HISTORY ENDS EVERYWHERE:

Tending a Small Patch of Capitalism in North Korea (EDWARD WONG, 10/12/11, NY Times)

A seaside casino resort developed by a Hong Kong company chauffeurs Chinese officials and businesspeople from the nearby border in a red Humvee.

A Chinese construction company is expanding a bazaar where North Korean entrepreneurs sell Chinese-made goods to their compatriots at market prices, a sign of nascent capitalism. Trucks bring coal from mines in northeast China to a pier leased by the Chinese where the coal is shipped to Shanghai. A Russian company is leasing another pier.

Those are some of the seeds of foreign enterprise in this remote northern port town that North Korean officials are seeking to nurture. Grappling with an economy that has stagnated from decades of communist central planning, North Korean leaders are slowly opening their isolated nation to foreign investment.

A thrust of their strategy is to develop previously created "free trade and economic zones" on the borders that have languished. Here, about 30 miles from China, the combined towns of Rajin and Sonbong, called Rason, are central to the new push. 

Posted by oj at November 23, 2011 6:10 AM
Tweet   

Follow @brothersjudd