders and also the agents and entrepreneurs of off. this 39 all of them hoping to make a quick deal here. china is by far north korea's most important trading partner according to economics experts it accounts for 90 percent of north korea's export trade.

thousands of north korean women i believe to work for textile manufacturers in the dandong region. posing as businessmen and equipped with hidden cameras we film inside one such factory chinese textile companies hire north koreans because their wages are lower than those of the domestic workforce the seamstresses work day and night and often sleep on the company premises many are effectively locked up there for years far away from their families. will meet together with a team of labor lawyers trade experts and data specialists remco breaka has been investigating whether the european browns work with chinese companies that directly or in directly employing north koreans. is different things

one of the things we are actually hoping to establish was to use as north korean workers in chinese factories. really to our surprise is that yes we do have north korean workers working on the slave like this is inside the more than that time these factories outsource to north korean factories in north korea. these letters to prove the existence of the significance. of north korean slave labor in the supply chain of some of the world's leading clothing companies to. break his team took an especially close look at one chinese textile company with the for. name dest or easton when the firm's own website states that it relies on low labor cost and abundant human resources the list of customers reads like a who's who of international fashion brands the home dest website features this men's

jackets described as korean imported the buttons bare the words armani jeans using trade databases break his team analyzed home this business dealings between 20132019 the database is u.s. customs information showing which goods to send back and forth between firms in different countries so what happens is that china sends the material to make sure sometimes as close to north korea. they are this and so. and then you have those clothes are shipped to the netherlands or to germany or to america. through that into our stores between 2013 and december 26th jane bomb vest sent around $10000000.00 worth of fabrics and more materials to north korea during the same period the company received finished garments worth almost $25000000.00 from

north korea. customs classify textiles by so-called harmonized system codes a lady sweater for example will have a different h.s. code than a pair of men's jeans. we take a look at a chest code 6201 it stands for men's anoraks and coats including the armani jacket on the website. between 2013 and december 26th jane von dest imported products with this code worth $12000000.00 from north korea the same code is also found with deliveries. from von dest to europe and the us among the customers diesel and armani. armani jackets that look exactly like the one on the on their website can also be bought in europe this one costs 219 year old it's impossible to prove beyond doubt that garments like this one made in north

korea but at the same time can it be ruled out. we asked the company's implicated to comment armani's response we confirm the dest is one of our suppliers and as such is regularly subject to checks and inspections the result of these checks being that no finished products are manufactured in north korea like all our suppliers it is also required to declare which subcontractors it uses and where these are concerned it is also the case that none are in north korea. we also wrote of own dest the company offered no explanation as to why and on what scale it trades with north korea. one thing can be said for certain big name fashion brands have their goods manufactured by a chinese company that does business with north korea a country where workers have no rights where human life counts for little or

nothing and breakers investigation shows that this is far from an isolated case chinese firms use factories in north korea to produce goods worth hundreds of millions of dollars. for years and years we've heard testimonies from north korean escapees who were in concentration camps that they have been forced out to produce textile for the export markets for of famous western brands and i think for the 1st time less than able to corroborate us through an external source and the through a testimony. in this same database i found the. department of bureaucratic departments that is responsible for managing the production of textiles for one of the concentration camps aside from that. it means that we know that only by close produced by forced laborers maybe even

slave labor we may even buy clothes in the netherlands in germany all 3 year in america that was made in cousin facing caused by people who will never see the light of day again these are the kinds of kinds as you don't leave until your debts that is just too horrific to to put in words and very complacent. hundreds of thousands of men and women secretly ensure the survival of the pyongyang regime their future is a sacrificed for the not sure iest lifestyles of the powers that be and also for western consumerism and convenience kim jong onis perhaps not so much an unhinged dictator as a coolly calculating businessman who runs his country like a company. and office $39.00 plenty of business with everything and everyone including ops.

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team of the our new mccance down. chasers are in hot pursuit life's a climb the tables are closing in on the. last border right on target after a victory in bielefeld. w . n u you may know here's here's a real new you and how last year's german chancellor will bring you an angle a man called as you've never heard her before surprise yourself with what is possible who is medical really what moves her and want. to talk to people who followed her along the way admirers and critics alike how is the world's most powerful woman shaping her legacy joining us from eccles law stops.

this is the w. news live from the united states process 500000 coronavirus tests. poor remember each person we've lost. lives they lived and loved ones are left behind. candles light the white house says president biden leads a nation in mourning but he warns months of suffering are still ahead.