>> stan graham, live in beijing.hank you very much. >>> mike chinoy reported extensively from the region. he told us how on a recent visit he was struck by the stability of the regime. >> reporter: been in pyongyang in six years. i went back in august. i was struck by the sense of political stability across the board, the diplomats, the aide workers, the people i spoke with seem very convinced that the succession was on track, that there was not a lot of internal discord about it. moreover, there was very intriguing signs in pyongyang of sort of inklings of movement towards opening up a little bit. north korea now has over 500,000 people using cell phones with an internal cell phone system that was set up by an egyptian company. there are more private restaurants than i had seen before. there was even the first joint venture pizza parlor in pyongyang. they were moving ahead with economic zones with the chinese. while i was there, kim jong-il went to russia and talked to vladimir putin about north korea and russia and