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| North Korean soldier Oh Chong-song gets out of the vehicle he was driving to the Panmunjeom truce village in this screen grab made from video footage released by the United Nations Command on Nov. 22, 2017. Ministry of Defense via UNC |
By Jung Da-min
Eighty percent of young North Koreans have no loyalty to the country's leader, according to a Japanese newspaper.
"Inside the North (North Korea), people, and especially the young generation, are indifferent to each other, politics and their leaders, and there is no sense of loyalty," a Japanese newspaper quoted a North Korean defector as saying.
Japan's Sankei Shimbun carried the interview Friday with a man they claimed was Oh Chong-song, 25, who crossed the border through the joint security area (JSA) in the demilitarized zone (DMZ) in November 2017.
"If the regime was able to feed the people, they would applaud it, but they are given nothing," he said.
He said the food distribution system has collapsed but North Korea was "excessively" idolizing leader Kim Jong-un.
He said residents were scraping by, while officials earn pocket money for overlooking illegal economic activities.
Interview Video: https://bit.ly/2P7SbpF (From SankeiNews YouTube channel)
In a short video clip released by Sankei Shimbun, he also said the gap between the capital Pyongyang and other regions has been widening.
"Kim Jong-un cares much about construction projects and (transportation) systems including taxis, subways and trolley buses in Pyongyang," he said.
"People in Pyongyang are seeing the city of Pyongyang and their way of thinking is more advanced than those living in other regions seeing only mountains there."
