Some officials are quietly hoping this means the government intends to start easing the country’s border lockdown, a source told Daily NK
As North Korea looks ahead to the 110th anniversary of the birth of Kim Il Sung on Apr. 15, each of the country’s provinces has been instructed to draft and submit reports about the measures they have taken during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The government has ordered officials in provinces, directly-administered cities, and special cities around the country to submit comprehensive reports on the pandemic measures they have administered while the country has been on an emergency footing over the past two years. The measures will be reviewed during a virtual conference at the end of the month,” a source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on Wednesday.
According to the source, this is the first comprehensive review to be carried out under the auspices of the Central Emergency Anti-epidemic Command, which was established in North Korea at the beginning of the pandemic. The North Korean government wants the provinces’ comprehensive reports to cover the degree of completion of their pandemic measures, how strictly and thoroughly those measures were implemented, and the current steps they are taking to stay vigilant and alert.
Now that the changes brought by the coronavirus have largely become part of people’s daily routines, the North Korean government stressed that each province must candidly report what steps pandemic leaders have taken to raise people’s awareness of pandemic measures, how many accidents and deaths have occurred during the battle against the pandemic, and what treatments have been used in the area of public health.
“In its instructions, the government says that while the emergency measures against the pandemic have had the important results of saving lives and restoring stability to the country, there have also been areas of inadequacy, and a serious assessment is needed to deal with those inadequacies anew,” the source said.
As a result, the pandemic leadership in North Hamgyong Province led a comprehensive review and analysis of all the emergency pandemic measures taken over the past few years in the province’s cities and counties (especially those near the border), producing a report that it then submitted to the central government.
With the North Korean government asking the provinces to submit reports on measures taken during the pandemic, provincial officials are quietly hoping this means the government intends to start easing the country’s border lockdown, the source said.
Even so, most officials are reportedly of the opinion that they will not be able to resume the smuggling that was common before the border’s closure, whether on an individual or institutional level.
“Most officials aren’t very hopeful about that because the government is likely to maintain the extremely harsh measures it imposed along the border during the pandemic,” the source said.
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