Anger grows as NKorea clamps down on free markets

Public discontent is simmering in North Korea after the hardline communist regime imposed tighter restrictions on market trading in an attempt to reassert its control over the state, observers say.

Free markets sprang up after the famine years of the mid to late 1990s, when the centralised command economy could not do its job and the state food distribution system broke down.

Their role was recognised under limited economic reforms introduced in 2002 and they became a lifeline for small traders trying to survive in the impoverished country.

However, in 2005, the reforms were rolled back and authorities began cracking down on stallholders, who traded a variety of foreign consumer goods as well as food.

The latest crackdown began after elections on March 8 for a new parliament, according to Good Friends, a Seoul-based research group with extensive contacts in the North.

Officials ordered markets to open for only five hours a day from 1:00pm and to sell only certain farm products excluding rice, the group said in its latest newsletter.

"Curbs are now tighter than several months ago," said Lee Seung-Yong, director of Good Friends.

More frequent confiscations and fines have been reported at designated markets and at places used by pedlars across the country, he said.

"So far this year no organised group protests have been reported but people are raising their voices in private," Lee told AFP. "Complaints are stronger than before and widespread across the country."

In April, officials in cities along the border with China used broadcasting trucks to warn the public that dealing in contraband items would be punished as a felony, Good Friends said, adding that public resentment is growing.

The curbs have led to a sharp drop in the number of traders but illegal clandestine trading is still widespread, Good Friends said.

It quoted trader Jung Pil-Rye as saying she displays farm products at the front of her stall and deals in banned items secretly. However, "once caught, everything is confiscated," Jung said.

In March last year thousands of women staged a rare street protest in the northeastern city of Chongjin against a clampdown on vendors and hawkers.

Analysts said Pyongyang appears to be fighting a losing battle against free-market forces.

Lim Soo-Ho, of South Korea's Samsung Economic Research Institute, said the North may have to ease the controls because of public resistance.

"The regime is now in a dilemma because controls over markets caused the proliferation of black markets and a sharp drop in tax revenues," he told AFP.

Low-ranking officials are also reluctant to enforce the curbs strictly because "they are more concerned (than their superiors) about public discontent," he said.

Previous curbs were ineffective due to collusion between citizens and low-level officials, Lim said.

Kim Yong-Hyun, a North Korea studies professor at Dongguk University, said controls over markets had sparked a price spiral and put basic commodities beyond the reach of ordinary people.

Workers cannot live on their wages and must find extra income or food elsewhere, Kim said. The regime cannot solve chronic food shortages and state shops do not have enough products to sell.

The North's food production will fall more than one million tons short of demand this year, the South's unification ministry said in February.

The United Nations special rapporteur for human rights in the North, Vitit Muntarbhorn, highlighted the market curbs in a February report to the UN's Human Rights Council.

The restrictions were reimposed in 2005 by the authorities "for fear of losing their grip on the population," he said.

"The sad irony is that the ruling elite still seeks to make the population dependent on the state, even in the face of increasing deprivations," Vitit said.