While big leaders in the United States and some other nations are tearing their hair in the face of North Korea Kim Jong-il’s defiance, some sensible guys are suggesting that the sanctions should be such that hurt the dictator the most.
Believe it or not but high on the agenda of the UN members is to deprive Kim of his favourite food and drinks that are mostly imported.
“No one enjoys luxury goods more than paramount leader Kim Jong-il, who boasts the country’s finest wine cellar with space for 10,000 bottles,” says Reuters report from Seoul.
“Kim has a penchant for fine food such as lobster, caviar and the most expensive cuts of sushi that he has flown in to him from Japan, according to Kim’s former chef.
“Kenji Fujimoto, a pseudonym, who worked as Kim’s personal sushi chef in the late 1980s and 1990s at a time when more than 1 million North Koreans perished in a famine, said in a book Kim would go to extremes to satisfy his appetite.
“Kim would have aides purchase caviar for him in Iran and even sent one envoy to Beijing to bring back McDonald’s hamburgers, he said.”
Then there is another interesting article in The Seoul Times…
“The North Korean leader might be one of the world’s most enigmatic figures, but thanks to a growing and eclectic body of books and articles that detail Kim’s epicurean habits, more is known about what he eats than nearly any other head of state.
“In what might be labeled cook-and-tell literature, two of his former chefs have written up their experiences and revealed the secrets of the most important part of any Kim Jong Il residence — the kitchen.
“So insistent is Kim on eating the best of everything that he sends trusted couriers on shopping missions around the world. His sushi-chef-turned-author, who writes under the pseudonym Kenji Fujimoto, revealed that he made trips to Iran and Uzbekistan to buy caviar, to Denmark to buy pork, to western China to buy grapes and to Thailand for mangos and papayas.
“Once, on a whim, Kim sent him to Tokyo to pick up a particular herb-scented rice cake. Fujimoto calculated that each bite-size cake ended up costing about $120.
“Former North Korean diplomats who were stationed abroad have told South Korean intelligence that they were asked to send each country’s delicacies to Pyongyang for Kim’s consumption — among them such exotic items as camel’s feet, said a South Korean biographer, Sohn Kwang Joo.”
The Times has this to say: Kim Jong IL will find it harder to get his beloved cognac, sushi and Hollywood films when the UN imposes sanctions today targeting the lavish lifestyle of North Korea’s ‘Dear Leader’.
“At Washington’s insistence, the UN Security Council is expected to prohibit trade in ‘luxury goods’ as well as heavy weapons, missile parts and components for the North Korean nuclear programme when it votes to punish Pyongyang for its nuclear test.
“Unlike his father, who led the austere life of a guerrilla leader in the 1930s, Mr Kim, 64, indulges his interest in women, food, fine wine and the movies. The bouffant-haired dictator, who stands only 5ft 3in if he is not wearing his customary platform shoes, is married to at least his fourth wife — Kim Ok, 42, a concert pianist who doubles as his secretary.
(Kim’s official family portrait)
“But he is alleged to be a philanderer, with a ‘happy corps’ of young women as a personal harem, and is rumoured to have 13 children.”
Maybe Kim is angry that the CIA never indulged him (and showed his anger by exploding a bomb!!!). But then after King Bush came onto the scene he never listened to anyone, including the CIA.
Swaraaj Chauhan describes his two-decade-long stint as a full-time journalist as eventful, purposeful, and full of joy and excitement. In 1993 he could foresee a different work culture appearing on the horizon, and decided to devote full time to teaching journalism (also, partly, with a desire to give back to the community from where he had enriched himself so much.)
Alongside, he worked for about a year in 1993 for the US State Department’s SPAN magazine, a nearly five-decade-old art and culture monthly magazine promoting US-India relations. It gave him an excellent opportunity to learn about things American, plus the pleasure of playing tennis in the lavish American embassy compound in the heart of New Delhi.
In !995 he joined WWF-India as a full-time media and environment education consultant and worked there for five years travelling a great deal, including to Husum in Germany as a part of the international team to formulate WWF’s Eco-tourism policy.
He taught journalism to honors students in a college affiliated to the University of Delhi, as also at the prestigious Indian Institute of Mass Communication where he lectured on “Development Journalism” to mid-career journalists/Information officers from the SAARC, African, East European and Latin American countries, for eight years.
In 2004 the BBC World Service Trust (BBC WST) selected him as a Trainer/Mentor for India under a European Union project. In 2008/09 He completed another European Union-funded project for the BBC WST related to Disaster Management and media coverage in two eastern States in India — West Bengal and Orissa.
Last year, he spent a couple of months in Australia and enjoyed trekking, and also taught for a while at the University of South Australia.
Recently, he was appointed as a Member of the Board of Studies at Chitkara University in Chandigarh, a beautiful city in North India designed by the famous Swiss/French architect Le Corbusier. He also teaches undergraduate and postgraduate students there.
He loves trekking, especially in the hills, and never misses an opportunity to play a game of tennis. The Western and Indian classical music are always within his reach for instant relaxation.
And last, but not least, is his firm belief in the power of the positive thought to heal oneself and others.